New York — In an attempt to lure serious video publishers, popular online video outfit Youtube is rolling out a couple of new features to its video player for embedded videos: HD preview images and logo-less options, so that video makers can easily embed their videos onto their website without any prominent YouTube branding.
Earlier Youtube would present a lower quality preview image of a video, even if the video itself was produced of playing in high definition. But moving forward, any new video uploaded to YouTube in a resolution of 480p or higher will have an HD preview image anywhere the player is embedded.
Below are the before and after shots:
After:
However, this may not seem like a big a deal, but these latest updates would not affect visitors to its own website, but rather are intended at improving user experience with YouTube videos posted elsewhere on the web. Also, in the next few week YouTube will automatically give HD preview images to older videos as well, as long as they meet the same resolution criteria.
“It may be hard to imagine, but YouTube’s video preview images represent to many the ultimate deciding component as to whether or not to watch a video,” the company says. “If a preview image looks interesting, it can mean the difference between someone pressing the play button. In addition, your site and the videos on it represents your polished masterpieces. Yet, your videos’ preview images can appear lower in quality, and sometimes you do not want a logo in your player. So today we are rolling out new features for both situations: HD preview images and the option to remove the logo from your player.”
Moreover, the aim of HD preview images is simple; as these snapshots of videos are one of the biggest influences on whether or not a video is played, it makes good sense to maximize the resolution of the preview in line with that of the video it represents. This sometimes was the cause that many people chose not to watch some videos because the quality appeared to be poor.
That will no longer be the case for newly uploaded videos will be able to display up to a 1,920 x 1,080 pixel (and up to 2MB if user-uploaded) preview image, and existing videos on the site will have higher resolution previews added in the coming weeks.
In addition, the second feature Youtube is rolling out is the logo-stripping option, that is to remove the annoying Youtube logo that sits like a watermark at the bottom right-hand corner of every video. Often this can be a cause of distraction from the content or can actually block an important part of the image, but now uploaders will be able to choose to remove it.
This is a bold move by Google, as it effectively debrands embedded videos. So, if you want your video to play in a player without the YouTube logo branding, you can add the code [without quotes] “?modestbranding=1” to the end of the video URL in your embed code, and it will display without the logo in the control bar. Only, a small “YouTube” label will be displayed in the upper-right corner of a paused video when you hover over the player.
Want to see how the new YouTube player looks? Check out the videos below:
{iframe width=”620″ height=”390″ align=”top”}http://www.youtube.com/embed/wA8V1LsWwus{/iframe}
{iframe width=”620″ height=”390″ align=”top”}http://www.youtube.com/embed/6_W_xLWtNa0{/iframe}