Windows Movie Maker is a great program that lets us take our still photos and videos, add awesome effects and transitions and all sorts of fun things to make a movie.  You can think of it as a movie or kind of like a glorified slideshow, but either way you think of it, it’s lots of fun.  One of the things I like most about Windows Movie Maker is that it really lets me take my pictures and tell a story.  Adding music to a movie can be a really big part of telling my story.  So how do you get music into a movie.

After you’ve got all your pictures arranged in your storyboard and all of your effects and transitions chosen, then you are ready to start adding music. 

1. Click on Audio or Music.  You will find this on the left side of your screen under tasks, in the import section. 

2. Double click on the folder you want to open, click on the song you want to import, and then click import.  this will actually bring the song into the program. 

3. You will need to click and drag the song down to the storyboard (remember that click and drag means to click and hold your click down and drag the object to where you want to move it and then let go of your click).  You cannot actually add music in the storyboard view so you will automatically be switched over to the timeline view. 

4. If you want to shorten your song you can click on the song (your mouse will turn from an arrow to a little hand when you move it over your song, that’s ok) in the bottom of the screen where it is sitting in the Audio/Music row.  This is just selecting the song, and you will see a thicker black line around the edge so you know it is selected.  When you move your mouse over to the very edge of your song on the right hand side you will see a little red arrow.  When you see that, you can click and hold your click down, then drag the song down to the left.  This is like telling the computer you only want to play the song until a certain time and is shortening the time you will hear the song. 

5. If you want your song to fade in and fade out you will need to right click on the song and select the options fade in and fade out.  This is a really nice way to make your music flow, especially if you are using more than one song in your movie. You definitely want to consider fading out from one song and fading into the next.