Featured Android App Review: WeVideo – Video Editor [Media]

Do you find yourself with a bunch of videos and pictures with no organization in sight? Do you wish you had the time to edit them and make them more meaningful? Then look no further because I have an app for you. It’s called WeVideo and it’s a very simple video editor for your Android phone. As people are starting to use their phones more and more for both videos and pictures, an app like this is a must have.

WeVideo is actually an online editing tool, but now you get many of the same features on your Android phone at basically no cost. I know what you’re thinking. You are saying to yourself that this is just going to be another app that is complicated, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. Trust me, within minutes you will have some really cool videos.

Once you open the app, you will be given the opportunity to create an account via Gmail, Facebook, or Yahoo!. I used the Gmail option, which was quite simple. You need this account because WeVideo is going to save your projects online at their website. More on that later. Once you are in the app, you can tap on the Menu icon at the top left. Just choose New Video. Then you type in a name for the video such as “A day at the beach”. Now you will be in the edit mode. You will see three tabs at the top: Videos, Images, and Audio. Each of those areas will have the media associated with it. For music, it’s just a matter of selecting what song (on your device) you want to be played on the video or if you don’t want music, you can choose “No audio”. For videos and images, just drag the ones you want to the area that says, “Drag video and photos here”. This is the timeline.

You can now tap on any of the video and images in the timeline for further editing. You can trim videos by sliding the start and end points. Don’t worry because your originals in your gallery will be unchanged. You can also adjust the volume and add a caption. For pictures, you can choose how long you want it to be displayed or add a caption. If you want to re-arrange the videos and image, you can drag them in the timeline. After you’re happy with your video, now it’s time to select a theme or style. Just tap on the Style icon at the bottom and you will find 23 styles to choose from. Each style has its own custom transitions and color effects. You will find styles such as Vintage, Punk Rock, Confetti, Travel Journal, Polished, Bold & Distinct, and so on. If you don’t want a theme, just select “No theme”.

After you have selected your style, you can review your video to give you an idea of what it will look like. If you want to do any further editing or change the style, you can still do so. If you’re happy with the results, you can now hit the publish icon at the bottom right. This is where you will be given an opportunity to send it directly to Facebook or YouTube. You can also save a local copy to your gallery if you choose. No matter what, it will publish to the WeVideo site as a cloud backup. All the images, videos, and music will be uploaded to WeVideo, the final video will be rendered, and the video will export to your local storage (if you chose this option). Once everything is completed you will get a notification and an email telling you so. If you chose to save a copy to your gallery, you can always share it whenever you want without having to render it again. Your project will automatically be saved to both your phone and the WeVideo site, so if you ever want to fine tune things, you can.

The app itself is free and you are allowed 5GB of storage and up to 15 minutes of export time (for exporting videos to your device) per month. You can purchase additional storage if you wish, but I would say most people will be fine with the amount they are offering at no charge. To give you an idea of costs, they offer a package that gives you 10GB of data and 60 minutes of exporting for $4.99 per month or $49.99 annually. If you only want storage, you can grab 10GB for $2.99 per month or $29.99 per year. They have other levels as well so check out their site. All videos on your phone will be rendered to 720p, but you can opt for 1080p on the site. You also get a chance to do some more sophisticated editing on the site as well. The one caveat is if you edit on the site and need to render, your final copy will have a watermark and only be 480p. You can drop the watermark and render to 720p for 99-cents or 1080p for $1.99. If you’re using your phone only, there is no charge and no watermark. One other thing the site offers is the ability to directly share to more sites such as Twitter, Vimeo, Dropbox, and Google Drive. In my opinion, the casual user will probably never need to go to the site or pay extra.

All in all, WeVideo is a very simple app for editing your videos. I know a lot of people will go on vacation or to an event and take a lot of videos and pictures, but what is the fun in that if it’s not documented correctly? I know most people share their images, but when it comes to videos, they usually get forgotten. WeVideo will turn those videos and images into something memorable for yourself and your family. The best part of it is that it won’t require that much work or cost.

If you’re still not convinced, check out my hands on video below on how easy it is, and grab one of the download links. As always, let me know what you think.