How should my Mom make Youtube videos?

October 9, 2006 7:53 PM

My 66 year old mother wants to make videos for Youtube on her 20" iMac with built-in camera. Suggestions?

I'm a Windows guy with little knowledge of how to best achieve the simple goal of making a short video. She's saavy enough to post on her weblog, but can't grok html or video timelines.

Any recommendations appreciated.

posted by Argyle to Computers & Internet (7 answers total)

iMovie should make this very easy indeed. She doesn't need to know any HTML, but she will need to figure out timelines to some basic degree.

I'd suggest starting very simple, just record a simple single shot video and learn how to upload that, and then how to copy-paste the YouTube code into her blog. From there, learning how to attach several sections of video together should be quite easy.
posted by The Monkey at 8:13 PM on October 9, 2006

If iMovie is to complex for her, maybe have her use Quicktime Pro (might be in regular quicktime, too) -- select "new movie recording" from the file menu, push record, and save when you're done.
posted by Tlogmer at 8:15 PM on October 9, 2006

Tlogmer's suggested feature is only available in Quicktime Pro, which is well worth the $30 bucks even if you are using iMovie.

However, if you really don't want to spend money, there are free programs that will do this kind of thing - iCamShare is one such program, I think, although I don't know if there's an Intel version. Google for "vlog" for more programs like it.
posted by spaceman_spiff at 8:30 PM on October 9, 2006

It's fairly easy to do this with iMovie.

- Open iMovie
- There is a little "switch" on the left side, one side is a pair of scissors (for editing) the other is a camera. Make sure the thing is set on Camera
- The iSight's view should appear on the upper left, just hit the button on it marked Record With iSight to being recording.
- Talk and record, hitting the big stop button when done.
- Go to File/Export to save as a .mov
- Upload to YouTube
posted by mathowie at 8:58 PM on October 9, 2006 [1 favorite]

Any recommendations appreciated.

Make sure she keeps her clothes on, IYKWIM.
posted by spacewrench at 10:21 PM on October 9, 2006

I would suggest that your 66-yo mother is pretty cool.
posted by adamrice at 8:12 AM on October 10, 2006

I second the motion.
posted by The Monkey at 1:39 PM on October 12, 2006