Sharing the movie is the best part of making it, and there are lots of ways available.

There are five ways to share your movie using Movie Maker 2. You can save the movie to your computer, save it to a recordable CD, or save as a specific file format (for e-mail, the Web, or for playback on your DV camera). Each has pros and cons, of course. You wouldn’t want to send an hour-long movie to a friend via e-mail, for instance, since burning to a CD would be a better choice, just as you wouldn’t want to save and distribute a two-minute video of your garage band on a CD when placing it on a web site would be more efficient.

Because choosing how and where to save can sometimes be a little tricky, here are a few thoughts on the saving options for particular movie types:

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■ My Computer Save the movie to your computer when you want

to burn it to a CD later, view the movie only on the computer, or

share the movie and view it later on any networked computer.

■ Recordable CD Save the movie to a recordable CD when you

want to mail it to a friend, take it with you to a gathering, give it to

someone, or archive it.

■ E-Mail Save the movie in this format when you plan to e-mail it.

Movies sent via e-mail must be extremely short, generally no more

than a minute or two in length.

■ The Web Save the movie for the Web when you have a short

movie and plan to put in on the Internet or save it to a Pocket PC

or smartphone. These movies must be short, generally only a few

minutes.

■ DV Camera Save the movie in this format when you plan to

record the finished movie back to the DV camera and a DV camera

tape. Tapes make so-so archive options but offer a good way to take

a movie with you when there are no other alternatives. For instance,

with a DV camera, you can view the movie at a backyard party,

where no computer is available.

Once you’ve decided how you want to save and share the movie, making the movie is a snap:

1. Click File | Save Movie File to open the Save Movie Wizard dialog

box, shown in Figure 7-27. Make the appropriate choice and click

Next.

2. Enter a filename for the movie and, if necessary, browse to the

location in which to save the movie. If necessary, place a blank

CD in the CD-R drive or connect the DV camera to the computer.

Click Next.

3. Depending on your choice in Step 1, you’ll be prompted on how

to proceed. If you chose e-mail, there won’t be much else to do. If

you chose My Computer, you’ll need to select quality options. For

the most part, the defaults and the recommended options are best.

However, in specific circumstances, configuring advanced options is

required. Configuring other options is achieved by selecting Other

Settings in the Movie Settings dialog box. There, you can select the exact

type of movie you need.

4. Click Next and wait for the movie to be rendered.

That about covers it for getting your media organized quickly and efficiently. Getting your pictures in folders, your music organized in playlists, and your movies created and saved, and then backing up all of those items is quite a task! With that done, you can now concentrate on other things.  Next, you’ll learn about networking. If you have another computer in  the house, such as a Media Center, sharing files among those computers can greatly enhance how often you can enjoy them. In the upcoming chapter, you’ll learn about wireless networking, troubleshooting the network with command- line tools, and firewalls. Stay tuned!