4 ms·

Not to nitpick... ok actually to nitpick, sorry. Your page bugged my to run a media player, which when allowed, changed to a background that was hard for me to

Not to nitpick... ok actually to nitpick, sorry. Your page bugged my to run a media player, which when allowed, changed to a background that was hard for me to read over and then sat there "buffering" interminably. After 10 minutes it had reached 15%. What happens at 100%? Edit: Ah. It finally got moving. It was coffee pouring. As the background. I guess if I didn't have my browser set so I have to approve plugins and it wasn't being HN'd to slowness so it started right up, that would have been kind of cool. As you were then.

Tehnix 13y ago
Hmm, it doesn't seem to work in Safari 7, but does in Chrome. Didn't think anything of it (it was just a orange background in Safari) before you asked. But, yeah, a coffee pouring.
davb 13y ago
Ah, so there was supposed to be a video? In Firefox 26 (Linux x64), a cup of coffee briefly flashes up in the background then disappears. I was confused by the "footage from Beachfront B-Roll" notice at the bottom of the page.
silverlight 13y ago
Yeah. I mean he's just using a regular ol' <video> tag. So you would presumably have that same issue with any site using HTML5 media tags.
- noonespecial 13y ago
  Or at least any site with a <video> tag. It will be nice once the standard become ubiquitous. Until then <video> causes decidedly non-deterministic things to happen on the client. I'd still like the ability to approve/disapprove a site that's about to play a 115meg video file as a background!
  - tg3 13y ago
    If your browser supports WebM, that version of the file is only 6.5MB. I include the MP4 as a backup.
    - gknoy 13y ago
      Would it be feasible to fall back to an animated gif, or even just a static image? It took so long to load that I was done reading the page, and was looking at the fine print when it started playing, and that was a little bit jarring. Moreover, the placeholder image you had already looked really good. (The video _was_ pretty cool, though.)
      - tg3 13y ago
        I just added a static image fallback instead of the brown background I had before. Keeps more in line with the intended look.
nfoz 13y ago
Isn't the New Web great?
pieterhg 13y ago
It doesn't help the MP4 is 115 MB, maybe compress that
jader201 13y ago
I thought the same thing. I mostly saw the stuttering buffer. Is the effect really worth the risk of poor UX? Seems a nice background image would be effective enough. (I also realize this is nitpicky, but still worth mentioning. Maybe the OP didn't realize some would have a poor UX.)
lnanek2 13y ago
Heh, I just saw a brown background, no video at all here on Mac/Chrome.
tg3 13y ago
OP here. The background video is supposed to get pulled if it doesn't start playing right away (which is what happens in browsers that don't allow autoplay, like iOS. Not sure why that feature detection didn't work in your case. It's definitely intended as a "background" - not supposed to detract from the site if it doesn't work.

Tehnix 13y ago

Hmm, it doesn't seem to work in Safari 7, but does in Chrome. Didn't think anything of it (it was just a orange background in Safari) before you asked. But, yeah, a coffee pouring.

davb 13y ago

Ah, so there was supposed to be a video? In Firefox 26 (Linux x64), a cup of coffee briefly flashes up in the background then disappears. I was confused by the "footage from Beachfront B-Roll" notice at the bottom of the page.

silverlight 13y ago

Yeah. I mean he's just using a regular ol' <video> tag. So you would presumably have that same issue with any site using HTML5 media tags.

noonespecial 13y ago
Or at least any site with a <video> tag. It will be nice once the standard become ubiquitous. Until then <video> causes decidedly non-deterministic things to happen on the client. I'd still like the ability to approve/disapprove a site that's about to play a 115meg video file as a background!
- tg3 13y ago
  If your browser supports WebM, that version of the file is only 6.5MB. I include the MP4 as a backup.
  - gknoy 13y ago
    Would it be feasible to fall back to an animated gif, or even just a static image? It took so long to load that I was done reading the page, and was looking at the fine print when it started playing, and that was a little bit jarring. Moreover, the placeholder image you had already looked really good. (The video _was_ pretty cool, though.)
    - tg3 13y ago
      I just added a static image fallback instead of the brown background I had before. Keeps more in line with the intended look.

nfoz 13y ago

Isn't the New Web great?

pieterhg 13y ago

It doesn't help the MP4 is 115 MB, maybe compress that

jader201 13y ago

I thought the same thing. I mostly saw the stuttering buffer. Is the effect really worth the risk of poor UX? Seems a nice background image would be effective enough. (I also realize this is nitpicky, but still worth mentioning. Maybe the OP didn't realize some would have a poor UX.)

lnanek2 13y ago

Heh, I just saw a brown background, no video at all here on Mac/Chrome.

tg3 13y ago

OP here. The background video is supposed to get pulled if it doesn't start playing right away (which is what happens in browsers that don't allow autoplay, like iOS. Not sure why that feature detection didn't work in your case. It's definitely intended as a "background" - not supposed to detract from the site if it doesn't work.