bill wolff fine art photography
Overview
There may be times when you want to download and use videos you find online. Online videos, such as those found on YouTube, are, however, often in file formats not compatible with video applications that come pre-installed on computers. Regardless of the format of a movie uploaded by a user, YouTube displays the movie online in a Flash format with the .flv extension. That format is not compatible with Windows Movie Maker, iMovie, Quicktime, and so on. As a result, if you want to download and use the movie on your computer, if must first be converted into a format compatible with the software you are using and then downloaded. There are a few ways to do this. I advocate two applications, Zamzar and the Firefox Video Download Helper toolbar plugin.
Using Zamzar
Zamzar is the easiest conversion application that I have found online (h/t @briancroxall who told me about it). And it is free, which is even better, and converts dozens of files types (including files that are not movies). There are two ways that it works: 1. you can upload a video; 2. you enter a URL for a video. Once the video is added and/or uploaded, Zamzar will send you an email with a link to where you can download the video. Zamzar will convert from these and more video sites:
See the below screencast to learn how to use Zamzar.
Using Download Helper
Use the download helper plugin when Zamzar isn’t able to convert the video file direct from an URL. Download helper will download the video to your computer and then you can upload it to Zamzar, which will convert it to a format you can use. See the below screencast to learn how to use the Download Helper Plugin.
Movies in the Internet Archive
Movies in the Internet Archive don’t need to be converted. Rather, there are multiple file format options directly under the movie. All you do is right click on the format that is compatible with your software and save the movie. See the below video to learn how to download Internet Archive movies to your computer.
