E-mail this pageExporting the Edited Video in Windows Movie Maker 2.0
This document outlines the video export options available in Movie Maker 2.0 . "Exporting" is the term used in video editing programs to denote the process of incorporating all of the edits, transitions, titles of the video project into a single new video file. The greatest part of the work has been done by the time you're ready to export your video, but you'll still have a few decisions to make before you're finished.
Save Movie Options
To export the edited movie, you can either select File|Save Movie File... from the main program menu, or you can select an option from the Finish Movie section of the Movie Tasks toolbar on the left of the Movie Maker screen.
The only options you should consider are the ones labelled Save to my computer or Send to DV camera : nobody wants a video file as an e-mail attachment (it would be a massive attachment), there's little point in saving directly to a CD, since you can easily do that at a later time, and the Send to Web compression options are too restricted to make Movie Maker the best program for that task.
Sending Video to DV Camera
It makes sense, if you've got a blank DV tape on hand, to send a copy of the finished video back to the DV camera. This way, you'll have a high-quality copy that you can dust off and re-encode, if you like, at some time in the future. Having a tape copy also simplifies the process of making a duplicate on a regular VHS tape, should you wish to do so at a later point. To send a copy of the completed video to the DV camera, make sure that your camera is connected to the computer via the Firewire cable and turned on in its VCR/Playback mode. Then click the Send to DV camera button. You'll be prompted to verify that the tape is wound to the place where you would like the recording to begin. Check to make sure, otherwise you'll wind up taping over whatever else might be on the tape.
Once the tape is cued to the place you would like to start recording, click the Next button. Movie Maker will warn you again that the tape contents will be overwritten by the video if you proceed.
When you click the Yes button, Movie Maker will first create a temporary copy of the video on the hard drive and then record the video to the DV camera. When the process is finished, you will see a notification like the one illustrated below.
Saving the video to the computer
The Save to my computer option is the one that you are likely to use most often. Selecting this option will first introduce a dialog asking you to specify a name and a location for the finished video. As you did when you started your video project, if you are working in the ITRC, the location should be on the computer's D:/ drive. The name can be as florid as you'd like, though you may want to take pains to ensure you don't accidentally give it the same name as you've given some other video file that's already stored in the location where yours is headed.
Once you've assigned a name and a location, click the Next button to introduce the Movie Settings options. When viewing the Movie Settings dialog, a click on the Show more choices link will allow you to select the Other settings option illustrated below.
The Other settings displays the full range of file encoding options at your disposal. If your plan is to incorporate the video into a DVD or eventually send it back to the DV camera, you'll be best served by selecting the option marked DV-AVI (NTSC) .
If you're planning to use the video in a PowerPoint presentation or for the eventual posting to a website (after a little work with the Windows Media Encoder), you may be best off by selecting one of the Video for broadband options. Which should you pick? It depends, in part, on the size of the video, the amount of fine detail in the video, and (in the case of PowerPoint presentations) the speed of the computer you'll be viewing the file with. The higher the bitrate (represented by the notations 150kbs, 340kbs, 512kbs, etc.) the larger the final file and the greater the requirements for computing power for adequate playback. You will probably be able to work with the Video for broadband (512kbs) setting without any issues, but it makes sense to test this after you've finished creating the movie file. If the video isn't all you hoped it would be, you can always return to the Movie Maker program and encode the file using a higher bitrate (if the video quality has suffered) or a lower bitrate (if the video is jerky on playback).
When you've selected your settings, Movie Maker will display the Saving Movie dialog illustrated below.
The Saving Movie dialog will present you, after a couple of seconds, with an estimate as to how long the process will take. Brace yourself for a time that's much longer the edited video's length: in the sample that was used in generating this help file, the three clips, two transitions, single effect, and single title had a running time of 24 seconds on the timeline, but took 55 seconds to export into a finished movie file. If you're working with a video that's 30 minutes long in its completely edited state, you might want to wander off and get a cup of coffee.
When the encoding has finished, you'll be greeted with a notification that the movie has been saved.
If you wish, you can put a checkmark into the option marked Play movie when I click Finish , in which case the program will do exactly what you've asked. Otherwise, if you want to try saving the movie using other settings and a different filename, you can just click the Finish button and begin the saving process again..
Final Steps
Now that your video is finished and saved to the ITRC computer's D: drive, you'll probably want to sort out how to get the video in front of its prospective viewers.
If you are planning to use the finshed video clip in a PowerPoint presentation, you may well want to see how it looks in PowerPoint at this time: that way, if you do need to save the file using different settings, you'll be able to do it immediately. If the file plays back nicely within your presentation, you're all set.
For instructions on saving the file to a CD, see the help file on Creating a CD.
For instructions on saving the file as a data file to a DVD, see Creating a Data DVD.
For instructions on saving the file on a video DVD, see Creating a Video DVD.
For instructions on using the file on the web, see the Streaming Media section of this web site.
And, no matter where you end up saving your file, please double-check to ensure that it's been saved appropriately and then, as a courtesy to other ITRC users, free up the hard drive space you've used by deleting the project and video files from the ITRC computer's D: drive.