Blogger: Using Video on Your Blog

Blogger is a helpful blogging tool powered by Google. If you already have a Gmail account, chances are you've spotted blogger in the toolbar before, and, you won't even need to make a new account to get started. Simply log in with your existing Gmail account to start publishing.

Blogger isn't clear about the file formats it supports, though it can be assumed that any common image file formats can be used. Blogger accepts all of the common video formats like .mp4, .wmv, and .mov.

File sizes and available space for images and videos on Blogger is technically unlimited, as long as your media stays within these guidelines:

• Neither the height nor the width of uploaded images exceeds 2,048 pixels.
• Videos are no longer than 15 minutes in length.

If media you upload goes beyond these, you can still use them, but they will count against your 15 GB storage limit you get with your free Google account.

To prepare your video to be posted to Blogger and not use any of your 15 GB of free storage, you'll want to edit it down to be under 15 minutes. If it is going to be longer than that, you'll likely want to keep the amount of space it will consume as low as you can by compressing it so that you achieve the highest quality with the smallest file size possible. We recommend using the H.264 codec with your original file format, or even better, switching file formats to .mp4. In addition, if you shot your video in full HD, you can lower your file size by changing the aspect ratio to 1280 x 720.

If you've already posted the video to another video hosting site, you can skip these steps and embed the video directly into Blogger.

To post your video, log in and click the orange New Post button. The next screen is where you compose your post, including text and links, as well as inserting images and video. Click the Compose button in the top left, and then click the Insert a video button.

You have several options for selecting a video to add to your post:

• If your video is a file on your computer, click Upload. You can also drag-and-drop your video onto the space to automatically upload the video. When you choose to upload a video from your computer, Google will be hosting your video, storing it on their servers.
• From YouTube lets you paste the URL of the YouTube video you want to add to your post.
• My YouTube videos will show you all of the videos you have posted under your Google account to YouTube so you can simply select from those displayed.

You can also embed a video from YouTube using HTML. Go to the video on YouTube and click the Share link, and then click the Embed option. Copy the HTML code that appears in the box next to your video.

Then, in your Blogger post, make sure HTML is clicked at the top of the New Post page. In the text box, paste the HTML code. You can click Preview in the top right to see how the video will appear once it is published.

When you're satisfied with your Blogger page, simply click Publish, and the video will appear on your site within the format of your Blogger theme.