Basics for IMovie (Edited 11/222/04 ADA) IMovie Controls Importing Video Editing Basics Exporting Video* *This tutorial is a quick start for movie creation with iMovie. For more extensive help with iMovie on a Macintosh open the Help menu and choose Help Center then iMovie Help. Also check out Apples web site for more information about iMovie development: http://www.apple.com/imovie/edit.html Note: Other video editing programs are available.  Apple Final Cut Express 2($299) is a great program that has most of the features of the professional Final Cut Pro (approx $1000) which has been used for feature movies.  Available for the PC Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 is Movie Maker 2 which has some of the same features as iMovie.  For more advanced PC video editing  Pennacle Studio 9 ($80), Ulead VideoStudio 8 ($100), Roxio Easy Media Creator 7 ($100), Sony's Vegas Movie Studio + DVD ($100) and Adobie Premiere Elements ($100) a limited version of  its Professional Premiere Pro 1.5 ($700).

Clip View

Timeline View

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From Apple's IMovie help

Connect the 6/4 pin firewire connector to your camera and your Macintosh.  The picture below is an iBook connected to the Cannon Z20 but the connections are much the same for other DV cameras and Macintosh models: carefully connect the 4 pin firewire connector to your camera connect the 8 pin firewire connector to your PC turn your camera on (see below)

(1) Turn on your Mac and your camera (Video Mode)
 

Turn your camera on switch to VCR mode. On the Cannon ZR 20 Press in the green bar and push the switch down to Play (VCR)

(2) Importing your movie to the Mac
 

My suggestion: Creating scene breaks as you import your movie makes it easier to put your movie together later. The following are the default selections but someone may have changed them so if necessary:: Choose preferences from the Edit menu Click Import tab then click  Automatically start new scene at clip break box and choose Shelf for clip placement I would then import all the footage and do the editing in iMovie. Apple suggests importing only what you intend to use and indeed this is what you should do if you have limited storage space on your hard drive.

(a) Double click the iMovie icon. Choose New Project in the dialog box that opens when you start iMovie for the first time.  If iMovie has been opened before it will try to bring in the last project. In this case choose New Project from the File menu
 

First Time iMovie

Previous used iMovie

(b) In the next dialog box, decide where you want your project and the name for your project then click the Create button. There are numerous files created with iMovie so you should create a folder for your project.

(c)  Make sure iMovie is in the camera mode by sliding the blue mode switch to DV  will be displayed on the iMovie screen

(d)  Use the VCR controls to control your camera and view your footage if desired, then rewind to just before the location you want to start importing

(e)  Press the Import button to start importing your video to the iMovie shelf. Click the Import button again to stop importing the video. (NOTE: you can use the space bar to start and stop importing.) The clips of your video will line up on the iMovie shelf

 

NOTE: iMovie files are quite large so keep a check on the space indicator:

General editing

NOTE: just as in word processing first select the clip or section of the clip to be edited: Select a clip by clicking once on the clip Select a section of a clip by clicking once on the clip to put it edit mode, then hold the <shift> key down while dragging the playhead, the top triangle marker, over the area to be selected (the selected area will appear yellow, see below)

-Delete all clips from the shelf or clip viewer you do not intend to use in your movie by dragging the clip to the trash
-Make a clip part of your movie by dragging it to the clip viewer or timeline viewer
-Edit clips from the shelf the timeline viewer or from the clip viewer.

• Use the VCR controls to view a selected clip (click on the clip first)
• Remove a section from a clip, select the section to be deleted then press the <delete> key
• Duplicate a selected section, select a section choose Copy from the Edit menu , <apple><c>, then place the playhead in the new location and choose Paste from the Edit menu, <apple><v>
• Delete a section of a clip, select a section choose Deletefrom the Edit menu or press the <delete> key
• Split a clip possibly to place a transition between parts of the clip, select the clip then drag the triangle to the location for the split. Choose Split Video Clip at Playhead from the Edit menu <apple><t>

(a) Click the Transitions button on the bottom of the clip shelf window to have the transition choices displayed (b) Choose a transition. (c) Click the Preview button to see what the transition will look like with your clip.  Change your selection and preview until you are satisfied (d) Drag the transition between the clips on your movie Clip Viewer. It will appear as a small green rectangle between the clips: NOTE: Transitions, Titles, Effects and Audio will take a little time being incorporated, rendered, into your movie. The image of the Title, transition, etc. will have a red line at the bottom of its representation until this rendering is completed.

(a) Click the Titles button on the bottom of the clip shelf window to have the  transition choices displayed (b) Choose a title style. (c) Click the Preview button to see what the title will look like.  Change and preview until you are satisfied (d) Drag the title to the beginning, end or between clips on your movie Clip Viewer. It will appear as a black clip: NOTE: You can add a title on top of a clip. Uncheck  "Over Black" and drag the title to the left of the clip you want titled. If you want the title to last the duratin of the clip drag the button on the Speed dial until it is the same time duration as the clip.  In all cases the title and clip will take a few secounds to render after the title is dragged to the movie.

(a) Click the Effects on the bottom of the clip shelf window to have the Effects choices displayed (b) Select title or video clip. (c) Choose an effect Adjust Colors, Black and White, Sepia, etc. (d) Click the Preview button to see how this effect will look with your clip. (e) Try other effects until you find one you like. (f) Click the Apply button. Sample effects:   Black and white Serpia

c

(a) Click the Audioon the bottom of the clip shelf window to have the audio choices displayed (b) Choose a title style. (c) Click the Preview button to see what the title will look like.  Change and preview until you are satisfied (d) Drag the title to the beginning, end or between clips on your movie Clip Viewer. It will appear as a black clip: (e) You can also record a voice over by clicking the Record Voice button and speaking into the mike.  Click the Stop button to stop recording. (f) You can drag the voice recording, the orange block below, or other sounds to the appropriate place in the movie: .

(2) Choose the Export: type camera, quicktime or iDVD.

(3) Choose a Quicktime Format or choose Expert:

• Expert lets you choose options to maximize quality with minimum file size.  The following are possibilities for decreasing file size:
• If the action is not to quick you can decrease the number of frames per page from 30 to 15 without much noticable change in quality unless action is a focus of your movie.
• If sound is not the focus of your movie ypu can change to mono and 22 khzwithout from 44 khz without noticable change in quality, unless of course sound is a focus of your movie.
• Size can be changed from 640 by 480 to 320 by 320 by 240 if this is an acceptable size.


After making your choices choose the format size:

[Original file size in iMovie:527.8 mb]
                  Choicr                  Frame Size        File Size
                Full Quality.....         720X480              149.8 mb
                CD-ROM.....            320X240                 4.1 mb
                Streaming....            240X480                 1.5 mb
                Web Movie Small     240X180                1.4 mb
                Email Movie Small   160X120               760 k

More extensive changes can be made with Media Cleaner, an application designed specifically to maximize quality with a minimum file size.  This program is about $400. The CSUB Media Services has a copy on their iMovie editing computer.