Manor Park – Larchmont NY – a short video…

Hi Andrew - its a great park...The day these were taken - the weather and light were perfect for photos.

Hi Barbara - Don't get me started on Animoto - If you are using it via Real Bird you might be OK.  But for the avereage consumer - if there are any issues or bugs - the just STINK>  I have had nothign but trouble.  Their customer service is SO BAD that I'm amazed that they are still in business.  They won't even answer questions by phone.  I requested a phone number and they said they ONLY would do email. Their emails show that they don't address the issues and don't care that they are not addressing issues...all they tell me is that I MUST upgrade to pro.  Well - since I have told them over and over and over and over again that they have to fix the bugs in Word Press that come up with the IE browser (the browser used by 80% of my readers) or the product is USELESS to me - you would think they would address the compatibility issues that are at the core of my being unwilling to upgrade.  

Instead of dealing with that - they cut off my account because I "insisted" on using their videos for commercial puproses.   First - I joined long before they were charging an extortionary $250 a year....The price would be FINE if the videos worked on all browsers in WP.  They did originally, but not now.  So they RAISED the price by  10-fold  and lowered the quality of the product - and then cut me off from the 45 videos I had taken the time and energy of creating.  They are on serious drugs if they think I'm coughing up $250 a year for something that doesn't work for 80% of my readers.   

I'll be posting something about them because I think bloggers should avoid them like the plague.   I looked up "animoto complaints" and found that I was far from alone.  It was amazing to see how many people described the customer service as Non-existant.   Don't use them outside that umbrella of Real Bird.  I felt they sucked before I looked them up - afterwards - FORGET IT....Even the comments on their FB page were filled with complaints from  customers who  couldn't get through to them any other way... they had billing problems, embedding problems, quality issues, you name it.

Hi Debbie - they love that park and any and all parks.....

Hi Barbara,

Do you have a word press blog?  Most of my marketing is through that blog.  I post a lot of what I put there here as well, but WP seems to have gotten me more readers over time.  The trouble is that embedding on WP has become a real problem with Animoto.  At first it worked fine - then they changed something and it worked for Firefox & Safari but not IE...but most people still use IE...so thats a BIG problem. It still worked on AR just not Wordpress/IE combo.  Then it got worse.  After WP upgraded, it wouldn't accept Animoto code at all.   It would just delete it.  there were several plugins for animoto on WP - NONE of them worked...So I don't get why they cut off my account when they had so many bugs to fix. And they WON'T talk to me on the phone.  They said that's for "pro" customers only. Well if they want more Pro customers they should pay it forward a bit and deal with serious issues.  The fact is that I don't have problems with other embeds - so the problem rests 99% with animoto.

Check out the urls below and you will see that I am not alone.   These guys are all about the money.  They don't seem to care at all about the consumer.  Great idea - but it shows you how a great idea can go bad if it isn't supported.  The links below are the tip of the iceberg.

http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=7010059809&topic=8250

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/apps/application.php?id=7010059809

Hi Stephanie - Thanks - I actually like this video format .  I read about it when I was reading about the Animoto complaints - several photographers thought this was superior and the youtube download has far better resolution than animoto.

Do people like this slide show?  They have a lot of choices on how to rendert he photos - so its more complex than animoto - but it looks pretty cool to me.   The pro version is less expensive as well but I have to check IE on my WP embed....

Hi Joanna - Huskies have the same issues. For bull dogs and pugs its because they can't dissipate heat through panting as well other dogs because of the way their snouts are shaped.  Huskies can pant - to dissipate heat but they are built in every other way to conserve heat. They can die of heat stroke very easily.  I use AC more for them than for me sometimes.

Hi Gail...I've been hunting for a slide show alternative.  I have a lot of videos with animoto but they are probably going to be inactivated.   There were too many problems with my WP blog and IE. So I wasn't about to spend $250 for the Pro program with so many issues.   It seems every time there was an upgrade, the problems got worse. Every time I tried to get help they refused to talk on the phone - told me it was my sites problem and labeled the problem "solved" then admonished me to upgrade to pro ($250) because I was using it commercially.  I started long before they had that price tag for PRo use. I also told them I would be happy to upgrade if they fixed the bugs.  They just said they had "solved the problem" (by telling me it was my probelm) and then locked me out of my account.   I couldn't get any answers as to what they were offering for pro - and given the long list of negative reviews I got when I checked "animoto customer service" I realized my experience was not unique. No way am I paying $250  for something like that.

I actually like the quality of this video better than the animoto quality. I found that site while looking up Animotos customer service complaints.  A couple of proffessional photographers mentioned it as a good alternative.  

Animoto has a great product - but what a terrible execution.  Even their FB page has angry comments from users who have problems they can't solve.  They are putting it randomly in the comments section of their posts.  Apparently, they can't get attention any other other way. Pitiful.  It shows you how important execution is.

I'm experimenting with the Pro-Show web.  Several professional photographers that specialized in weddings really  liked it. I would think that they would be a tough group to please.   Can you imagine the Bridzilla population if they didn't like ths slide show?? So  I decided that they were worth a good shot.  These guys are bound to be very picky and they felt the customer service was good too...Haven't checked that out.  The issue with my WP blog and IE - not a problem.  I viewed this on my WP blog on a IE the other day.  So the bugs that were making me crazy aren't there.  The problem may be that Animoto will probably delete what I have which pi$$es me off.  But Iwas not about to pay major money to  get no service.