Multimedia Presentations: Insert a Video from a Website in PowerPoint 2010

Well, it’s about time. No more packaging files to send your presentation to others or show it from a different computer, just because your slide content includes a video or two. No more worrying about maintaining paths for linked video files so that your media will play. If you’re a PowerPoint user, you might already know what I’m about to tell you: we can finally embed video in PowerPoint presentations.

In previous versions of PowerPoint, if you post a video to a website (such as You Tube) and then want to play it back during your presentation, you need to add a hyperlink on a slide to take you to that webpage for playback. But if you’ve needed this functionality in the past, you might have wondered if there was a way to play that video directly from the slide rather than opening it in a browser. In PowerPoint 2010, you now have the option to insert a video onto your slide from a website and then play it back during your presentation right on the slide—no hyperlinks or browsers involved. To do this:

1.      On the Insert tab, in the Media group, click the arrow at the bottom of the Video command and then click Video From Web Site.

2.      In the dialog box that opens, paste the embed code for the video you want to insert and then click Insert. If the video can be embedded, the embed code is typically available from the webpage where the video is posted. You might see an embed command on the page, or you might need to right-click the video to see that option, depending upon the site. Just select and copy the embed code when it displays on screen.

When you insert video from a website, keep a couple of additional points in mind:

 

·         You must be connected to the Internet, and the video must still be available on the source website for it to play back during your presentation.

·         Video that you insert from a website can’t be edited like the embedded or linked videos from your files and can't use some of the new formatting tools. For example, if you apply a video style, that style is not retained while the video plays.

 Important to note is that If you see a message that PowerPoint cannot use the embed code you have pasted and you know that you copied it correctly, PowerPoint might require a different type of code. There are two types of embed codes available. The correct embed code type to use in PowerPoint starts with the object tag. That is, the word object appears after an open angle bracket: <object… To get this embed code if it is not the one first presented for the video, check whether the page offers an option to use an alternate or old embed code.

Of caution though is Keep in mind that this feature gives you the ability to insert your videos that are hosted on a website. It does not confer any rights. So, please be cautious and respectful of copyrights when choosing media for your presentation. Just because you can technically embed a video does not mean the copyright on that video allows you to do so for your purposes. For example, a video that someone else owns and posts on a public video site may provide an embed code, but that does not mean the owner has given you the right to use it for your marketing or other commercial content.

 

 

Tweet