MakeUseOf.com: “Cool Websites and Tools [August 30th]” plus 8 more |  |
- Cool Websites and Tools [August 30th]
- 10 Top iTunes Troubleshooting Tips & Tricks
- 7 Video Editing Tasks VirtualDub Handles With Ease [Windows]
- 6 Websites To Help You Learn Japanese Online For Free
- Hot Tech Deals [Aug 30th]
- 10 Reasons To Use Apple’s iMovie ‘09 [Mac]
- The Google Docs Drawing Tool Makes Collaborative Drawing Easier
- Yogile – A Cool Alternative To Flickr With Group Sharing Features
- Daniusoft Double Giveaway: Video Converter Ultimate & DVD Creator [Mac]
| Cool Websites and Tools [August 30th] Posted: 30 Aug 2010 08:31 PM PDT
These are just half of the websites that we discovered in the last couple of days. If you want us to send you daily round-ups of all cool websites we come across, leave your email here. Or follow us via RSS feed. NEW: Download MakeUseOf iPhone App. FREE!
    
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| 10 Top iTunes Troubleshooting Tips & Tricks Posted: 30 Aug 2010 06:31 PM PDT
So, today we’re going to look at some of the best iTunes troubleshooting tips and tricks to fix the most amount of problems quickly. Let’s go through the quickest ways to get your iTunes setup behaving normally again.
Here’s the best iTunes troubleshooting ideas in the most effective, least painful order. See the Apple iTunes support pages for more specific instructions for your particular device. Back Up First!Before you start messing around with iTunes, do a quick backup of your entire library folder (especially the .xml and .itl files). In newer versions of iTunes (9.2), there’s a backup option you can use by going to File > Library > “Back up to Disc”. That will also backup any music you’ve downloaded from the iTunes store. 1. Is It Your iPod Or iPhone?Sadly, a lot of iTunes problems occur when you’re trying to use iTunes with an iPod or iPhone. Some of the best troubleshooting methods for these troubles involve resetting or rebooting your iPod/iPhone device or updating the firmware for the device – all of which is different for each device, so see the Apple support pages. If you’re lucky, it can be fixed by upgrading iTunes.
2. Is It The iTunes Or Quicktime Install?It’s possible your installations are faulty or need updating:
3. Is It Your Anti-Virus Software Or Internet?Try these steps (check iTunes again after each step to see if it now works):
4. Is It Your iTunes Library Or Account?Things to try:
5. Video/Audio Troubles Only? Enable The Highest SettingThroughout iTunes troubleshooting documentation for video and audio troubles has one recurring theme: enable the highest setting. Go into your sound or video settings and set things to maximum hardware acceleration, maximum screen resolution, enable 3D video etc. Rule of thumb, “turn it up”. 6. Check Your Plug-InsRemove all your third-party iTunes plugins. 7. It Might Be DirectXIf you’re using Windows (especially XP, 2000 Vista or Windows 7) and you have video issues, try updating DirectX or disable DirectX in Quicktime (change it to Safe Mode GDI instead). 8. Check Your iTunes ConfigurationClose iTunes. Move the file you’re testing to a safe place. Restart iTunes. Replace the file if that didn’t help.
The preference files for Windows Vista and 7 live here:
In Windows XP and 2000 the iTunes preference files are here:
In Windows XP and 2000 the iTunes configuration files are here:
Delete the “SC Info.sidb” file and restart iTunes. 9. Check Conflicting ProcessesGo through the list of current processes, disabling things sequentially to see if you can pinpoint the problem. Here’s Apple’s guide for using MSCONFIG to check for processes conflicting with iTunes in Windows Vista and Windows 7. 10. Update PC driversLook at sound cards and video cards in particular and see if there’s an available update.
There’s a number of things that may go wrong with iTunes, and the exact details of the steps you need to take will always be device-specific, but these are the general troubleshooting ideas which will get you results fast. If none of the itunes troubleshooting tips listed here worked and you’re a little over iTunes now, you could try Songbird and many ways to sync your iPod and iPhone without iTunes. Good luck! Hey Facebookers, make sure to check out MakeUseOf page on Facebook. Over 24,000 fans already!
