Vimeo launches ‘Looks’, lets creators add filters to videos

By Trevor Mogg March 1, 2013

Software companies with photo- or video-based products are all going gaga for filters these days, with video-sharing site Vimeo the latest to roll out a (huge) range of filters to help beautify your work, or in some cases, leave it looking horribly over-cooked.

Vimeo has partnered with video-enhancer start-up Vivoom to bring web-based users of its site more than 700 filters – no, that’s not a typo. Seven hundred.

Recommended Videos

Called ‘Looks’, the feature offers a split-screen enabling you to compare your original video with the filtered look. Find something you like, preview it, tweak the strength of the effect with the ‘intensity’ slider, click ‘enhance’ and you’re done.

vimeo enhancer — Image used with permission by copyright holder

There are 61 pages of filters to work your way through – 12 per page – so enhancing your video might end up taking hours, days or even weeks if you’re the type of person that likes to explore all available options.

“You can also check out recommended Looks tailored to your specific video, or browse by genre, mood, location, color, time period, even holiday,” Vimeo’s Ryan Hefner wrote in a blog post introducing the new feature. “This means you can finally finish that ‘40s Christmas crime drama you’ve been working on since 1947.”

While some filters appear to offer very subtle alterations (eg. Fresh, CSI), others completely transform the image (DNA Transcription, Awesome Possum), though if used with the intensity slider they could offer some neat effects to help your video stand out. However, though Looks may offer many video uploaders a chance to quickly jazz up their clip, it’s a safe bet serious video makers will stick with their current image enhancing tools without giving the new feature a second look.

Vimeo’s filters are free to use for the next three months (so plenty of time to find your favorites) after which time they’ll be available for 99 cents each. The filters are not part of its mobile app, though we can expect to see them incorporated at some point down the road.

Contributing Editor

Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…

Computing

How to change margins in Google Docs

Laptop Working from Home

When you create a document in Google Docs, you may need to adjust the space between the edge of the page and the content --- the margins. For instance, many professors have requirements for the margin sizes you must use for college papers.

You can easily change the left, right, top, and bottom margins in Google Docs and have a few different ways to do it.

Computing

What is Microsoft Teams? How to use the collaboration app

A close-up of someone using Microsoft Teams on a laptop for a videoconference.

Online team collaboration is the new norm as companies spread their workforce across the globe. Gone are the days of primarily relying on group emails, as teams can now work together in real time using an instant chat-style interface, no matter where they are.

Using Microsoft Teams affords video conferencing, real-time discussions, document sharing and editing, and more for companies and corporations. It's one of many collaboration tools designed to bring company workers together in an online space. It’s not designed for communicating with family and friends, but for colleagues and clients.

Computing

Microsoft Word vs. Google Docs

A person using a laptop that displays various Microsoft Office apps.

For the last few decades, Microsoft Word has been the de facto standard for word processors across the working world. That's finally starting to shift, and it looks like one of Google's productivity apps is the heir apparent. The company's Google Docs solution (or to be specific, the integrated word processor) is cross-platform and interoperable, automatically syncs, is easily shareable, and perhaps best of all, is free.

However, using Google Docs proves it still has a long way to go before it can match all of Word's features -- Microsoft has been developing its word processor for over 30 years, after all, and millions still use Microsoft Word. Will Google Docs' low barrier to entry and cross-platform functionality win out? Let's break down each word processor in terms of features and capabilities to help you determine which is best for your needs.
How does each word processing program compare?
To put it lightly, Microsoft Word has an incredible advantage over Google Docs in terms of raw technical capability. From relatively humble beginnings in the 1980s, Microsoft has added new tools and options in each successive version. Most of the essential editing tools are available in Google Docs, but users who are used to Word will find it limited.