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If someone had suggested 10 years ago that we’d soon be watching videos on small, portable devices — possibly even our mobile phones — he or she would have heard a lot of “Yeah, right” responses. Maybe in some far-flung future where we all ride hoverboards, live off nuclear energy, and wear weird-looking yet functional sunglasses. But over the course of the next decade? Pshaw! Yet here we are, in 2008, and we have this slew of smartphones that are perfectly capable of broadcasting streaming video. Hell, the major carriers even have services where you can watch video on your non-smartphone.

Of course, not everyone is on board with this shift to the mobile medium. For instance, filmmaker and director David Lynch (remember Eraserhead? That movie was sweet) doesn’t think that you can experience a film in such a limiting format (foul language ahead):

Of course, he completely ignores the virtues held in the platform. No, you’re not going to be able to get the full effect of The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly or The Empire Strikes Back if you’re seeing it for the first time on your mobile. You can, however, still take advantage of this medium. Whether its viewing items you’ve already seen and are familiar with, or if you’re exploring new ideas not meant for the silver screen, there are plenty of new opportunities within mobile video.

Where do I sign up?

There are two ways to gain access to videos on your mobile phone. First is to sign up for your carrier’s multimedia service. Of course, these services are limited to what the carrier can and is willing to offer. Verizon, for example, does not offer full movies through its VCAST service. AT&T offers movies, but only short clips. So when you’re going through your carrier, you’re basically limited to short clips, and sometimes TV shows. If you’re looking for full-lenght movies, you’ll have to bypass them.

What you need

Clearly, you’re going to need a cell phone with a media player. If your phone doesn’t have a media player, you’re going to be limited to what your carrier offers. Thankfully, most new phones do have media players. This is something to keep in mind when you’re shopping around.

You’ll also need plenty of disk space. Videos in mobile format are compressed, but you’re still going to need at least half a gig for a full movie. Even then, having a full gig is ideal. This is best accomplished via a microSD card, since most consumer phones don’t come with more than a hundred or so megabytes of on-board memory.

You’ll need a means of transferring the file from your computer to your phone. The microSD works just fine for this. A USB cable is an alternative. You can also go to 3Guppies and upload a video file, which they’ll format for your cell and send you a download link. The caveat here is that if you have limits on your bandwidth usage, these files could eat up a lot of it.

(There’s also a note not to use copyrighted material. We won’t get into digital media fascism right now, but yeah, we’ll leave it at that.)

Finally, you’ll need a program which converts the file to the correct format. You might already have this, but its best to convert the file in order to optimize it for mobile viewing. You can find one at Imtoo.com, though it will cost $30. You can find instructions on how to use the program here.

Getting the DVD to your computer

Before you do anything else, you’ll have to rip the DVD to your computer. Once again, the legality of this is under constant question, so any thing you do from this point on is at your own risk. This can be done with a number of programs. Eazy VCD works for PCs, and Handbrake for Macs. Note that the ripping process will take quite a long time.

Getting the file to your phone

Once you have the DVD in a compatible file format on your computer — mpeg4 is usually safe — then its time to run it through the converter program. I mentioned the Imtoo program, but you can also nab the Nokia Multimedia Converter or Quicktime Pro. Run the video file through the converter, which should take about as long, maybe a tick less, than ripping the DVD. This will turn it into a .3gp file.

Then you’ll have to either hook your phone up via a USB cable or connect your microSD adapter to your computer. Note that not all carriers allow for USB file transfers between phone and computer.

So you’ll either be transferring via USB, which varies from phone to phone, or using your microSD. To add the file, just open up the microSD folder on your desktop, and drag your movie file into the window. Pretty easy, huh? Disconnect the device, and slip it back into your phone. You now have a viewable movie on your microSD.

No, the mobile medium might not be ideal for viewing movies, at least for the first time. But when you’re hitting the road and have few options, then having a small-sized movie is a big bonus. The only problem is that it’s not quite that easy to do on consumer phones.

On smartphones, the process is simpler, since files are routinely shuffled between phone and computer. But nonetheless, those of us with consumer phones can benefit from having videos, too.

Many thanks go to the After Dawn forums and WikiHow.

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