Animoto Demo Review

Animoto presented at the NY Tech Meetup last evening. Animoto is a way to take your photos and music and create a groovy slideshow that can be embedded on any Web site including MySpace. Here are my notes from the demo:

• They use the Amazon AWS platform for hosting
• The render engine is actually outside of the Amazon platform
• The demo actually didn't work due to the rendering engine at high volume – the presenter explained that it's not the Amazon service that is over-taxed, it's the rendering engine
• Music can be your own or use the pre-made music from Animoto
• Animoto is working on partnerships to expand the platform
• They use clearspring for the widgets
• Clips under 30 seconds are free, over 30 seconds are $3 or $30 a year

Here is the video (apologies for the lighting):