Not everything about WMM (Windows Movie Maker which usually comes bundled for free in Windows XP) is covered here, only the basics that’s enough to get anyone started in editing and completing their own videos.

Note: At any time if you have not finished your video and wish to continue your video-making later, simply press the F12 button (keyboard) or pressing Ctrl and S simultaneously, to save your project.

First, click on START (bottom left of your desktop).

Click on RUN.

Type in moviemk . (Typing in “C:\Program Files\Movie Maker\moviemk.exe” will work equally well but I am lazy in typing!)

This will bring up your free Microsoft Windows Movie Maker WMM).

If you have a video somewhere on your pc, you’ll be able to import the video into WMM. Otherwise you can capture your video directly from your web cam (time to check for vegetables stuck in between your teeth!) lol

No video?  How about importing still pictures?  Works equally well.

You will see a storyboard and the timeline panel (blue portion) outlining 3 things:

• 1. Your video
• 2. Your audio or music
• 3. Your title overlays

Any of these 3 elements can be dragged into the panel.

To view a “clearer” timeline, go to VIEW >> TIMELINE

The smaller rectangles are where your video transitions are shown.

Note: Clearing a storyboard will let you re-start your video project and re-do from scratch (be careful there!) To do this, EDIT >> Clear storyboard.

Okie…now to the more interesting part…

Click on the link “Import video”. Ctrl + left click (mouse) will help you to select multiple video clips.

Drag the videos into sequence into the timeline of the storyboard (blue portion).

If you wish to take a video directly from your web cam, groom yourself for the camera, click on link “Capture from video device”.

At this stage, there’s no need to adjust audio levels. Leave everything to default until you’re more familiar with WMM.

Drag captured video into the timeline for video.

Click on the link “Import audio or music”.

Do the same for what’s done to import video.

Go to TOOLS >> VIDEO TRANSITIONS

(Note: It makes sense to take a few/many short videos and then link them up into a longer video. This also gives you space to add transitions between the video clips.)

You will see more than just 4 transitions of course.

Drag transitions to where you want them (example below indicated by blue line).

Your effects must be between 2 video clips.

There’s no limit to the number of transitions you want to use.

(For me I prefer to stick to a maximum of 3 if I can help it. )

Go to TOOLS >> VIDEO EFFECTS and fdo the same for what’s done for video transitions.

Go to TOOLS >> Titles and Credits

Like video transitions and effects, titles and credits can go between any 2 video clips.

Enter your desired title and links (if any).

You may wish to select your font type and colour.

Adjust the font size so it’s no bigger than your video screen.

(In this example, I’ve used the Monotype Corsiva font.)

If you’d like to use more creative or decorative fonts, google for them .

WMM allows you to change your title/credits animation as well.

View your title/credits animation.

If you do not like the ”boring” RGB colours WMM offers for the title/credits background, you can consider using “scrapbooking images” or any other images
you made.

Almost complete! The finishing touches!

Go to CLIP >> Audio Fade (or Fade out) I like to use the audio fade for the ending of the videos I made. You can even mute any video clips as you wish.

Play your video by simultaneously pressing Ctrl and W on your keyboard (yep, press both keys at the same time).

Adjust, tune here and there and when you are ready, save your video by simultaneously pressing Ctrl and P on your keyboard , or FILES >> SAVE MOVIE FILE.

In most cases, I’d either save to a re-writable CD (CD-R) or directly to my computer.

To save your movie to a plug-and-play thumb-drive, choose the first option (My computer).

Enter your desired file name, and choose folder to save your movie.

Choose your movie setting.

For me, I usually choose “Best fit to file size” – yep, I do not have to adjust the KB there cos WMM has adjusted the number (KB) there for me.

If you want video for your mp4 player, choose Other settings.

DON’t get out of WMM yet!

Do you wish to save this WMM project as a template for future use?  Or you wish to continue the video at a later date?

If so, then you need to save your WMM project.  Simply press the F12 button (keyboard) or pressing Ctrl and S simultaneously, to save your project.

I try to keep all of my videos short and sweet and under 10MB although most video-hosting sites like Youtube.com accepts videos up to a maximum of 100MB.

If your avi video is too big, try converting it to an .mpeg (you need another software for this). Usually this compresses the video with some loss of clarity. So avoid capturing too large a screen (when capturing video from websites) – the bigger area your screen capture is, the bigger loss in clarity when your
avi video is eventually converted to mpeg).

There – your video is saved and ready to be uploaded to the web.