Making YouTube Videos the Easy Way

If you have wanted to start a video diary or a nice video to share with your friends on YouTube, or MySpace or a number of other video websites, you might already have video editing software on your computer. I have found that many people don't realize they already have the software they need to make videos. Some people end up spending a lot of money on video editing software, when all they really need to do is open up their Start menu. (Sorry, Mac Users, I don't know if you have video software.)

So Windows users, for those who don't know where this is, open up your Start menu. Go up to your Accessories folder. Next step: there should be a little reel of film icon and next to it says Microsoft Movie Maker. Click on that.

Instant movie magic! Okay, not yet. First, let's get comfortable with how this works. We're talking really basic stuff.

Over where it says Import Video or Import Photos or Import Music, you can do various imports from your files into your space in the middle. The right shows a short video window where you can see a sample of your clip, your audio file, etc. It will also be where you can see how your video editing is coming along.

When you have a few clips of videos, pictures and sound to add, you drag each piece around to that blue bar at the bottom. When you over the edge of a section of film, for example, you can shorten or lengthen how long a video is played, repeated, or like a picture, just how long it stays in the frame. You can also shorten your music and sound bites in the same way.

If you have sound bites, but you want the sound cut out so your music can be heard, just right click on the sound bite. You can make sure you have the right one by playing it. When you have the right one, right click on the sound and look for the Mute option.

If you want to add special features to your video, like credits, you can look just below the Import options. There are transitions, adding text and credits and other ideas already prepared for you. It will guide you to insert text, and you can choose how your text will zip across the page. You can add it to a current clip; add to the beginning or end of a clip, and so forth.

When you are done and ready to save your homemade video for YouTube, remember to not just save the usual way. If you do it the usual way, by going to File and hitting Save or Save As, you are not actually saving it as a formatted video that YouTube can upload. You will need to export your Video or choose Save My Video To Computer. Change your option, though, from The Best Video For Your Viewing. This first recommended option will be pretty big. And while it might be good for your more quality videos, it will take a long time to upload and will eat up a lot of hard drive space. So choose another one. You may have to play around to find the best format for whatever place you are uploading.

There you have it. This is the quick and dirty way to make videos for YouTube, MySpace or even Associated Content. So make your videos, make your friends jealous that you can add all the fancy credits and everything. All with software many people didn't even know they already had.