HighlightCam provides a no-edit-editing mobile video editing experience that mashes up user-selected iPhone videos into short, shareable mini-movies using face recognition and automated editing. Users pick videos, choose a title, and select whether the software should focus on people, audio, action, or a balance of the three; creation time varies with video size and one reviewer reported about two minutes. The app uses a credit model—users start with 10 movie credits and can purchase more to create additional videos. The product originated from a surveillance-style approach that highlighted audio and motion changes and was repurposed into consumer-facing automated editing. The company graduated from Y Combinator and officially launched in February 2011. Financially, HighlightCam disclosed a $2.8M funding event in a Form D filing and previously had only Y Combinator as prior funding. HighlightCam provides an iPhone/iPod Touch app that automates video editing by using machine-vision analysis of images and audio to score clips on quality, activity, voice and faces, then simulates a human editor to assemble minimovies. Users specify an objective and the system selects scenes, applies fades, cuts bad shots, and performs audio fading, returning finished videos to the user’s device. The app also offers one-step publishing to YouTube and Facebook. HighlightCam is positioning video creation around mobile devices rather than PCs and plans an Android component in the near future. The company targets casual shooters—especially parents and pet owners—who shoot lots of video but lack time or skill to edit manually. Founded in 2009, the startup currently has four employees and has disclosed outside funding.

Total raised

$3M

Funding rounds

2

Latest round

Series A

Latest activity

Nov 2011