Teach ‘Em How to Fish

Zamzar and Handbrake

This post is intended to be a companion to my presentation, “YouTube or DVD to your hard drive!” at the CVCUE conference on April 5, 2008.
I have blogged about Zamzar and Handbrake in the past, but here is a more detailed account of this particular conference session.

———————————————————————————————————————
Zamzar
http://zamzar.com

1. Select files (Choose File) or paste URL.
2. Choose the format to convert to:
(Image, Document, Music, Video, and more!)
3. Enter your email address to receive converted file.
4. Click “Convert”.
5. Wait for the email.
6. Click on the link in the email to download converted file.
7. Put video in iTunes for easy access during class.

•Wait time has increased since the paid account option appeared.
•YouTube or TeacherTube videos are now “harvestable” to your hard drive.
•Grab video that might be blocked on your campus, or otherwise not be accessible during class time.
•Put downloaded videos in a video editor like iMovie to crop, combine, etc.

———————————————————————————————————————
Handbrake

1. Download at http://handbrake.fr/
2. Put application in the proper place (Applications folder on Mac OS X) so it runs off the hard drive instead of the disk image.
3. Run program & insert DVD.
4. Wait. Program will take time to read the chapters on the DVD.
5. Choose the section of the DVD that you want to harvest to your hard drive (might be tricky; might have to guess).
6. Explore pop-up options.
7. Click Start.
8. Wait. Now it’s reading and harvesting the chapter from the DVD to your hard drive.
9. Locate file on your hard drive. If it’s too long, use a video editor such as iMovie to trim it down.
10. Put it in iTunes for easy access during class.

Click here to download a Word document version of this Zamzar and Handbrake How-To

Please comment below if you have additional tips on either of these two tools, or if you think something I’ve done here could be improved.

Tags: CVCUE, video