I have a client (to be named later) that had a need to deliver high-quality videos without breaking the budget. By budget I mean in terms of bandwidth, encoding, and preparation. We also host this clients website which was recently moved to a new server running Windows 2008 R2, with IIS 7.5. So in looking for a solution I came upon Silverlight, which is a natural fit with IIS 7.5′s  Media Services and Smooth Streaming.

To make this scenario work, you’ll need Microsoft’s Expression Web 3 or Microsoft’s Expression Studio 3. The Expression Encoder 3 is bundled with those packages with sell from (estimated) $150 to $500 dollars. Both packages offer a wide array of tools that will help in your video encoding as well as many other tasks such as website development and desktop applications.

With Expression Web 3 alone, you be able to code in PHP, HTML/XHTML, CSS, JavaScript, ASP.NET, ASP.NET AJAX, all using standards-based code (yes, I checked), however Expression Encoder is the key. It’s not only easy to navigate and use, but allows you to drop in QuickTime, AVI, MPEG, and other formats into the encoder, and utilize the latest quality and speed improvements to the VC-1 or H.264 codecs, choose a Silverlight template (or make your own), and publish directly to a web server using Expression Encoder Publishing Plug-in. It should be noted that the video can also be published locally and viewed.

Smooth Streaming is the production version of a technology first used by Microsoft to deliver on-demand video of the 2008 Summer Olympics for NBCOlympics.com. By dynamically monitoring both local bandwidth and video rendering performance, Smooth Streaming optimizes playback of content by switching video quality in real-time.

Using Smooth Streaming, visitors with high bandwidth connections and modern computers can experience full HD quality streaming, while others with lower bandwidth or older computers receive the appropriate stream for their capabilities. The result is visitors across the board enjoy a compelling, uninterrupted streaming experience, which ultimately lead to extended visitor stays and increased revenue opportunities.

In my next installment of this topic, I’ll cover the nuts and bolts of Bit Rate Throttling and Smooth Streaming.