Problem:

How should I format / encode / compress my movies for optimal use with ArKaos software

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Solution:

Video compression selection is an important factor that will influence the result of your performance.
Basically, your choice is going to be influenced by the following factors:

• The less compression you use, the less your processor has to work for rendering.
• The more you compress, the less your disk has to transfer data to the computer's RAM.
• If you use a compression scheme that uses spaced key frames, you will need a lot of computation to go backwards. This type of compression is therefore not appropriate for video scratching.
• It is important to size your movies according to what your final performance resolution is going to be. If you computer is really fast, use full resolution. If u need smaller files, use half or quarter size.

Good candidates for compression codecs are Photo-JPEG, QT DV, Animation, Sorenson and Cinepac.
If you want to be able to use alpha channels, you will need to use a codec that supports millon+ colours (32 bits). Anitmation seems to be the best so far.