Create Lyric Videos for YouTube Using Windows Movie Maker

Everyone wants to become famous on YouTube by making videos and you want to do that too. However, what kind of videos are you going to make? Don't know? How about lyric videos? You know, the ones that you sing along with. That sounds like hard work, but it isn't; it's actually quite easy. This article will show you how to create a YouTube lyric video using Windows Movie Maker. Keep on reading!

Steps

  1. Make a YouTube account. If you have an old one, keep it. If you want, you can make a new account that only makes lyric videos. The username for your new lyric-video-making account should be something like TheLyricerz, TheAwesomeLyrics, or LyricCity. Create a username that's funky and cool. Don't copy others. Also, remember that you can't take a username that has already been taken; you will be asked to put another username.
  2. Create or find an exciting image. All the lyrics will go there. However, make sure you aren't committing copyright infringement by doing this!
  3. Open Windows Movie Maker. That's where you'll make the lyric video.
  4. Click the Audio/Video button. Find your song and click "Import".

    For the newest version of Windows Movie Maker, however, you will need to add a title page or picture /before/ adding a song. To do this, simply click the "Add photo or video" button or the "Title" button on the ribbon along the top of the screen, select the desired image, if you so choose, and click "Open" to import it.
  5. Click and drag your song to where it says "Audio/Music" on the video timeline or the video storyboard.

    Your picture should be at the beginning already unless you imported the picture before adding a title. To switch the positions, simply click and drag the image you would like to change the location of and place the blue line (the indication of where the image or video will go) to the desired location.
  6. Import the picture you chose. Click the "Pictures" button, find the picture that you chose, and click the button that says "Import".

    For those of you using the newer version of Windows Movie Maker, however, you have already imported your picture or video. For this step, you will instead click on the "Add Music" button which is also in the ribbon along the top of the screen next to the "Add Picture or Video" button, usually to the right. After that, you simply select your song and click the "open" button to import the song to the video.
  7. Click and drag your picture to where it says "Video" on the video timeline or storyboard.

    Again, for those of you who have already adjusted the placement of the pictures and videos, you will instead need to adjust the placement of the song. Since there is no longer a timeline with the music on the bottom, the music imported simply begins wherever you are in the video when you import it. To adjust the song placement, there are two methods.
    A: You may do as you have done with the pictures by clicking and dragging the music to wherever you would like it to start. You can drag the song so that it begins at the beginning or ending of a certain slide, or you may drag the song such that it begins somewhere within a frame, or
    B: You may see that there is a button along the top ribbon which contains an option of song properties. Click this tab. Within this tab, on the ribbon at the top of the screen, there will be an option to manually input the start and end time for the song, down to the nearest hundredth of a second. You can use the arrows to increase or decrease the starting and ending time, or you may type in into the box.
  8. Click the "Titles and Credits" button, then click "Title on Selected Clip" and type out all the lyrics for the song.

    For the users of the newer versions, on the home tab within the ribbon, there are buttons to add a title page or to add a credits page. Either option will work, though many people find the credits option to work better. From here, you may approach this in numerous manners. First, you may type all of your lyrics into this one text box. This, however, is not recommended as there is a great likelihood that the pace of the words will not keep up with the song. Another option is to add one screen's worth of credits for each verse or so. Later, there will be more detail about how to adjust this.
  9. Check it over. Make sure all the lyrics are accurate.
  10. Make a lot more lyric videos. Create them for many songs, even the ones you don't like.
  11. Make yourself known!
    • Create your own website. In your website, post all of your lyric videos and the other songs you are going to do in the future.
    • Open Facebook, Myspace and Twitter Accounts. Let your fans know what you are doing.
  12. As for more details about how to customize your video: experiment. There are many tabs that allow you to adjust your video to your own tastes and make it more of your video. There are ways to adjust font, text color, text size, background color, lyric effects, lyric animations (how the words come on or off of the screen), picture transitions, picture effects, the very specific timing of the lyrics, how long each phrase or verse will last, among many other things. Don't forget to save often!



Tips

  • Pay attention to your videos to make sure you didn't make any mistakes.
  • Make sure the lyrics are correct or people will call you out on it.
  • Come up with an original username.
  • Have Fun!
  • Don't delete your old account for the new one if you don't want to.

Warnings

  • Create an original name and don't copyright. You might get in trouble.
  • Be careful that the songs and pictures you choose will not have severe copyright infringement repercussions.

Things You'll Need

  • Laptop/computer
  • Headsets (optional)
  • Windows Movie Maker
  • YouTube Account (Or Gmail Account)
  • Songs and their lyrics
  • Backdrop for lyric picture

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