I’ve been toying around with the video production site “Animoto“. This is a very cool way to upload your own photos, used CC licensed photos from the web, and from other sources, while producing a video complete with music. They offer a music library (with some very good tunes) or you can upload files of your own. (Please remember to respect the license limitations of the artists.)

I’ve made a few shorts and then decided I’d make a full-length video to promote one of the songs from my children’s CD “Sing a Song for Safety.” Overall, the production came out well. A few complaints that I have, though… I wish that the software would tell you if there are too few photos to finish the complete song (it cut my tune short) and I wish that the audio didn’t sound “reprocessed”. I uploaded a 192kb mp3 file and it sounds as though it was re-compressed. I’m sure it was, but it shouldn’t “sound” as thought this had happened.

Anyway, this is a fun way to make some quick videos via the net. Perhaps I’ll get my employer to invest in a full account so that we can produce some quickie web videos to promote safety or to market my agency.

Also, they offer a “friends” setup in the account, but I’ve yet to find out how to access or add my friends to it. I know that a friend can send me a video via email and that will take me back to the site… perhaps it adds them in my friend directory at that point?