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| 7 Video Editing Tasks VirtualDub Handles With Ease [Windows] Posted: 30 Aug 2010 04:31 PM PDT
In reality, VirtualDub has a lot of potential for the price tag it holds. It might not be a fully-featured Adobe Premiere alternative, but it certainly can accomplish more than a few tasks that you might think you need other separate applications for.
Splitting, Extracting & Joining AVI Files Without Re-encodingVirtualDub has the ability to save a portion of an AVI video file that you have selected with the position slider, provided you’re in Direct Stream Copy mode in both the Video and Audio menus.
You can easily split videos this way or extract portions to be saved as new files.
Here’s another easy one-page tutorial on how to split videos with VirtualDub. To join files, open your first video, then head to File > Append AVI segment.
For more, check out the easy tutorial Merge Multiple Video Files with VirtualDub. CroppingTo crop inside the video, first check that you’re in Full Processing mode and then click on Video > Filters. You’ll notice that there’s a Cropping button that’s not quite clickable (because it’s only enabled after you have chosen a filter).
We’ll add a dummy filter (click Add and choose Null Transform) which doesn’t do anything, but will ungray the Cropping button now.
In the Filter input cropping dialog box, you can experiment by typing any numbers to see what covers up the part you wish to crop.
In my case, I’m looking to crop the black bars above and below the video.
Cropping the black bars will change the dimensions and quality of the video, so I will use the resize filter to change the cropped video to the original video’s resolution.
Since the quality will be affected, even YouTube recommends to just use the original resolution. Saving AVI As Animated GIFThere’s not a whole lot of free animated GIF utilities, perhaps because GIFs are old-school, but I still find GIF animations useful to illustrate articles. This is especially true when the steps I’m trying to illustrate aren’t long enough to make a video out of them. So after you’ve loaded your video, getting your GIF animation is as easy as selecting the portion of the video you want to save by moving the slider (which is even an optional step if you want the whole movie as a GIF file), heading to File > Export and selecting Animated GIF.
You can choose whether your GIF animation will play once, infinitely or a set number of times.
The tool’s not perfect as I’ve been able to get a perfect-looking GIF animation after a lot of trial and error, but the shorter (fewer frames) your video selection is, the better the GIF might turn out. Saving JPEG/PNG/BMP Snapshots From A Video To A Folder Or The ClipboardThis is very useful if you want to get thumbnails from your video. The steps are identical to those from the previous section, with the exception that you’ll export the selected portion of the video as an Image Sequence.
Before you do this though, it’s preferable to create a new folder so you can contain all of your images there because there’s no option in VirtualDub to make a new folder when you’re choosing your target folder.
If you’re interested in getting a single snapshot from a scene in the video and editing it in, say, Paint, you can easily use the slider to position it at the right scene, press Ctrl + 1 or head to Video > Copy source frame to clipboard.
You can then open up Paint or another image editing application and paste the image in. If you have applied any filters to the video, pressing Ctrl + 2 will get you a snapshot with the applied filters. Achieving A Zooming EffectWhat would take 3 effects (Zoom In, Zoom/Focus, and Zoom Out) and splitting the file 3 times in Windows Movie Maker to achieve a smooth zooming effect, VirtualDub can do with a simple filter from the VirtualDub filter site. Download the filter and add the .vdf file to VirtualDub’s Plugins folder (usually at C:\Program Files\VirtualDub\plugins, but if you don’t have that plugins subdirectory, just create one). Here’s a great video tutorial (made by smokscren, which is where I learned this) on how to use it: Basically, in Full Processing mode, add the zoom (1.2) filter.
You’ll get this screen, where you can choose the duration in frames for zooming in (Phase 1) and zooming out (Phase 2).
