File Types Supported by Windows Movie Maker

2008-09-09

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Many File Types

Windows Movie Maker is a digital editing program that hopes to combine multiple types of media files into a single project. In this way you create a finished piece that ends up as a collage coming together as one solid video. To do this, the program is designed to capture and import a variety of file types.

Video

Once you import a file into Windows Movie Maker it is saved as a Windows Media file. If you are importing video files that you already have saved on your hard drive you can choose most files types. Windows Move Maker supports all the usual files, including avi, asf, mpeg, mpg, m1v, mp2, mp2v, mpe, and wm.

Audio or Picture

If you want outside audio files for sound effects and music, you also have a variety to choose from. It supports most files types such as mp3, aif, aiff, asf, au, mp2, mpa, snd, wva and wav. The same thing goes when it comes to picture files. You can import bmp, dib, emf, gif, jfif, jpe, jpg,jpeg, png, tif, tiff, and wmf.

Capture Buffer

If you are trying to capture footage directly from an external device, tape, or recording instrument, then you are going to want to use the capture transfer. When footage is captured, it essentially plays all the way through, while the editing program records the footage into a specified file type. The capture buffer helps save each frame immediately as it is captured, to prevent large amount of footage in case something cancels or corrupts the capturing process. This file is saved in the Temporary Storage file.

Multimedia

Film is a medium that is crafted to combine many visual and audio elements to create something entirely new. Because of this, it is important for any editing program you use to include as many formats as possible. Since Windows Media Maker does allow so many media file types your options are dramatically increased, and this is good for video producers both large and small.

This post is part of the series: Windows Movie Maker

This series of articles cover the different tools in Window’s on-board editing program, Windows Movie Maker, teaching you all you need to customize your video production.