There are several forums and posts with this one question regarding video formats or codecs. Depending on your worship software you can use a few different formats. Most worship media sites include (.mov .mpeg & .wmv). This is because they cover a wide variety of worship software and the compressions are high quality.

What is a Codec?

Codec (enCOder/DECoder or COmpressor/DECompressor) is used to reduce size of audio and video. Find out more about Codec here.

A safe way to determine the supported codec or video format for your worship software is directly related to your operating system. The most popular operating system in the worship community is Windows XP / Vista. Alternatively there are a hand full of Apple Mac users but this is mostly in the high end mega Churches. There is a great deal of power in an Apple Mac for worship service and worship software offerings which I’ll talk about in another blog.

Windows XP and Windows Vista uses a native video player Windows Media Player. Windows Media Player supports for video: AVI, MPEG1 & WMV and for audio: WMA, MP3 & WAV natively. So this means if you are using EasyWorship, MediaShout and SongShow Plus you can use MPEG1, WMV & AVI.

MPEG4 & MOV Support On Windows

Alternatively you can run MOV or MPEG4 video files in EasyWorship, MediaShout, SundayPlus and SongShow Plus but you need a special CODEC called K-Lite Codec Pack. Be sure to follow install instructions from the worship software’s website.

Apple Mac OS X Worship Software

If you are using an Apple Mac OS X operating system then you can natively support MOV, MPEG2 & MPEG4. If you wanted to support WMV or AVI you can install separate codecs from Apple’s website under Quicktime Player. The most popular worship software for the Apple Mac is Pro Presenter by Renewed Vision. This is a very professional software and used in the entertainment business as well.

Side Note: You can also use a DVD to play your video backgrounds on all the worship software mentioned in this blog.

Please leave a post with your experience to help others.