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Follow these steps to compress video

1. Install the VLC media player.

2. Once it is installed, start VLC.

3. Click on the Media tab, and then on Convert/Save (see diagram below)

4. This will open up the Open Media dialog box.  From here you can either drag and drop the video file into the File Selection box (green arrow) or click the Add button and navigate to where the media file is located (red arrow).

5. Once you have accomplished that, you will click on the Convert/Save pull-down menu at the bottom of the dialog box and select Convert.

6. Now the fun begins.  The Convert dialog box will appear, and in the lower middle is a pull-down menu.  For starters, select Video for MPEG4 720p TV/device.

7a. OPTIONAL.  To further modify the compression settings, you can click on the Settings icon (a wrench) to make changes to the height and width of the video, and other options.  Otherwise, skip to step 8 below.

7b. Once you do that the Profile Edition dialog box will open.  First click on the Video Codec tab (red arrow) and then on the Resolution tab (green arrow).  From here you can adjust the height and width (blue arrows).  When finished, click on Save.

8. The next thing you must do is tell VLC where to save your compressed video file.  In the Destination section, at the bottom, click the Browse button (red arrow) to navigate to that location on your computer, and then give it a name.   You will note that it retains the same file extension as the original file, so there is no need to type that in (i.e. .MP4).

9. Once you have done that, you will be back at the Convert dialog box.  Press Start, and you are done !