Vines just got bigger with a higher quality video upgrade today. A new post on the company blog announced a technical change that allows Vine users to upload the higher-resolution 720p HD video to the app. That’s a significant improvement from the 480p resolution.
Video is increasingly viewed on mobile devices and across the web. Facebook rolled out the ability to embed video on other sites this week. As this Pricenomics survey clearly shows, BuzzFeed and other online media sites heavily rely on content from Instagram videos — and Vine wants (more of) that action. Instagram video, by comparison, plays in 640×640 standard definition resolution.
Vine’s upgrade will affect the visual quality of those six-second video clips within the Vine app — but more importantly it will improve what we see across the web. The quality of these videos could make the difference in what gets picked up and what gets left out of a listicle.
As you can see in the picture below, the quality of an embedded Vine is pretty sharp:
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Another possible effect is that it could separate the pros from the amateurs. The quality improvement could expose the differences in the kind of equipment used or post-production done. Newer iPhones have much better quality video cameras. Those dedicated to their craft are more likely to own the latest model and use that to record videos.
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Vine users will see the improvements “rolling out over the coming days” for both iOS and Android. The new format is supported on iPhone, but Android owners will have to wait a bit longer for it, likely due to the difficulty in determining exactly what hardware is available on a given Android device.
