Best format for iMovie input: DV or AppleIntermetiateCodec

I thought (and I think I read here several times) that the best input for iMovie, if you use a MiniDV camcorder, was to import the DV files into the app.
Now I have read an article ( http://imovietricks.blogspot.com/ )where it is said that iMovie does not properly work with those files and that a previous conversion to AppleIntermediateCodec should be give better quality.
Can someone give more information about this subject?
I think is a very interesting subject not only for the quality but because AppleIntermediateCodec files are half the size as DV files which make them more easily stored.

I have only DV camera and this issue is very important to me. I have read probably all the threads about it and have seen no solution. I even bought an e-book from a guy who said here that he knows the solution (but didn't of course open the secret here in forum) and guess what he recommended in his book? To convert the files to AIC.
As there have been so many discussions about it then I wouldn't say that iMovie works perfectly well with DV. Even Macworld mentioned this in their review of iMovie '08:
+"...The bad news is that in order to get this real time performance without renders or progress bars, there is some sacrifice in quality. For interlaced video such as DV and 1080i HDV, iMovie now uses single-field processing. This means every other horizontal line of the video is thrown out, which reduces the sharpness of the footage..."+
http://www.macworld.com/article/59668/2006/12/imovie08.html
Sorry, but I have difficulties believing anyone who claims that iMovie '08 handles DV fine. If all these reports were wrong and iMovie really could give full quality from DV then Apple would have refuted such reports (especially ones by popular magazines like Macworld) and given some guidelines.

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What is the best format for iMovie imports

Hi There,
I am trying to convert some home movies to iMovie on my mac the movies are on DVD in VLC> VTS files. What is the best file available on Xilisoft video converter Ultimate for best quality in iMovie please.
so many choices but none specifically for iMovie.
cheers

I don't seem to have DV or AIC as an option! Nor M-JPEG.
What is available depends on which converter you are trying to use. iSquint, for instance, will only convert to MPEG4/AAC or H.264/AAC. A converter like MPEG Streamclip, on the other hand, will convert to DV, AIC, M-JPEG, Photo-JPEG, MPEG-4, or H.264 but requires the $20 QT MPEG-2 Playback component to work on VOB files.
Also, although my VOB file is about 15mins, when I enter it in my converter it comes up as 2 seconds in the 'Duration' column. Why?
This is a common problem with MPEG-1/2 files. Usually it stems from timecode breaks. Such breaks are ignored by many non-Mac multi-media players but not by applications relying on the QT structure which synchronizes tracks "temporally" rather than spatially as with "multiplexed" GOP files or interleaved tracks. Once again, this is why I prefer MPEG Streamclip for converting such files. It includes a "fix timecode" option ("Command-F") to correct these breaks.

Best clip format for iMovie 8?

I have a few .avi clips from a Nikon CoolPix which load alright into iMovie, but they take a long time to load. Is there a better format for iMovie and should I convert the clips to that format?
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ray

iM is meant by concept for camcorder imports.
its internal codec is appeleintermediate.
I doubt, a 'manual' conversion is faster than iM's.
but give it a try, a popular (and free) tool is Mpeg Streamclip

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I am importing old VHS and 8mm family videos for my cousin, to both burn them to DVD, and to archive the movies in case he wants to edit them later.
I am planning on purchasing for him, a "write once," external HDD, probably firewire, (though I am open to suggestions), to put both the backup Video TS folders on, as well as the Quicktime movies themselves.
My guess is, the best format for the QT movies would be their original DV-NTSC, but at around 13GB an hour, this can add up pretty fast.
The h264 .mov codec looks great, takes forever to render, and it seems the file size difference to DV-NTSC is nominal at best.
Obviously the future is some kind of HD, so these movies will never look great years from now, but I want them to be preserved for him at the best quality possible, at the smallest file size, if it will not compromise the quality too much.
I know I can render them significantly smaller as h264 .mp4 files, or as DIVX, (which also takes a long time), but I imagine they are of significantly reduced quality that would be visible in future video editing he might do.
If DV-NTSC is the only way to go, so be it. But if not, then any suggestions for what other format I could use to save these QT files, without visible loss of quality is greatly appreciated.

