Create your personal Easter movie with MAGIX Movie Edit pro and Catooh
Finally spring is there! The birds have returned from the south, the flowers grow, the days are getting longer again and the sunbeams warm our temper.
Inseperably linked to that time of the year is Easter time. Family and friends gather and enjoy delicious food, search for eggs, walk around in the springtime landscape and – of course – shoot loads of photos and videos.
Instead of handing friends and family the mere prints, you might create a little movie out of the nicest shots. Especially those who could not be there, will love to share a bit of the festivity that way. And for those who have been there, it is a nice and lasting reminder.
With MAGIX Movie Edit pro and media from Catooh, creating such a movie is easy to do, as this tutorial will show you.
To help you orientate in Catooh's huge range of products, we created an Easter-Collection that is well adjusted to Easter and the beginning of springtime. This media will help you to complement your movie. Just take a look!
Soundtrack
First you should pick a soundtrack for your movie. A song, that depicts the spring atmosphere and that matches your shots. We have put some recommendations into the Easter-Collection.
Place the song on a track in the time mode and adjust your movie to it. Keep an eye on the rhythm and atmosphere of single passages, so you do not disturb the flow of the movie with wrong placed scene changes. Just like music, pictures in a good movie have their own rhythm.
Fades
To further support the picture flow, you should connect the individual scenes with fades. You can find different fades in the 'Fades' menu. There are some fades that thematically match Easter and springtime (e.g. flowers, beams etc.) You can find such fades in the 'Objects' or the 'Random' section.
If you found a fade you want to use for your film, just click on it and drag it onto the intersection of two scenes. It will be automatically applied and you will be able to adjust its position or duration afterwards. Click on the 'X' that appears at the intersection and enlarge or diminish it. The wider it is, the longer the fade lasts and the other way around.
The „good old“ cross- and black fades are a pretty good alternative. You can easily add them to your film.
To create a crossfade, just move two scenes together, so they overlap. You can see that on the basis of the 'X' that appears at the intersection, just as described before.
To create a black fade, you just have to fade the first scene out and the second one in. Click on the small box in the end or beginning of the scene and move it to or fro, so a diagonal line shows. They form a 'V' between the two scenes. Doing like this, you create a short moment, in which the picture is merely black.
This kind of fade is especially suitable to mark a topic change inside the movie. The black fade seperates different pictures or chapters, whereas the crossfade melts the pictures together and creates a smooth transition.
To make it all clearer, the cross- and the black fade have been positioned next to each other on this screenshot. You can clearly see the 'X' of the crossfade and the 'V' of the blackfade.
Sound FX
Now that you adapted the music and the pictures, you can make your movie even more lively with sound effects.
Especially springtime is full of different sounds, compared to the snowdamped winter. The birds twitter, the first insects fly around through the air... Live returns with all its sounds.
Why should you and your movie do without that variety? Catooh offers you multiple natural sounds that you can either find by searching with keywords or in the category 'Sounds & FX' under 'Sound Effects' → 'Natural Effects'.
When you connected to catooh.com from MAGIX Movie Edit pro, you will have direct access on the media after downloading it. Just drag it into the right position of your movie.
Combine bleating sheep with twittering birds to create a more realistic effect or accompany closeups of flowers with the sound of a humming bumble bee. Give your fantasy full scope and bring especially photos to life.
Titles
When you combine shots with different topics but want to make sure everyone in the audience understands your movie, you can use titles. Especially when you are working with photo shots, titles can help you to communicate your story.
You can find different types of titles in the 'Titles' menu. If you click on them once, you can watch a preview on the video screen. To add a title to your movie, you just have to drag it into the right position in your movie.
The Title Editor will open automatically, after you positioned the title. But you will be able to open it again later, by right clicking onto the respective title. With the Title Editor you can change the font, the font size and color, the position and a whole lot more. If you are pleased with your changes, you just have to click on 'OK'.
DVD-menu
When you have completed your movie, you will have to decide whether you want to export it on your hard disc or want to burn it on DVD.
To export your movie, you have to open the 'Files' menu and click on 'Export movie'. Following you will have to pick a file format and a storage position. The final mixdown of the movie will then take up to a few minutes, depending on how long the movie is.
If you want to make a gift, you should burn your movie on DVD. Click on 'Burn' and pick a DVD-menu from the different layouts.
Tip: To make sure the DVD-menu matches the topic of your movie, the Catooh Easter Colleciton offers you some suitable DVD-menus.
After picking a DVD-menu, you can change the font type, the arrangement of the preview screens and a lot more.
If you activate the 'Advanced mode', you can also decide whether you want backgroundmusic in your DVD-menu, how the content on the DVD is ordered and a lot more..
Tip: For more details about the functons of the advanced mode, take a look into the MAGIX Movie Edit pro handbook. You can open it by pressing 'F1'.
When you are done with all your settings, you will only have to click on the symbol of the burning disc and soon you will be able to hold your Easter-DVD in your own hands.
Have fun with your Easter movie!
