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Digitizing Your Media

The first step to getting your media online is to get it into a computer. This process is referred to as digitizing for analog media such as VHS tapes and audio cassattes and ripping for digital media such as DVDs and CDs.

Digitizing analog media such as a video tape requires specialized hardware that will make the switch from Analog to Digital. The Center for Instructional Technology has two video editing workstations that are equipped to handle this task. For video content , we generally use iMovie for this task, though others (Vidi and Final Cut Express among others) are available as well to meet any specific needs. Other good choices for this task may include Premiere Elements and Windows Movie Maker as well. Many of these products are free or come pre-installed on a new computer and may also include editing features as well.

For audio only content, we primarily recommend and use Audacity for it's ability to combine power and simplicity will being cross platform and free. Audacity also has the ability to use commericial filters that reduce noise and whines in your audio. These are available for use in the CIT as well.

Specific guides to help you accomplish these tasks using on your own are forthcoming and much good info can be found using the links above. Once you've gotten the movie on your computer, you're ready to Edit and then Encode.