---
title: Creating and sharing a video on Vimeo using Windows Movie Maker
date: 2009-06-27
topics: video
---

These are just the bare basics. Windows Movie Maker comes free with Windows and
is simple to use for creating a basic video.

Most Canon cameras record in AVI format. Although you could just upload this
file directly from your camera to Vimeo, AVI files are very large, so it’s
better to convert them to WMV format first, using Windows Movie Maker. This
creates a much smaller file that looks and sounds just as good, and also uploads
much faster. Plus if you want to edit anything out, or string multiple clips
together in your movie, or add music, you can do so easily in this program.

Copy the .AVI file off your camera’s SD card to somewhere on your hard drive

Open Windows Movie Maker and click the **Import Media** button on the toolbar
and import your .AVI movie clip that you just copied.

An icon for the imported movie clip will appear in the upper middle area of
Movie Maker. Drag the clip down into the **Video** area of the Timeline at the
bottom of the screen.

You can play around with adding music, editing and effects to your movie, or
combining multiple clips (by simply repeating the three steps above for each
movie clip). However, if your whole movie is in this one clip and you don’t need
to edit anything out, then you are essentially ready to save your movie!

1. Click the **Publish Movie** button in the toolbar.
2. In the next screen choose **This Computer** and click Next
3. Type a unique and super-creative name and location for the saved movie file
   and click Next
4. On the *Choose settings for your movie* screen, select the **Compress to**
   option. You will need to find the right file size for this option, which is
   easy. Start with a low size (in MB) and go up, keeping an eye on the “Bit
   Rate” option at the bottom left of the screen. When it reads 1.8[^1] or 1.9
   Mbps, you’ve found the optimum file size .
5. Click Publish!

Go to the Vimeo group and upload your newly created movie.

***Note:*** If this is a private movie, make sure you click the “Privacy”
settings on the left while the movie is uploading, and set the appropriate
privacy options! (“Who can see this video: Nobody else” is the simplest; it will
still be visible to private group members.)

Vimeo may take some time before the video is ready. Mornings are the best times
to upload. Sundays and Mondays are the busiest days, and uploaded videos could
take much longer to finish converting on these days.

[^1]: The 1.8 Mbps number comes from [Vimeo’s compression
    guidelines](http://vimeo.com/help/compression) for standard definition
    video.