A few weeks ago, a friend sent me a link to a video for a charity. I was impressed with the video and commented on it. Nice pictures. Catchy music. I thought to myself, “that must have taken forever to make.” While video production isn’t my forte, I know a few who do it and know the time commitment involved. At the time, I took note that the video was hosted on Animoto, but thought nothing of it.
Fast forward to this weekend, I was reading this article in Forbes magazine discussing the online video boom. We all know about Youtube. But what about some of the others? Animoto was listed, and I got curious. Well, I signed up for a count to “kick the tires”. A few pictures here and there, pick a song from their music library and….voila! I’ve got a 30-second video of the pictures I uploaded of our kids to share. Pretty neat, huh?
Here’s how it works. You upload the pictures you want to include and pick the song you want. You also have the option to upload your own song. Under normal circumstances, I would definitely upload a song from my music library. Animoto’s is pretty limited. After you’ve got the pictures and the music, Animoto analyzes the pictures and sets them to the music you’ve selected.
Animoto does allow you to pull your photos from other sites if you’ve already uploaded them. You can also easily share your new video creation on Facebook, Twitter, post on your website or email it to friends and family. By the way, did I mention that this service is free? There is Animoto for business that charges a fee for an annual subscription or a 3-month trial.
After about 30 minutes of playing around, here’s what I created on Animoto. Enjoy!