In my case, , I’m setting it so that the zooming in will occur from frame 0 to frame 100 (will start at the original view of 100% and then end at 300% zoomed in). I’ve also set the zooming out in Phase 2 to go from 300% view back to the original view (100%) starting from frame 200, lasting all the way through frame 300. That means between frames 100 and 200, the video will stay zoomed in. Hit the Show Preview button to display the video with the applied effect. Easy peasy. Adding A Transparent Image Or LogoWe have detailed how to add a watermark image in Windows Movie Maker. For VirtualDub, you’ll need to download and extract this logo filter.
You’ll be able to select any 24-bit bitmap file and drag it around the video using the X,Y sliders.
If your image has a black transparent background (like the next screenshot), you can type all zeros under Transparent color.
Type 255 in all of the Red, Green and Blue boxes when your image has a white background. Embedding Subtitles PermanentlyIf you have figured out how to create subtitles or you have downloaded some from subtitle search engines, you can use VirtualDub along with the TextSub filter to embed them in your movie permanently, in what is called hardsubbing. Here’s a very detailed guide on how to do it. If you’re using VirtualDub as your sole video editor, you could always ‘add’ text to your video by embedding it in the form of a subtitle file.
There’s a whole lot of filters that would make VirtualDub a super video editor but we didn’t cover here. If you know of any, enlighten us in the comments! Do you like MakeUseOf articles? Don’t forget to share our articles with others! It’s really important to us.
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| 6 Websites To Help You Learn Japanese Online For Free Posted: 30 Aug 2010 02:31 PM PDT
Now, of course, you could pay a lot of money to take classes, but for those of us who would rather just find a free alternative online, even if it’s just for the basics of the language, there are many options to choose from. Below are some of the most helpful (or creative) sites to help you learn Japanese online. Learn Japanese LanguageOne of the first things that puzzles students of the Japanese language is that there seem to be three entire alphabets that need to be learned when studying the language: Hiragana, Katakana and Kanji, the characters of the Chinese writing system. They are used together in most Japanese sentences and causes a lot of confusion. One very good site for those trying to overcome this particular hurdle is "Learn Japanese Online". The site presents each one with relevant cultural information, usage and even tutorials on how to do the strokes in the correct order for several of the symbols.
TofuguTofugu , "Wonky Japanese Language and Culture Blog" is not your usual language website. It has been around since 2007, and is run by its founder, Koichi, who has a very creative approach to teaching the Japanese language. His idea is to educate while presenting tidbits about Japanese culture, and to make it entertaining to the point of absolute silliness. Some of his videos manage to be incredibly helpful, while displaying some very YouTube friendly sense of humor. The site is also connected to textfugu, which is Tofugu's Online Japanese Textbook, where many of the lessons are free and where he professes (with good reason) to have created an online text book specifically for the self-learner.
Japanese 101Japanese 101 is part of 101 Languages, which is a site with resources for several languages. Although not a great site to learn about the nuances of the language, Japanese 101 has a nice array of vocabulary words as well as some nifty links to Japanese television and some related sites (there is also a forum, but the Japanese one seems to be non-existent). The site is kind of a pain to navigate, since you have to constantly select "Japanese" from the various languages from each menu option, but it contains various articles about Japanese culture and language usage which could be informative.
Japanese Pod 101Japanese Pod 101 requires a membership, but it does have a free option which will still give you access to a large number of videos, sound files, lessons and their newsletter, with extra lessons and free daily podcasts. The videos are professional and easy to follow and the forum is active and helpful.
MLC Japanese Language School ResourcesMLC Japanese Language School is located in Meguro, Tokyo, but what is most useful about their site is the fact that they have downloadable PDF files of a lot of the resources they use to teach English speakers. They have even separated them into levels, for ease of use. So if you need a worksheet to practice your Japanese letters, or an interactive Flash drill of some of the most common expressions, or even some extensive advanced materials, you can find it all here. There is also a nice collection of audio files and Flash materials with sound.
