Windows Movie Maker 2 Zero to Hero [Paperback]

Jon Bounds (Author), John Buechler (Author), Jen deHaan (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1590591496 | ISBN-13: 978-1590591499 | Publication Date: July 31, 2003

You've seen the promises in the advertising: Microsoft's free Movie Maker 2 will make it simple to capture, edit and share your home movies. We agree, but how do you know where to start, or where you're going? The answer is Windows Movie Maker 2 Zero to Hero, which will take you from filming your movie (with useful tips to improve the quality) through editing and adding effects, to premiering your masterpiece to your friends and family. You'll learn how to produce professional looking films, with effects and transitions like those you see on TV, and how to show them off. Send them by e-mail, post them to web sites, copy them to a CD, or even make your own DVD! Zero to Hero is more than a catchy slogan and an opportunity for puns and graphical representations of tights, capes, and phone booths. It's a style of learning designed by Friends of ED to reach beyond dry technical explanations and dusty old authors who don't know how it is for real users and wouldn't know good design if it slapped them round the face with a wet fish. With a Zero to Hero book you can choose how you learn. You can choose to learn everything you need to know about Windows Movie Maker 2 by working through the first section of the book from start to finish. Alternatively you can dive straight in to the inspirational 'Hero' chapters and refer back as and when you need. Then later, when you're a hero yourself, the book is easily used as a reference tool. When you're done you'll be ready to wear your underwear on the outside, metaphorically speaking of course. And if you get stuck, our support heroes are just an e-mail away. As with all books from friends of ED - our support is fast, friendly and free. All friends of ED authors help with the support on their books, and will either directly e-mail readers with answers, or send their response to an editor to pass on. Information and Inspiration. Speed and Support. We'll not only unlock the toolset for you, we'll feed your imagination, and that's a promise. So, what are you waiting for?

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

John Buechler has been a photographer and videographer from the pre-digital days of film cameras and projectors to the non-linear computerized editing of today. He uses many different photo and video editing software tools and, since its first release, he has been an avid user of Microsoft's Movie Maker. He lives in Kalamazoo, Michigan. In addition to doing freelance video work, he applies his photography, video and computer skills to home and family uses. He is called 'Papa' by his grandchildren and is known by many on the Internet as 'PapaJohn'. His personal website (papajohn.org), includes links to some of his movies. PapaJohn is active on several Microsoft-sponsored multimedia newsgroups. John was recognized by Microsoft as one of their 2003 "Most Valuable Professionals" in the multimedia area. He recently expanded his support role by becoming a moderator of the Movie Maker 2 Special Interest Group (SIG) for the Windows Media Los Angeles Users Group at windowsmedia.org.

Jen deHaan is a freelance web designer and developer based in Calgary, Alberta. She has been involved in writing, contributing to or editing many computer books on Flash, ActionScript, digital video and ColdFusion in 2002. She has co-authored three books on ActionScript: Flash MX Designer's ActionScript Reference, ActionScript Zero to Hero, and Flash MX Components Most Wanted. Jen graduated with top honors from a top new media program, and also with a bachelor's in fine arts in developmental art from the University of Calgary. She is an experienced teacher and writer, focusing on integrating technologies for the Web using Flash MX. Jen's personal websites are ejepo.com and flash-mx.com.

Jon Bounds is a writer and editor from Birmingham, U.K., where he grew up listening to The Smiths and trying to get his Sinclair Spectrum to do desktop publishing. Jon studied computer science at the University of Birmingham in the days when the Internet was still dismissed as a niche research tool, and digital video would never replace film. He graduated with plans to use computers to create and share "stuff." A short-lived journalism career ended when he realized that he'd rather just make it all up—the National Enquirer had no vacancies. Jon instead settled for the equally glamorous life of a technical editor at friends of ED and has edited many titles on digital video including Final Cut Pro, Premiere, QuickTime, After Effects, and video for Flash. Now computers have caught up a little, Jon spends many an hour editing video, writing, and entertaining people at jonbounds.co.uk.

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: A-Press (July 31, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1590591496
• ISBN-13: 978-1590591499
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7.5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #420,088 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars full to bursting, August 14, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Windows Movie Maker 2 Zero to Hero (Paperback)

Each and every page of this book is covered with either words or pictures, and yet none of them seem to be there just to fill the space - if you know what i mean. The book is encyclopedic, coverign every bit of knowledge that you'll need to edit your home movies on your pc.
I've been shootign home movies for years, so some of the first chapter (techniques to maximise the quality of your footage) wasn't news to me, but each tip was obviously born from the same experiences i'd had. How nice it would have been to have read this in a book before having to make the mistakes in the first place.
The rest of the book dealls with the entire process of producign movies on your pc, each step copiously ilustrated and explained in the same detail.
Best of all the book tries to guess the troubles you could encounter and the mistakes that a first timer can make, and paitnely explains who to avoid each one.
The problem with having so much crammed into the book is that if you try to read it all in one sitting you could be overwhelmed, but each part is separate from the others and you can return to, and re-read, the pieces you need as you need them. It can be a little dry in places, but the case studies at the end more than make up for that - they are based on people makign the sort of movie that you will try to make vacations and parties. you can watch the finished results on the book's internet site and they really look professional, it's outstanding that they have been produced with free software.
If you've not dipped your toes into the world of digital video editing before then this book will help you make movies you'll not be embarrassed to show people!

16 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Everything About Movie Maker Is Here, September 7, 2004

By 

Roger R. Cousineau (Tucson, AZ USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Windows Movie Maker 2 Zero to Hero (Paperback)

I bought this book because Movie Maker 2 is a fairly complex movie editing program, and therefore, not intuitive.
I have to agree with some of the other reviewers that this book contains almost too much material, but for the user who really wants to use Movie Maker to make a near professional product, all the tools are covered.
I am new to the world of digital video and this is the approach I used with this book. Read the first chapter to get an understanding of the nature of digital video, then quickly read the chapters covering collections, the story board, and the time line. Finally, skim the rest of the chapters, to get a general idea of what else you can do with Movie Maker 2. Now go to the 3rd project in the back of the book, on making a video of your vacation, and following the outline there, create your own movie from what ever clips you have in your collection. Refer back to the appropriate sections of the book as necessary. Its only by working with the program that you're ever really going to learn it.
There are two good reasons for buying this book. Number 1 is that it does cover all the features of Movie Maker 2, and number 2 is that friends of Ed will answer your questions. I bought this book about a month ago, and have submitted questions to Ed's website twice. On both occasions I got the answer I needed within 24 hours.
TIP: For those of you with a lot of quicktime and real media clips that you want to edit in Movie Maker 2, you will need quicktime pro ($29.00) and RM Converter v2.21 ($28.45) to convert these movies into a format that you can use with Movie Maker 2.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not an inch wasted!, August 26, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Windows Movie Maker 2 Zero to Hero (Paperback)

Every page of this book is crammed with information on using Movie Maker 2. You might be under the impression that it is a simple program that dosen't need a manual - but it does if you really want to make movies like a pro, it needs this book!
There is a chapter on how to shoot better footage, with great little tips like showing you how to avoid all that camera 'wobble' you see on home movies - even when walking around.
It also has troubleshooting tips all the way through that can make using Windows Movie Maker a much less frustrating experience, from how best to set your films to output to editing your movies to replace and correct bad sound - it's all in here.
The book is clear with pictures and diagrams all down the pages showign you exactly how to perform each task, and the writers keep on topic and seldom deviate from the tasks in hand.
Get this book, and I'll assure you that it'll pay for itslef with the great feeling you get when you premeire you first creation.