[MEncoder-users] which movie format for different OS (windows, apple, linux ...)

[Wolfgang Engelmann]

Dear all,

I am new to this list.
May I introduce myself.

I have worked on biological rhythms and written some books on it. I want to 
illustrate new editions of some of them now with short movie clips on 
rhythmic movements in plants (flowers, leaves) and animals (eclosion rhythm 
of fruit flies out of their puparium, etc) and they should go to a portal of 
the university library Tuebingen, Germany. 

I have produced the movies with a Nikon D700 and a timer (taking eg every 
10 minutes a shot) and converted the TIF images (which are quite large, 
about 9MB each) in jpg which were used under mencoder to produce .mkv 
movies. 

I was told by the staff that most normal users don't have a media player, 
such as VLC, to see them. I therefore converted them to .avi, but a test by 
a windows user showed that it can not be played with the window player. 

So my question is what kind of format is recommended to serve most people 
seeing the movies.

The next, more specific mencoder question, is how to insert a short title 
(with VLC the file name is shown at the begin of the movie). Or is it better 
to include an audio track? I don't have the equipment yet (microphone and 
recorder, any suggestions?) and don't know the procedure to include it.

And finally, I have tried to do some cropping on some of the movies, but 
haven't succeeded so far. Is there a manual for mencoder which is easy 
enough to be understood by a newbie like me?

Thanks in advance and wish you a good 2012,

Wolfgang