Japanese-Online.comJapanese-Online.com has been around since 1996, and has an extensive collection of lessons, although some of its resources and links are outdated and the newsletter archive, although very informative, hasn't been updated since 2005. Yet, the lessons themselves make this site worth visiting. To have full access to the site, a registration is required. But it is completely free, unlike other sites which will only give you a few samples for free and then charge you for the lessons.
Do you use any other good sites to help you learn Japanese? Share them with us and arigato! Follow MakeUseOf on Twitter. Includes cool extras.
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| Posted: 30 Aug 2010 01:15 PM PDT
For more fresh hot deals, visit our Hot Tech Deals page, which is constantly updated. Keep reading to find out today’s Hot Tech Deals.
Image credit: Modified from Svengraph’s icon set Hey Facebookers, make sure to check out MakeUseOf page on Facebook. Over 24,000 fans already!
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| 10 Reasons To Use Apple’s iMovie ‘09 [Mac] Posted: 30 Aug 2010 12:31 PM PDT
With the release of iMovie ‘08, followed by the '09 update, Apple significantly re-designed iMovie, to the dismay of many long-time users like myself. Although I still use Apple iMovie '06 from time to time, I have discovered many reasons why the latest version, iMovie '09, is a useful program for managing, editing, and producing short form videos. Event & Project ManagementIf you start shooting and editing movies on a regular basis, be it with the video camera on your cellphone or with your camcorder, iMovie is a useful program for managing and accessing your movie files in one place. When you import files into the program, you can save the footage to either a new or existing Event. So for example, an event might be a vacation trip, birthday party, or YouTube presentation. After you create an event you can always add additional clips to it.
Also, events are organized by year, which is helpful for keeping track of clips. Right- or Control- clicking on an event provides additional options for managing and accessing files. Similar to Events, Apple iMovie '09 allows you to organize all your movie projects within the application, rather than as complete separate files/projects outside of the program. You can select to save your projects to one or more storage drives, but you can access them all from within the program.
Mark As FavoritesIf you're working on a large project, you can mark individual clips as favorites. This is useful if your Event browser has lots of clips and you need a way to narrow it down. You can also reject individual clips, which means they are removed from the Events Browser but not deleted from your hard drive or the project itself. You can un-reject them at any time.
Video AdjustmentsIf you know how to make exposure adjustments and enhancements in programs like iPhoto, you might be surprised to know that you can make similar adjustments to your movie files in iMovie. Click on the tiny gear button of a clip in either the Event and Project browser to bring up the adjustment panals.
You get choices for making exposure and audio adjustments, as well as the ability to crop and rotate clips as you would still photos. And even better, you can copy adjustments you make on one clip and paste them to another. Go to Edit>Paste Adjustments….
Clip OptionsAn advanced feature of iMovie '09 does what some third-party plug-ins did for previous versions of iMovie. You can, for example, drag a selected clip or a portion of it from the Event Browser on top of one or more clips in the Project Story Board. You then choose from the pop-up window how you want the added clip to be used. For instance, you can create a quick cutaway shot or picture within a picture.
Voice OverApple iMovie '09 makes it easy for you to select a group of clips or an entire project and perform a voice-over production. This is great for how-to or documentary videos.
Export OptionsiMovie '09 provides several export options for your completed projects. You can format projects for YouTube posting, your iPhone, Flash Video, QuickTime format, etc. You can also save projects in the Media Browser; these files in turn can be accessed from the Media Browser of other iLife programs such as iDVD and Keynote.
When you save a project to the Media Browser, iMovie compresses the movie according to your specifications. That way you don't have to open iMovie in order to retrieve saved projects. With the latest version of iMovie you can also export movies to iDVD.
Edit To The BeatWhen you want to create an advanced slide show, the Edit to the Beat feature of iMovie is very useful for getting the job done quickly. See my video tutorial for how to use this feature.
Project PropertiesBefore or after you begin a project, you can set default properties for automatic transitions between clips, the duration of transitions, the aspect ratio of clips, and the theme you want to use for a project. Go to File>Project Properties to make these settings.
Also in Properties, you can set the default for the duration time for transitions, titles and photo displays.
