You don't need to be Stephen Spielberg to shoot a great home movie these days -- simply point and shoot the camcorder and your memories are captured -- but you might feel like you have to be Bill Gates to get the video onto a PC.

While it might seem like a daunting task, transferring your home movie to a home computer is a breeze. Why is it necessary, you ask? For three main reasons: to edit the home movie into something that's entertaining to watch; to archive the video for long-term storage (perhaps on an external hard drive or a few recordable DVDs); or to share these memories with family and friends over the Internet.

Here's all you need to know about importing video and making a home movie:

Step 1. After you shoot video on your camcorder or digital camera, connect it to your PC via its USB or FireWire cable, which is usually included in the camcorder box. If you use a DVD-based camcorder, however, simply pop out the disc and put it in your PC's DVD-ROM tray. Windows XP and Windows Vista users should see an AutoPlay prompt, so click the option to import your video into the built-in Windows Movie Maker program. Alternatively, launch Windows Movie Maker (by clicking Start > All Programs) and choose to import your video. If you're on a Mac you can use iMovie to import your video.

Step 2. Now you can start a new project in Windows Movie Maker (or iMovie, on a Mac) and you'll see a number of thumbnail images of your movie on the screen (usually the first frame). Use your mouse to drag and drop these video clips onto the timeline at the bottom of the screen (in the order you choose). Tools are also available here to cut unwanted video, such as removing a few minutes from the beginning of one clip. You can also add effects to tweak the look of your video with fancy zooms, colour tweaks, and of course, transitions for how one video bleeds into the next. Click Titles/Credits to add on-screen text. It all should be all easy to follow (when in doubt, resort to the Help file).

Step 3. You're almost done! Now, click Audio (or Music) to select a favourite song to play during your home movie. You can also import a fitting song you already have on your hard drive (e.g. a MP3 file), and if you like, use a computer microphone to add some personal narration. Now you can preview your handiwork by clicking the large Play button beneath the video screen. Ready to share your home movie? Choose from a number of options to publish your video to a recordable DVD, post to a website, save to your hard drive, and so on. Now break out the popcorn.