There’s a host of new web applications coming out every day. Most are just hype but a few really stand out as something unique and useful. Animoto is one that is not only useful but also amazingly easy and fun to use.

Animoto is a web application that creates MTV-style videos with the click of a button. Users simply choose a song and images. Animoto then automatically generates a unique video for them. But before you think this is just another slideshow service like the countless others out there, keep reading.

Many of the post-production techniques that the founders used while working as producers for MTV, Comedy Central & ABC are used in Animoto’s patent-pending Cinematic Artificial Intelligence developed to think like an actual editor and director. The resulting video is produced in a widescreen format, containing the visual energy of a music video and the emotional impact of a movie trailer.

Best of all, no two videos are ever the same. Even videos generated with an identical set of images and music selection will each have an entirely distinct set of motion design.

One of my favorite features about Animoto is their awesome music selection available for your video. Animoto is dedicated to supporting new artists and music. You can either upload your own music or choose from the growing library of commercially-licensed indie bands. No stock music, no cover bands and no elevator music.

Once your song is selected, the Animoto technology takes into account every nuance of the song – the genre, song structure, energy, rhythm, instrumentation, and vocals. Whether it’s punk, pop, hip-hop or a classical Mozart piece, the video is totally customized to match the track.

The finished video can then be downloaded to your computer, uploaded to YouTube, embedded into a web site or downloaded as an ISO file ready to burn to DVD.

There is even make a free iPhone/iPodTouch version of the application that allows you to select photos from your iPhone and create a 30 second video right there on the spot!

The pricing structure is extremely reasonable considering the time and cost of creating videos of this quality commercially. You can choose to pay per video ($3/full-length video) or purchase an All-Access pass for $30/year. Churches, businesses or organizations can purchase a Commercial Account for $249/year.

As a former Creative Director at a church, I can tell you that the Commercial Account would pay for itself in the first month when you look at how many countless hours are saved putting together slideshows that don’t look anywhere near as attractive as these. Imagine every missions trip, VBS, or outreach event turned into a full-length music-video-style slideshow in less than 10 minutes. You could even create DVDs of your completed videos for all your volunteers with a simple download.

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As you can probably tell, I was pretty blown away by this app. I’d love to know what you think if you try it, especially if you decide to use it at your church.

Thoughts?