Favorite FontsIn iMovie's Preferences, you can create a collection of favorite fonts you use for projects. You're not limited to the default set. Click on an existing font and change it.
There are several other advanced features in iMovie '09 that I didn't touch upon. If you have shied away from movie editing because it looks too complicated, I can assure you that it's possible for anyone to learn, using iMovie '09. Start with Apple's own tutorials and then experiment with many of the features described above. See our other MUO articles about online video tutorials and home movie making tips. If you're an avid iMovie '09 user, let us know what features you like. Hey Facebookers, make sure to check out MakeUseOf page on Facebook. Over 24,000 fans already!
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| The Google Docs Drawing Tool Makes Collaborative Drawing Easier Posted: 30 Aug 2010 11:31 AM PDT
We checked out the utility of an online whiteboard called Dabbleboard some time back. The online collaboration app has gone from beta to final and from free to a mix of pro and free. In the meantime, Google Docs has been building up a presence in our web lives with a slew of improvements. Tim covered features like real time collaboration, online chat, and high quality imports, when he took a fresh talked about 4 New Features That Makes Google Docs Even Better.
Let's test Google's online drawing tool and see if it's as hospitable as most of Google's other members. Create Your First DrawingOpen your canvas from Create new – Drawing.
It's definitely not sophisticated as a full-featured drawing app, but the tools are adequate for basic drawing and representing ideas. You can draw a variety of Shapes, Scribbles, Polylines, and smooth Curves.
For instance, Shapes can be quickly used to build up flowcharts or hierarchical diagrams. You can connect shapes with lines. Line tools come with all the regular enhancements like different types of arrowheads and line decoration options.
Text formatting gives you the added use of Word Art. The fonts are limited, but it's OK if you aren't looking to do a lot of typographical artistry in a simple collaborative drawing tool.
Ordering and rotating elements on the page are handy when you want to create flowcharts or mindmaps. And of course, you can set the color of the canvas (or drawing) too from the palettes.
All drawings are vectors, so changing the scale of the images is as easy as dragging the corner handles. Bringing In ImagesOK, you are a person who likes to explain a concept with images rather than lines and text. On Google's Drawing tool, you can upload and insert images from your desktop, bring it in via a URL, or use the riches of Google Image Search.
Google Image Search displays those that are labeled for commercial reuse with modification. After bringing it into your canvas, you can tweak its size and position. Save It…Export It…Or Junk ItYou can arrange your drawing in specific Google Docs folders with or without sharing access. Download it as a PNG, JPEG, SVG, or PDF file.
Or export it to another Google Docs document using the Web Clipboard. This option lets you quickly move your diagrams from the canvas to a presentation slide or another document.
Using the web clipboard keeps your items protected from one session to the next. Also, while pasting, you can select which item to paste into the target document. The pasted drawing is a copy of the original, and both can be edited independently after copying. Collaboration & TeamworkYou can set permissions with email IDs that will allow a select few to view and work on the document in real time. You can further open it up by giving editing privileges too. Of course, you can open it up to the wider public too with public sharing. Check out the specific roles of owners, editors, and viewers when it comes to collaborative sharing.
You can also create a mailing list and email the drawing across as an attachment. Hundreds Of TemplatesGoogle Docs and the drawing tool save you a few chores by the use of its gallery of templates. You can narrow down to the right one from the filters on the left. Choose Drawings, preview the templates, or even create your own and save them.
If Google is your online cubicle, then the Drawing tool with its small but useful feature set is a nice option to have. If you are serious about it, do familiarize yourself with the keyboard shortcuts or press CTRL+/ when you forget one. So, do you feel that Google Docs Drawings is scribble worthy?
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| Yogile – A Cool Alternative To Flickr With Group Sharing Features Posted: 30 Aug 2010 10:31 AM PDT
Yogile sets itself apart from other photo-sharing websites by adding one feature that turns into the ultimate photo sharing choice – and that is the feature of collaboration – allowing more than one person to add photos to any given photo album. And the best part is that you can choose exactly how you want to use the site.
