Working with video

So, you've added a video to your page, let's see what you can do with it

Dan Kemp avatar
Written by Dan Kemp
Updated over a week ago

Positioning and resizing

Click on a video to make it active. You'll see a blue border and four blue handles in the corners. You can use the handles to resize the video (just drag the corners with your mouse or with a finger).

If you're using Book Creator for iPad, as you move the video around the page you may notice a red border appear, restricting where you can place the video. This is because we need to leave room at the edge of the page to be able to turn the pages if you export the book to Apple Books. You won't see this border if you're using Book Creator online - you can move the video right to the edge of the page.

Layering and locking the image

If you right-click on the video, you'll see a little menu appear. With this you can:

  • Move the video to the front/back - this will re-order which layer the video exists on. Try placing a rectangle behind your video and layering the video in front of it to give a cool border effect.

  • Lock - you can lock the video in place so it can't be moved.

Help - I can't play my video?!

You'll find that the video doesn't play when you're in edit mode. You'll need to switch to Read mode (press the Play button in the toolbar) or publish the book online first.

Other options for video in Book Creator for iPad

Tap the Inspector and you can change the Poster Image for your video (the thumbnail). This is the default image displayed in your book when the video is not playing.

Formatting video for the Apple Books Store

Book Creator will import your video in Apple’s Quicktime format which is great for most needs. However, if you plan to submit your book to Apple’s Books store then you will need to convert your videos into M4V format. You can do this by bringing up the video inspector, and choosing Format.

For advanced users

Book Creator uses the following settings when formatting your book to M4V format for the iBooks Store:

  • Video – H.264 with a maximum bit rate of 2mbps

  • Audio – AAC, Mono at 128kbps, 44100Hz

If you would like to use different settings for video compression you can easily replace the M4V files in your final book with ones you have compressed yourself. To replace the files you will need to edit the exported ePub file and manually edit it.

Inside the ePub folder look for files with the .m4v extension and replace them with files of exactly the same name, ensuring your video meets Apple’s requirements for M4V files.

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