In the pre-YouTube era, my favorite mashup was adding corn to my mashed potatoes at KFC, dipping in pulled-off pieces of fried chicken breast--basically creating a precursor to the now infamous Famous Bowl.

Enter YouTube (was it really just back in February '05?) and with it the rise in popularity of the video mashup. Never was it so easy to distribute your mashed up masterpiece, nor so easy to find and download the source material, the clay to be sculpted via your hand-above-mouse.

Soon after beginning to learn some basic video editing in Windows Movie Maker, I hopped on the bandwagon and created my first: a mashup of not only two fight movies, but also two video types, with my webcam recorded, vlog style footage complementing that from the Hollywood big screenpromotion campaigns. Here's how I did it.

Step 1: Light bulb above head

After seeing the trailer for Fighting, I noticed how similar it seemed to the 80s action classic Lionheart, starring Jean-Claude Van Damme. Upon seeing it in the theater, I realized it was basically a redo, hilariously even having its muscly lead, Channing Tatum, mimic Van Damme's all denim outift. But despite being an "update" for our more politically correct times, it mined some of the same stereotypes from its predecessor--something ripe for satire of the viral variety, so I envisioned.

Step 2: Looking through the YouTubes

I needed footage from the two movies, so I started searching through the largest repository of video available online. Bingo! Found the full trailer for Fighting and unearthed a surprisingly full treasure chest of trailer and non-trailer scenes from Lionheart--all of them deliciously cheesy, all of them tastily Van Damme-y. Seriously, anything you want to mash up, I'm sure the ingredients are somewhere on YouTube.

Step 3: Keep it on the download

At CNET's download.com, I found Any Video Converter, a freeware program that allows you to download YouTube videos per their URL, and as the name promises, convert them to various file types (useful, because you'll probably want them in something other than .flv). After first favoriting any clips I deemed as potentials for inclusion, and then crafting a story board/script from sequences in a select few, I downloaded the finalists through AVC, converting them to .wmv.

Step 4: (in your best Dick Vitale voice) Mashup City, baby!

Now for the fun part: placing all of your source material on the timeline in your video editor of choice (like I said, I started out with Movie Maker, then upped the ante with Sony Vegas Pro 8), then cutting and combining until you've transformed that collection of downloaded clips into an entirely new, at least somewhat coherent digital work of art.

Step 5: Render unto Caesar, or with a proper codec

If you're using Windows Movie Maker, basically your only option is to publish it as .wmv. Not a bad thing, because, while still maintaining relatively high quality, it'll leave you with a compressed file, sized significantly smaller than .avi (which is why I'd also recommend rendering to .wmv with Sony Vegas Pro or any other higher end editor with more options). Plus, it's been my experience that the Windows Media format uploads well--and quicker, given the smaller size--to YouTube.

So you upload your artwork to your channel, then what? Millions of views, instant stardom, right? Absolutely...not. Making a YouTube video mashup is one thing; making something that goes viral is quite another. Who knows, though, maybe you've got the next "Brokeback to the Future" going precisely 88 MPH through your head right now, waiting for you to pour it out and start mixing in movie clips (before you get started, I'd recommend KFC as brainfood).

As for my mashup video? Decidedly not the outcome I had pictured, having garnered just a few hundred views to date. Disappointing, because with Jean-Claude Van Damme kicking someone through a racquet ball court glass backstop and a cameo appearance from Wesley Snipes offering gambling advice, I'm pretty sure you couldn't ask for more. Well, maybe footage of Dolph Lundgren as Ivan Drago--cue the light bulb, I've got the idea for my next Famous Bowl of soon-to-be viral success.