Once you are signed up, you can choose whether or not to list your albums publicly on Yogile. If you do so, anyone on Yogile can upload a photo to that album. The availability of this option has great potential to be used for crowdsourcing images of a specific event or theme. Alternatively, you can choose not to list it publicly, but anyone who has the URL can add photos to the album. If you want the utmost privacy, you can choose not to list it publicly and password protect it so that no one can view or add photos unless they have the URL and password.
Adding photos can be done in one of two ways. The easiest way is to upload the photos directly onto the site, and you don’t even have to be a registered member to do so. The drawback, when adding photos to a friend’s album, if you are not a registered member, is that they will be listed under an anonymous contributor. If you sign up, you have the added advantage of being able to take credit for the photos that you added.
Alternatively, you can send the photos to the album-specific email and they will be added to the album. If the album is password protected, simply add the password to the body of the email. If you enter a subject in the email, it will be used as the title of the photo, otherwise the file name will be used. If an album is not password protected, you can use the subject to enter a title, and the body of the email to enter a caption. As they suggest at Yogile, one of the ideal ways in which their service can be used is if a group of friends are attending an event, you can all add and view photos in the very same album. Like Flickr’s free accounts, you are limited to 100MB per month for your uploads, which really can go a very long way. If that isn’t enough, there is a paid upgrade for unlimited storage for $24.95 a year. You can keep track of your usage each time you upload a new photo.
But that’s not to say it can’t be used in a hundred other ways. With its clean layout, you can use it simply to showcase your photographs, whether publicly or only with a select few. This is another way in which Yogile has one up on Flickr. While you can post pictures privately on Flickr, and share them with specific people – they have to be registered members on Flickr. With Yogile, all you have to do is send them the link to the album, along with the password and they can view it without having to sign up for a thing. There are three options for the album display. The album can be displayed with small thumbnails.
With medium thumbnails.
Or with just one large image per page.
The only minuscule shortcoming is the fact that you cannot choose whether or not to allow people to upload photos to the album. That feature is, of course, their biggest selling point, but it wouldn’t be a terrible idea to have the option to switch it off, if you so choose. When someone adds a photo to your album, you will receive an email notification. That is the default setting for your albums, but you can choose to switch notifications off.
There are, however, certain features in Flickr that are lacking in Yogile. You cannot view the images at a larger size, add other members as contacts to follow their work, add photos as favourites, and there are no groups. Features that you can find in Yogile include the ability to share each of your photo albums, to view the photos as a slideshow, or you can even download the entire album at the click of a button, albeit at smaller sizes. Another interesting personal touch is the ability to choose your own customised URL for your album. Would you consider leaving behind Flickr in favour of Yogile? Let us know in the comments. Do you like MakeUseOf articles? Don’t forget to share our articles with others! It’s really important to us.
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| Daniusoft Double Giveaway: Video Converter Ultimate & DVD Creator [Mac] Posted: 30 Aug 2010 08:30 AM PDT
This week, we will be giving away 10 licenses for Video Converter Ultimate and 10 licenses for DVD Creator for Mac, worth almost $1100 in total! Find out how you can grab yourself a copy. Giveaway #1: Video Converter Ultimate (reviewed by Jonathan Bennett)
Throughout testing, Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate worked flawlessly. It supports an impressive amount of file formats, more than you will probably ever need. This software has the ability to rip and burn DVDs for backups, convert one file format into another, remove DRM licenses, and easily transfer files to media devices like the iPod or PSP. For this review, we devised three scenarios.
Converting A Video To Another Video FormatThe first test was to convert a YouTube video to another format. After downloading the “Will it Blend” YouTube video using DownloadHelper, the FLV was added to the queue.
You can view and change some options to suit your output preference.
Now all that’s left to do is click "Start" and let it go.
The software gives you an estimated file size and as shown above, the conversion is in process. It took about 20 seconds to convert this video on a relatively new computer, but these times can vary depending on your computer specifications. As expected, the converted file worked great.
