Define a default profile

Use the default profiles included with Microsoft Expression Media to quickly create a high-quality file or stream. For information about the available encoding profiles, see Video settings and Audio settings.

To define a default profile

1. In the Media Content panel, select the files for which you want to set a profile.

2. If you cannot see the Encode panel, in the Window menu, click Encode to select it. If Encode is already selected in the menu, on the right side of the application, click the Encode tab.

3. Click the arrow in the Profile category to expand it.

4. If you don't want to encode either audio or video, clear the box next to Audio or Video. If you don't need to encode video or audio, you can still leave the video box selected. This will create black video or silent audio for your file.

5. In the Video category, click the Video menu and then select an option that best matches your target playback medium. If you want to preserve the video attributes of the source video to avoid recompression, click Source Profile.

   Warning

   You can only select Source Profile if your video is either a WMV or ASF file. In addition, the file must have settings that Expression Encoder supports. For example, Expression Encoder does not support WMA Pro 5:1 output, and so the application will not recognize that setting. If you click Source Profile for a file that Expression Encoder does not support, a warning label appears next to the menu.

6. Click the Audio menu, and then choose an audio bit rate. If you want to use an audio profile optimized for your video profile settings, select Default Profile. If you don't want to encode audio, then clear the Audio check box.

7. Enable Two Pass Encoding (required for VBR encoding) to obtain the highest quality encode for a given bit rate. Enabling this option can double the encode time.

8. Note your Estimated FileSize. To reduce or increase this size, change the audio or video parameters.