One of the exciting new features in Acrobat Pro Extended is the support of Video inside a pdf document.  This also highlights the flash integration into Acrobat.  Today the industry primarily deals with photographs and in large quantities.   Many times they are taken for risk mitigation or in the case of litigation surrounding projects.  With photographs it is taken in a 2D perspective, meaning that it is at a certain orientation and it does not always give you the best orientation.  In the case of litigation, you often have to document the location, the direction you were facing, and other helpful descriptions surrounding the photograph.  As the world moves to video, it only makes sense that the natural progression for the AEC industry will be to video as well.  I am going to take you through the steps to take a video in a variety of formats and convert it to pdf.  I will also answer the questions as to why you would want to convert it to pdf, when you have so many video players on the market today.

The question that I get asked the most when describing this feature is why would you convert the video to pdf?  The first is that you will be able to leverage the FREE Adobe Reader and distribute it to whomever you see fit and the recipient will be able to properly view the video and have the software to be able to do so.  More importantly you have all of your Acrobat functionality available to you once it is in pdf.  You will be able to review and comment directly on the video, you will be able to combine the video with other supporting documentation, and you will have all the security in being able to protect the video in the pdf document.  One of the use cases I heard recently was the use of video with job site reports.  Now you can submit the job site report along with the video that supports it.

Let’s take a look at how you can convert a video to pdf.  The easiest way to do this is simply open up Acrobat and open the folder in which the video is stored.  Then just simply drag and drop the video into the open Acrobat window.

Note:  Video formats supported are:  ASF, ASX, AVI, 3GPP, MOV, MP4, MPEG, MPG, QT, and WMV files

Once you have done this, the conversion screen will appear.  The first thing that I like to do is set the Poster Image.  This will be the first frame that is show in the resulting pdf file.  It does not always have to be the first frame of the video.  You can use the slider bars to scrub through the video the find the poster image that you want to use and then simply select set poster image from current frame.  The other option you have here is the scrub the video down.  You do not have to use the entire video.  You can use the slider bars on the left hand side to only show the portion of the video you want to use in the resulting pdf.  If you click on advanced, it will give you further options to set the Launch Settings, Quality, Controls and Video options. 

Once you have clicked okay the conversion process will start, and the result will be a flv file stored inside the pdf document as shown below.  If you click the play button in the bottom right corner the video will begin to play.  In your Advanced Options you could have set the video to play when the document is opened. 

Now for the fun stuff.  Where I see this being used the most is not necessarily just viewing the video, but the ability to use all of your other Acrobat functionality.  The first thing I want to show you is the ability to review and comment directly on the video.  All you have to do is turn on your review and commenting toolbar and then play the video and stop the video where you would like to make a comment.  Then just choose your preferred commenting tool and place the comment directly on the video.  I will show you a couple of screen shots where I commented on the video.

The great part about making the comments on the video is that it time stamps it and it also stores the comments like other pdf comments in the comments tab.  You can click on a comment in the comments tab and it will take you directly to that point in the video in which the comment was made for ease of navigation.

Also as I said before I can now combine this video with a job site report, or any other form that is required.  I can also use all of my other Acrobat functionality.

As the world moves to video, it just seems like a natural progression that the AEC industry will as well.  This is just another example of how Acrobat can be used to increase productivity surrounding your projects.

Have fun,

Jonathan