Trick Play Files – what they are and how to generate them.
Trick play files have been an industry standard for a while now. They are smaller image shots from your video content that users can see when they scroll over your navigation item menu.
On YouTube, for example, we can see things like this for a long time now. As of the end of last year, Roku made mandatory user-provided trick-play files.
They did generate these files for all videos in the past, but starting with the end of last year, they will not cause any more trick play files for longer videos than 15 minutes.
Unfortunately, some TV networks do require it as a mandatory requirement; others do not yet, but sooner or later, all of them will need developer-provided trick-play files.
How do you generate these files?
Go to google and search for the “biff file generator software,” and you’ll see tons of results and programs.
I use this one because it’s for windows, and I work on windows, it’s easy to use, and most importantly, it’s free.
You can go to the website and download the software.
https://burningbushsoft.com/index-1.htmlÂ
Unfortunately, it’s only for windows, but you can do the exact search for Mac and find other solutions.
Download, install and start the software. You can add folders, or you can add files one by one.
It may take seconds or a couple of minutes, depending on your video length. The longer the video is, the more time it will take a. actually to generate the file.
The generated file will be in the same folder as your video file.
All you need to do now is take the file upload to a VPS or dedicated server. Remember, these files will be used every time the video will load, so you need the same quality of hosting that your video files require, so choose a VPS or a dedicated server to host them; or an account on a VPS or an account on a dedicated server.
Upload the files, and generate the links. You can use the same technique I showed you in the article about the video links. For a video file, the link ended in mp4; in this case, the file will end in bif; this is the ending for trick play files.
Please remember – don’t change the file names; the trick play file needs to have the same title as your video; otherwise, the Roku or Amazon player will give you errors.
This should cover everything about trick play files.
I hope it was easy to understand, and it will be easy for you to generate and use the trick play files you need for your TV channels.
See you in the next article.