In case you’re curious – yes, the iPad will blend, so be careful where you place it down while in the kitchen. Converting A Video To MP3 FormatNext, I wanted to convert the video to MP3 audio, so I could transfer it to my iPod and listen to it blend while I’m doing my semi-annual 15-minute jog outside. I followed the same procedure as before, but chose the MP3 format for my output.
Again, the software lets you change a number of settings that pertain to whatever file type you choose. Converting video to audio MP3 only took about five seconds, which is much quicker than converting it to another video format. The audio quality sounded just as good as the original video. Ripping a DVD For The iPodFor my final test I wanted to backup a DVD. The movie I grabbed from my shelf was Casanova, which coincidentally is what I unsuccessfully encourage girlfriends to call me. Anyway, simply load the DVD into the software as shown below.
The software will scan the disk and ask which tracks you want to backup. You can also see a preview of the video, if needed.
After this, select the file format. I went with an iPod MP4 file.
Great! As shown below, the estimated file size for this 2-hour movie is 820MB, which will fit easily on a 8GB iPod.
Conversion of this movie took around 45 minutes, which is reasonable for a video of this length. I highly recommend Daniusoft Video Converter Ultimate to anyone who is looking to extend the portability of their files. It has worked great for me and I’m happy it passed my tests. If you’re interested, give the free trial a go and see how it works for you. Video Converter Ultimate has been through major upgrades and now boasts 5X faster conversion with NVIDIA CUDA Giveaway #2: DVD Creator for MacIf you’re the kind of person who likes to burn your own homemade DVDs or create fun slideshows of your photos – Daniusoft DVD Creator for Mac has all the features you could possibly ask for, and then some.
Daniusoft DVD Creator for Mac allows you to convert just about any format video into a DVD. Using the software you can also burn videos from your AVCHD videos (MTS, M2TS), TP and TRP. Supported video formats include AVI, MP4, MPG, 3GP, WMV, ASF, RM, RMVB, DAT, MOV, FLV and MKV.
If you’re a photography enthusiast, and want to show off your photos in a larger than life slideshow, Daniusoft DVD Creator makes it easy to create a stunning slideshow of your photos. Supported image formats include PNG, JPG, TIFF and BMP. Just select all the photos you want included in the slideshow and drag them into Daniusoft DVD Creator. Editing the slideshow allows you to include music and add dynamic transitions.
The software will also come in handy when putting together home-made films, with a built-in video editor. The editing suite has a long list of features including trimming your files, adding effects, increasing brightness, contrast, cropping the size of your frame, rotating and adding a watermark.
Once your video is ready to be burned to a DVD, you can create a personalised DVD menu, adding your own text, frame and buttons.
Daniusoft DVD Creator allows you to select the background picture, video thumbnail, and music.
The software is easy to use, with its drag and drop interface, and is compatible with DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, DVD+R DL, DVD-R DL, DVD-RAM, DVD–5 and DVD–9. How do I win a copy?It’s simple, just follow the instructions.
This giveaway begins now and ends Friday, 3rd September at 2100hrs PST. The winners will be selected at random and announced via email. Spread the word to your friends and have fun! MakeUseOf would like to thank Daniusoft for their generosity while participating in this giveaway. Interesting in sponsoring? We’d love to hear from you. Get in touch with us via email. Hey Facebookers, make sure to check out MakeUseOf page on Facebook. Over 24,000 fans already!
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iTunes is one of those programs many of us love to hate. When it’s working well it’s okay, but when things go wrong it can get spectacularly bad. And quickly. Ever run into an iTunes issue that left you hunting all over the internet and Apple forums for a fix? I doubt there’s any iTunes users who haven’t spent time doing exactly this.
Japanese culture has infiltrated the imagination of millions of non-Japanese people, be it via the explosion of Anime and Manga, the delicacy of the Japanese cuisine, the mystery of the Geishas or the fascination with samurais. For some fans of the culture, there is one thing that separates them from a real understanding of the nuances of the Japanese world – its language.
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