Make your own virtual tour videos for FREE!

I found a really nice piece of software way back in August 2005 and it is perfect for "do it yourself" real estate agents. It's called Microsoft Photo Story 3. The program is really awesome and you will not believe what you can do with a few pictures in just a couple of minutes. This program works as well today as it did 4 years ago.  I use it all the time.  The only catch is you have to verify that your version of Windows is legal. Once you pass the test you can get the program for free.


I put together a short example, seen below, using some photo's I took of my home during the Christmas season.  This is the source code for embedding a movie into your web  page.  Just change the information so it fits your video and you can easily  embed your own "virtual tours" into your own web pages.  It isn't hard at all.  I added controls and made it loop the movie once you start it.  I could have easily auto-started the movie after the page loaded, but I like the reader to have some control.  I would probably auto-start the tour if it was on my web site.  I just wanted to show you there are options.

<object type="video/x-ms-wmv"
data="http://www.your_domain.com/movies/PhotoStoryMovie.wmv"
width="575" height="430">
<param name="src"
value="http://www.your_domain.com/movies/PhotoStoryMovie.wmv">
<param name="autostart" value="false">
<param name="loop" value="true">
<param name="showstatusbar" value="true">
<param name="controller" value="true">
</object>



The above example only took me about 10 minutes to make and it wouldn't take much longer to expand it even further.  I did try some custom pan and zoom features so it wouldn't even take 10 minutes to create a tour if you let the program use its own default pan and zoom features.  It really does a nice job all by itself.

This is perfect for making your own virtual tours. Of course if you like paying others to do something you can do by simply taking a few pictures of the home, loading them into Photo Story 3, spending a few minutes tweaking it, adding some built in music... and saving it, that's ok with me. Personally, if I have some extra time on my hands I like to do things that will keep money in my pocket.

There is enough different music built into the program that can be easily added. You can even narrate each image if you choose as well as add custom text to each picture.  The music I used in my example is right out of the program. You can of course use some of your own if you want.  Just be careful of copyright laws.

Spend just a little time playing with the program and before you know it you'll be making a virtual tour just like a pro. The program will do most of the work for you and you will be surprised at how good it looks just using default values used by the built in wizard. I am seriously impressed, and the price is about as good as it gets, FREE.