Microsoft Education has a Digital Storytelling e-book that contains resources, project ideas, and information you may find useful for your classroom filmmaking activities.  Since it’s a Microsoft product, the editing software highlighted in the e-book is Windows Movie Maker and Photo Story. 

 

Here is a great link to find free public domain classical music to use in your projects.

 

As a continuation from last week’s blog about video cameras, I wanted to post some thoughts about different editing software available for your computer. This week, I’ll be mentioning a few programs I recommend for your PC. Next week I’ll address options for Mac users.

 

Windows Movie Maker.

After using Windows Movie Maker fairly extensively this year, I’ve actually been somewhat impressed. For a free program that comes installed on your computer, it’s not too bad. For simple editing, Windows Movie Maker is great, but if you’re looking to do some more complicated tricks, expect to get frustrated.

Cost: Free

 

Pros: 

-          Cost.

-          Easy to use.

-          Come preinstalled on your PC.

 

Cons:

-          Not many editing options.

-         Only one additional audio track is allowed, so if you want to add sound effects  and music simultaneously, you’re out of luck.

 

 

Adobe Premiere Elements

Although it’s essentially a bare bones version of Premiere Pro, Adobe Premiere Elements still gives you plenty of options to edit projects in more advanced ways. With the addition of multiple video and audio tracks, you’ll be able to lay as many clips on top of each other as you’d like. The bottom line is if you’re looking to create some more complicated projects (especially events that were shot with more than one camera) Premiere is the way to go.

Cost: $140

 

Pros:

-          Edit complex projects much easier than Windows Movie Maker.

-          More transition and title options.

 

Cons:

-          Although $140 isn’t a lot of money for software, you’ll still need to buy copies for multiple computers.

-          Premiere will take a bit more power to run. You’ll need to make sure your computer can handle the system requirements.

-          Premiere is easy to use once you’ve played with it for a bit, but it’s not as intuitive as Windows Movie Maker.