TABLE OF CONTENTS Before you get too far into the mechanics of encoding, you should revisit your audience evaluation in Chapter 2, Streaming Media Basics, and review your streaming audience evaluation form. Familiarize yourself with the details of your audience's capabilities, especially with regard to bandwidth and the version of Windows Media Player they likely have installed.
You should also be sure you fully understand the type of audio and video you have; in other words, is it action-packed, talking heads, or something in between. And if you haven't done so already, touch base with your IT department and bring the networking gurus up to speed on your plans. Their help will be invaluable, especially as you get ready to deploy your work.
Windows Media File Formats
You're already familiar with a variety of Microsoft file formats, ranging from Word documents with a .doc extension to Access databases with an .mdb extension. Raw audio and video files come with .wav and .avi extensions, signaling the Waveform Audio and the Audio Video Interleaved formats.
Windows Media files have their own formats, including Windows Media Audio ( .wma), Windows Media Video ( .wmv), and Advanced Systems Format ( .asf). Actually, ASF is less a format than a container for holding more than just the audio or video information, such as images or text. It can also store title, author and copyright information, indexing data, and script commands for closed-captioning purposes. The
