I love to show off pictures from events. Animoto slideshows are a way to show off a lot of images without boring everyone to tears.
The advantages of Animoto are that it is a service. So no large software purchase, the intense video processing is performed on Animoto's servers, there is a selection of royalty free music and it is relatively easy to build an impressive video with little effort.
The drawbacks are a natural result of the benefits. Precise control of how the images are presented is impossible. You can control the order of the images and select certain images to last a little longer.
The biggest trick is to match the number of images to the length of the music. If the music runs out the remaining images display without music. If the images run out the slideshow ends in the middle of the song. The only solution is to change the number of images and/or the music and tell Animoto to build another rendition. It can be a very hit and miss process.
It's great to show off new images as a slideshow because it creates excitement without revealing too much. Viewers can't really linger on a particular image and they can't download the individual images.
There are many different styles to choose from. Overall the best is still the Original Animoto. Each style also has a limit on the resolution that can be used. Some styles only build 480p while others will build to 720p. This is a little less than some applications available that will build 1080p shows. That isn't much of a problem for a quick show-off the new images video, but if I were selling slideshows I would want to be providing 1080p.
You can build 30 second shows for free. A pro account is $39/month and allows unlimited shows. A plus account ($5/month) can produce full length shows, but downloading the HD versions is $3 or $6 each, depending on the resolution.
A video slideshow can communicate the feeling and mood of an event much better than a gallery of images. Here is a show I did for my daughter's baton twirling recital. I think people viewing this would get a sense of what baton twirling is all about and how much fun it could be. In that sense, these shows are useful for advertising as well.
See the Animoto web site for more information or to try it out.
