Converting File Formats - Music & Videos

Making sure files are in the correct format is very important when we are “inserting” them into projects such as videos and music into PowerPoint Presentations, MovieMaker, PicasaMovies and others..

That includes when you want to download a YouTube video for use in either a MovieMaker project or PowerPoint.

This free software/tool does everything you need and much more and also has great additional conversions for all types of applications and is one of my personal favorites… It is a great program “free” to convert music, videos (even YouTube Videos) and much more for use in numerous applications including Movie Maker, PowerPoint presentations etc…

Remember with many of the free & other programs, it is advisable to use the smallest files possible, such as MP3 for music vs. mp4 and this software helps you with all those conversions..

Download from www.dvdvideosoft.com

1. Chooser to install all programs – FREE STUDIO 5.0.4
2. This way you can then do various types of conversions for all types of projects
3. Once installed it will put a great shortcut on your desktop-called Free Studio Manager. This is the complete interface for the suite of programs that are available from dvdvideosoft.com.

Note for Power Point Users: While it is faster to simply link to a YouTube video that will play in your PowerPoint presentation, the down side of this is that you must have a live & fast internet connection for the YouTube video to play.

Here is a link to a youtube video that walks you thru inserting the link directly into the PowerPoint if you have a good internet connection:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RApFAXMtero

When you are unsure about the internet connection where you are going to do your presentation with, you can embed the YouTube video right into your PowerPoint presentation. No internet connection needed.

And also refer to updates & video tutorials which are referenced on our class blog to make this easier.. Using this and other programs simply takes a little practice – so play & enjoy…

Aligning your text

It is very easy to align your text - but let the computer do it for you - never use the space key several dozen times to "center" text in a document, email or other application....

When you use Microsoft Word, Works, Word Pad or Word Perfect an this also works for cells in Excel, slides in Power Point, in most email programs when you are typing a new email message and many other software programs when you are working with “text”.

The "alignment buttons" allow you to easily align your text and the 4 standard options are:

• Left
• Center
• Right
• Justify/full justify (used to be called block style)

On your formatting toolbar (or in the Home Tab Ribbon of Word 2007/2010) you will see 4 “alignment buttons”.

When your cursor/pointer is in the word, sentence or paragraph you want to change the alignment for, simply click on the alignment button of your choice..