Thanks for all the advice. And I mean everyone.
Here is my latest dilemma.
Though 15 years old, the original Vhs's play beautifully. Aside from some (expected) glitches in the beginning or end of some of the shots, the video has not degraded appreciably. This is great news, as my cousin wanted to make back ups before degradation begins.
First, I captured the Vhs movies and corrected some bad color, mostly due to poor white balancing, and on the computer, they looked great in comparison. I burned DVD's and they looked terrible in comparison with the originals. Now I know I am going to lose some resolution when going to DVD, but it seemed harsh, so I ran some tests.
I burned a DVD of the original capture, with no color correction, just the raw footage and the DVD did not look much better, so it wasn't the color correction.
Not satisfied, I made a copy from the FCP timeline straight to Vhs, (I should note, through the ADVC-110.) This looked significantly degraded as well.
Finally, I made a straight dub from Vhs to DVCam, figuring that had to look good, and that also looked significantly degraded, compared to the, (now looking pristine), Vhs original.
As the original Vhs looks so good, what good would a TBC do? Or a proc amp?
Is there some secret to capturing and exporting Vhs that I am missing? Or, will it always look significantly degraded, even straight to DVCam?
+David Murray wrote: There is an industrial way to get good VhS copies but it is extremely expensive+
I don't know what this is, but I am sure it is clearly out of our league, but David M., if you are still following this thread, I'm curious, would this ultra expensive method actually result in a dub that looks like the original? I am actually really shocked at how bad the straight DVCam dub looks. It really does not look much better than the color corrected, computer exported version.
The Vhs tapes of my cousins daughter are as precious to him as anything he has.
As they date back 15 years, he is concerned about the longevity of the tapes.
As there are over forty hours of them, he wants them to be in an editable format, so later he or his daughter can make a highlight reel, or whatever. So thus the QT movie archive/backup on HD.
Whether as Finalcutter said, that this drive, even if unused, and put in a cool dry safe, might not function years down the line, makes it iffy, but what other choice is there for editable versions, unless I break the QT movies up into 20 minute chunks and archive them to over a hundred DVD's instead. Perhaps that is the safest solution, though certainly time consuming.
As failure of the HDD somewhere in the future is likely, though not certain, I am still not sure that the HDD holding all his QT movies for future editing is the wrong way to go.
As it is a digital version, and not an analog copy, I get that a DVCam backup of the originals is the best option. I will suggest to him that we do this as well, even though he does not have DVCam himself. But again, is there something I am missing here? Why does the Vhs to DVCam copy look so degraded? Is there anything I can do to keep the original quality, or will it die with his original Vhs as it slowly degrades over time?

Best format for converting video

What is the best format for converting videos for your iPod? I am using handbrake but there are alot of settings. What is the best one? mp4,avi,ogm? and what about codecs? aac audio, mp3 audio,h.264 video mpeg 4 video, .mp4 video? Need help?

See this Wikipedia article for some encoders:
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What is the best manual for imovie 10.0.6?

what is the best manual for imovie 10.0.6?

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Still trying and trying to find an answer. So I have tried http://www.iskysoft.com/topic-mts/convert-mtsm2ts-files-to-imovie-on-mac.html which says it will convert it to a version for imovie so I downloaded trial so that I could try it. TOok an mts file Converted it to the version for imovie. Tried to drag and drop it into imovie. Nope wont do it. Tried converting it to the MPEG format in this trial version nope wont drag and drop into imovie either.
Im willing to buy a converter but want to make sure it will work. Have found nothing thus far that I can figure out how to convert an MTS file to a version that can be dragged and dropped into Imovie.
Sigh so frustrated by this.
I have mts video files on my desktop in a folder. Which I had taken from camera. They are no longer on my camera so I cant download directly into imovie. Trying to figure out how to convert them to a format for imovie and have tried several trials another of those being wondershare.
Maybe I am just slow but have had no success so far.
I have spent literally hours so far tonight trying to solve this problem.

mts doesn't need a 'conversion' just a re-wrapping.
two options
• ReWrap2M4V - google for it, it's a free automator script; to make it run, you have to install two other items, basically to get a functioning installtion of the ffmpeg package - sounds tricky, just follow installtion advices, easy. re-wraps any mts within split-seconds
• AVCCAM - is a QT-plugin provided by Panasonic; it teaches any QT-based app to handle mts; after DL in installation, use most popular tool Mpeg Streamclip to open your mts; then, without any settings nor conversions, goto 'save as' and choose mov.

