Formats and sizes

You record a take once and export it as often as you like. Exports never change the take, so you can fix an edit, pick another format and export again at any time. Every shape gets its own layout of the same take, with the same edits, redactions and captions.

#Every output at a glance

Videos carry the sound you recorded. Stretches that play faster than real time, and frames held on screen, are silent. The sizes above are for High quality; Upload-friendly videos play at 30 fps (see Video file below).

The Reviewer Pack always uses the conservative reviewer cut, whatever style the take uses otherwise: no automatic zoom, a calm pointer, no background or padding. See Reviewer Packs. The Guide turns the take's scenes and actions into numbered steps with screenshots, ready for your docs or help center.

#Export from the Export sheet

Press ⌘E or click Export in the editor toolbar. The Export sheet shows every output as a tile. Click as many tiles as you need, then click the export button, which counts your selection: Export 2 Outputs. The tiles start with the outputs you chose when you created the take.

Each export shows its progress in the Exports list, as a percentage and the time left, and is checked before it is marked ready. Click Cancel on a row to stop a render. If an export fails, its row says what went wrong and offers Copy Details. See Export checks and troubleshooting.

A finished row shows the file's first frame, its file name and its size, for example "48.3 MB · Upload-friendly · under 45 MB", plus any warnings. Hover over the file name to see the video's SHA-256 hash, the same hash the proof manifest records; right-click it for Copy SHA-256. Once everything you started has finished, Done becomes the main button and the other one reads Export Again.

#Video file

The Video file section of the Export sheet sets how MP4 outputs are encoded:

• Quality: High ("Best picture, 60 fps. Large files.") or Upload-friendly ("30 fps H.264 tuned for app recordings. Small files for upload forms."). With Upload-friendly, the sheet estimates the file size for 16:9.
• Resolution: 1080p (the sizes above), 4K (3840 × 2160 for 16:9, 2160 × 3840 for 9:16, 2880 × 2160 for 4:3, 2160 × 2160 for square) or Native, the recording's own pixels: a Retina capture is about twice the 1080p canvas, so native lands between 1080p and 4K and is never upscaled. 4K and native are laid out exactly like 1080p (pointer, captions, keystrokes and overlays included), only sharper. A 4K file is about four times the size of the 1080p one.
• Codec (4K and native): Automatic uses HEVC for High quality (about 40 % smaller than H.264 for the same picture) and H.264 for Upload-friendly files. Choose H.264 when the file must play everywhere; 4K at 60 fps then needs H.264 level 5.2, which some older devices can't play.
• Keep under a size: turn it on and enter a size in MB. DemoTake picks the bitrate to land under that size, and encodes again if the first try is too big. It applies to MP4 outputs only; GIFs, screenshots and guides ignore it. 1 MB is 1,000,000 bytes, the way upload forms count. If the size is small for the video's length, the sheet warns that text may look soft.

If a file is still over the size after encoding again, the export completes with a warning instead of failing. Keep under a size works at every resolution; a small size at 4K looks softer than the same size at 1080p.

If the recording has fewer pixels than 4K needs (a non-Retina display, or a small window), a 4K export is upscaled and says so: the row shows a warning with the native size, and Native gives the sharpest file without upscaling. 4K renders hold several 33 MB frames in memory, so on Macs with 8 GB, close other large apps first; every export still checks its clips before it starts and validates the file at the end. DemoTake Web exports stop at 1080p: encoding 4K in a browser tab isn't reliable enough yet, so export 4K from DemoTake for Mac.

#Platform upload limits

When the take is set up for a platform review with a known file limit, the Video file section shows it. Today that is TikTok: MP4 or MOV, at most 50 MB. If Keep under a size is off, or set above the limit, the sheet warns you. TikTok review takes start with Upload-friendly and Keep under a size at 45 MB. Each finished row then says whether the file fits, for example "Fits TikTok (at most 50 MB)", or what to change.

For the other review platforms, check the current upload rules in their own documentation. Reviewer Mode checks the latest export's format before you upload.

#Subtitles and languages

Under the tiles, the Export sheet has two more sections:

• Subtitles adds SRT, WebVTT and transcript files next to each video, and a subtitle track inside the MP4. They say what the voiceover says, or the captions. See Subtitles and transcripts.
• Languages appears when the take has other languages. Each format is exported once per language you check, with the language in the file name (-de, -sv).

#Quick Export

Need one format right now? Click the arrow next to Export in the editor toolbar. The menu has Export… (the sheet), Open in Reviewer Mode and four one-click renders:

• Quick Export 16:9
• Quick Export 9:16
• Quick Export 1:1
• Quick Export GIF

A quick export starts at once and appears in the Export sheet's list like any other export.

#Where the files go

Exports are saved in the exports folder inside the take's package, in your library:

~/Movies/DemoTake/Projects/<project>/Takes/<take>.take/exports/
  checkout-redesign-16x9-20260926-141502.mp4
  checkout-redesign-9x16-20260926-141502.mp4
  checkout-redesign-reviewer_pack-20260926-141733.zip
  checkout-redesign-guide-20260926-142010/        # index.html, guide.md, images/
  checkout-redesign-guide-20260926-142010.zip

Each file name is the take name, the format and the time of the export, so a new export never overwrites an older one. Show in Finder on an export row takes you straight to the file. Screenshots arrive as a folder of PNGs. The Guide is a folder (open index.html) with a ZIP next to it for sending.

#Export from your agent or the command line

Agents render with export_render and the formats they want: 16:9, 9:16, 4:3, 1:1, gif, screenshots, reviewer_pack, guide, interactive or app_preview. With wait: true the call returns when the files are ready, and export_status lists every export of a take with its output path. Pass quality: "upload" and max_mb for the Video file settings. From a terminal, demotake export does the same:

$ demotake export take_8f2c --format 16:9,9:16,guide
16:9: completed → ~/Movies/DemoTake/…/exports/checkout-redesign-16x9-20260926-141502.mp4
9:16: completed → ~/Movies/DemoTake/…/exports/checkout-redesign-9x16-20260926-141502.mp4
guide: completed → ~/Movies/DemoTake/…/exports/checkout-redesign-guide-20260926-141502

See the CLI reference for every flag.

#The trial watermark

During the free trial, every rendered export carries a centered "Made with DemoTake" watermark and a small pill in the corner: videos, GIFs, screenshots, guide images and the Reviewer Pack video. The Export sheet says so above the list of exports, with a link to remove the watermark (Activate License in DemoTake Agent, Remove Watermark in DemoTake Studio). Previews in the editor are never watermarked. Once you activate a license, new exports are clean, so export again anything you made during the trial.

#Next

• Export checks and troubleshooting
• Reviewer Packs
• Share links
• Interactive demos
• Framing and Fit to Content for how each shape is laid out