- YouTube introduces six new features to make Shorts more compelling.
- The tools include auto-generated captions, Minecraft effects, and easier conversion of long-form videos.
- Shorts videos now receive 70 billion daily views.
YouTube Chief Product Officer Johanna Voolich introduced six new tools designed to make YouTube Shorts more compelling.
These tools aim to make Shorts creation accessible to everyone, even those without extensive video editing experience.
Two of the offerings focus on presenting audio and speech in your video, including auto-generated captions that can be edited and customized, and the option to choose from four voices to have your text narrated or spoken out loud.
Celebrate Minecraft’s 15th anniversary
Creators are gaining access to two new effects celebrating the popular game Minecraft’s 15th anniversary.
The Minecraft Spring effect lets you film a video inside the world of Minecraft, while Minecraft Rush adds a new mini-game that can be played inside the Shorts player.
The goal of Minecraft Rush is to record yourself tapping to clear the blocks as quickly as you can, then share that video others to see who’s faster.
Transforming long-form videos into shorts
YouTube is capitalizing on its existing collection of public videos by introducing new tools that make it easier to turn regular videos into Shorts.
The auto-layout tool, initially available on Android, will automatically track the video’s main subject when turning the video into a Short, dynamically panning, zooming, and cropping the video for you.
Another tool will let people remix a remix, allowing creators to create remixes from existing remixes, instead of only from other long-form or Shorts videos.
Shorts continue to grow
Voolich said that Shorts videos now receive 70 billion daily views, the same figure YouTube announced last September.
She also hinted that YouTube may test Shorts videos that extend beyond 60 seconds, as some people want shorter Shorts and others want longer Shorts. YouTube is trying to figure out the right cutoff for Shorts video length.
Some of the new features are newly available but still rolling out, while others will be launched soon.
