Turn videos that play on their side

The quickest and easiest way to remedy video that plays on its side is to use a media player that includes built-in support for video rotation. This is not a feature that is to be found in the likes of Windows Media Player, but it is available in the free program VLC Media Player. Launch a web browser and go to the VideoLAN website. When the site loads, click the blue Download VLC button that appears to the right-hand side of the page.

If the File Download Security Warning dialogue box appears, click Save and then choose a location for the downloaded file. Firefox users should select Save File to save the download to Firefox’s default download folder. Now double-click the downloaded file (named ‘vlc-1.1.11-win32.exe’, or similar) and click Run if a security warning dialogue is displayed. In the User Account Control pop-up, click the Yes button and then click OK to start the installation process. Click Next followed by Next, select the Full option from the dropdown menu and click Next. Click the Install button and wait while the installation completes. Tick the box labelled ‘Run VLC media player 1.1.1’ and click the Finish button: VLC should launch.

Open the Media menu, select Open File and browse to the affected video: select it and click the Open button. Click the Tools menu and select the ‘Effects and Filters’ option before clicking the Video Effects tab. Move to the Basic tab and then tick the box labelled Transform. From the dropdown menu in the lower right of the window select either ‘Rotate by 90 degrees’ or ‘Rotate by 270 degrees’ (the appropriate one depends on the required fix) before clicking Close. Now click the Play button to watch the video, using the transport buttons at the bottom of the VLC window to control playback.

This does the job but it’s a temporary, on-the-fly fix by VLC – the original file is unaffected, so the orientation remains wrong. If you want to share the clip with others who may not have VLC installed, or would like to upload footage to a site such as Youtube, a permanent rotation must be applied to the video. This can be done using Windows Live Movie Maker. If you don’t already have this installed, launch a web browser and visit the Windows Live Essentials 2011 page. Click the blue ‘Download now’ button and, if the File Download Security Warning dialogue box appears, click Save and then choose a location for the downloaded file. Firefox users should select Save File to save the download to Firefox’s default download folder. Save the executable file to the desktop. Double-click the downloaded file and click the ‘Choose the programs you want to install’ link. Ensure that ‘Photo Gallery and Movie Maker’ is installed and click Install. Restart the computer when prompted.

Launch Windows Live Movie Maker from the Start menu and then click the ‘Add videos and photos’ button in the toolbar before selecting the video file to work with; alternatively, simply drag and drop a video onto the empty panel to the right of the program window. The video preview area shows the footage on its side. In the main program toolbar, click either the ‘Rotate left 90°’ or ‘Rotate right 90°’ button until the video is shown the right way up.

Now that the video has the correct orientation, it can be saved as a new clip so that it can be viewed or shared with others with no further work. Click the arrow button to the left of the Home tab at the top of the screen and then click ‘Save movie’ followed by ‘For computer’. Choose where the video should be saved, type in a suitable name and click the Save button. Depending on the length and resolution of the video, you may have to wait anything from a few seconds to a few minutes for the new video file to be created and saved.