…I’d hate to rely on a working internet connection when in front of an audience!
When I embed an internet videos in a presentation, I always make sure to be running off a copy that has been saved to my hard-drive.
Here is one way to make this happen:
- Install the Firefox extension DownloadHelper
- Download & install Riva FLV Encoder (freeware – PC-only)
Using the DownloadHelper, you can now download video from just about any online site to your hard-drive. Assuming you want to embed a YouTube video, you’ll need to convert the resulting flash video to an MPEG format before you can embed it in your presentation.
Using the Riva software you can convert your file to MPEG format, but one step is a bit counter-intuitive since the software is “designed” to go from MPEG to flash. (Detail on the steps can be found here)
Once you have the video in an MPEG format, you can use the standard tools within PowerPoint to embed the video into your presentation and you won’t have to worry about loosing an internet connection during your presentation!
Head’s up: I honestly have no idea about the legality of using YouTube video in your presentation, but my guess is that depending on who owns the video, this could be against YouTube rules and could be illegal. Nonetheless, in the past, I’ve had a lot of luck by simply asking the permission of the person who posted the video if I could use it in one of my presentations…
Good advice Dustin. Another way to go is to simply embed a link in a video frame screen shot which connects to the video at the source (probably bypassing legal issues). Again, you need internet access.
I, too, do not rely on internet access at the venue (although the MLS school is pretty reliable) so I bring my Verizon air card. It has yet to fail me.
You rightly advise about copyright risks of using another’s video but I take the position that the doctrine of Fair Use allows video in the context of an educational setting. But yes, permission is usually the way I go. (note: the one video I plan to use is a humorous one “I’m busy blogging ” which Rudy uploaded to YouTube some time ago– do you know that video has over 82,000 views. )
Here’s the link for those you have not seen it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12yD8JyaVvY
Great stuff Joe. Amusingly, when I did my first blog presentation with Top Producer a little over a year ago, I used the exact methodology above to embed that blogging video into my presentation. Amusingly, I didn’t ask permission and it turned out that the source of the video (RUDY!) showed up at my first presentation!!!
Also, just a head’s up… I REALLY wanted to do a demo of twitter at a NAR conference in Vegas, but the event center was underground, so even the Verizon air card wouldn’t work! 🙁
This is great for those of us who are technically challenged.
I am giving a talk tomorrow about blogging for beginners, and this looks very, very useful, as the Common Craft videos are perfect.
http://www.commoncraft.com/store
Now, of course I only recommend you use this for videos you have rights to… but you can use this website to save a copy from most of the video streaming sites (including YouTube) regardless of the browser you are using:
http://www.keepvid.com
Jim: Glad to hear the timing works well for you! 😉
I use the “Download Embedded” Firefox Add-on, which does about the same thing. But recently I have been using the capture screen video feature of SnagIt for quick an dirty screen quality captures to reference in emails or Twitters. It’s very quick and easy and I find it to be “good enough” for a lot of uses. I suppose in presentations you might want to keep the quality a little higher, though.
Playing around with it a bit, it looks like you can load up a YouTube video the same way as in the browser — so prior to actually presenting just play through the video in the slide and keep PowerPoint open.
Brad: Good call… If I had the YouTube video “cached” before the presentation, I’d feel much better about using the embed tool…