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I will be exporting from FCP4.5 and am wondering what is the best format to get the best possible quality from FCP to DVDSP? Also, should I go through compressor and what settings should I use?
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The movie is 90 minutes.
You didn't mention your video format. You can export your movie as QuickTime Movie (not QT Conversion), same settings and self contained (my favorite flavor). The use that movie in Compressor and use the Best Quality DVD: 90 min presets encoding your video to MPEG2 and your audio to Dolby 2 (AC3).
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Cheers

AVI and MOV are both simply "containers". The video and audio files inside them can be many formats with less or more compression. The MPEG-4 compression can be very good, of course, depending on the quality of the original file. The MOV files you saved must be using a different type of video compression that may be better quality but takes up more hard drive space. The "best" type of compression is probably a personal choice. What type of software are you using to save the files? QuickTime Pro?
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Message was edited by: rwltrz4

Thanks.
I've posted up on their forum too (the folks over there are not as responsive as you guys, helpful, but not in the same volume )
I kinda hear what you're saying, but the encoding time (fps and time taken) is pretty slow on my PPC G5 iMac at the moment, and if the Turbo.264 is doing most of the processing then from what you say it'll stay the same on a new Intel Mac. I really hope not, or it'll be me throwing in the whole notion of recording TV on my Mac and heading off down the shop for a PlayTV for the PS3.
Either that or hope for a decent upgrade to the Mini at Macworld, sling the Apple TV on to ebay (film rental selection here in the UK is still pretty weak) and replace with a Mini, plug the tuner in that and watch native EyeTV recordings without the need for lengthy encoding. I reckon Front Row, and an iPhone Remote will do almost as good a job for my music as the Apple TV does.
One day we will look back and laugh at the notion of an hour long TV show being 'encoded' for playback at all, let alone waiting more than 2 minutes for the process to happen!

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What is the best format for making movies on PRE 12? My clips are now .mov files, whether on iPhone 5 or Nikon 7000 SLR. Should I still convert them to .AVI files?

fish614
Are you working with Nikon D7000 as well as the iPhone video?
What are your settings for these devices when you record?
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i would like to know what is the best format for upload to a website, what i got now is an exported quicktime self contained movie from fcp 25 minutes in length.
the footage itself is shot on mini dv and edited on an uncompressed 8 bit sequence, when exported to quicktime it is 28 gb in size so it is kind of a heavy one.
is it possible to upload it in one piece ( apple recommends exporting to mpeg4 yet i got a bad quality out of this using mpeg streamclip.
what would be the best compreessor for this
than you very much

i got a bad quality out of this using mpeg streamclip.
Check the links that Cristina posted, then let us know if your quality improved, using Compressor...it should.
One question for you regarding quality...are you referring to overall quality of the full frame image, or are you displeased with text/graphics.
If this is the case, then I'd wonder if you edited in a DV sequence, then dropped the edited content into an 8bit timeline for exporting at better quality.
This can cause degradation of the image (particularly text/graphics), since you're taking a 720x480 frame and ever-so-slightly vertically scaling the frame up to 720x486.
Let us know what you did...and your results w/Compressor.
K

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Hi All,
working in animation project to be broadcasted on a TV channel as HD1080 50i,
1- all the animation layers was rendered from TOONBOOM as .SWF to keep it in vector for compositing issue.
Dose SWF lose any quality? we always use TGA sequence with alpha in our past SD projects but now we found SWF is a smaller file size and allows zooming Because it keeps all vector lines.
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sherif

Thanks Rick for your reply,
Regarding the SWF i moved to flash pro forums and they are supporting me now,
My system is a pc, win.64, I7-3930K, 64G RAM, EVGA GTX680 4G, Many HGST 3TB with raid controler,
Some advised me to go with Quicktime Prores HQ or DNXHD or DPX ,
In this year project my client's requirement for delivery is :
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So do i work with dnxhd 120 from the beginning to the delivery? (and it will be my only master source) or another format encode it at the end to dnxhd 120? ( i will distribut this project to many channels after the first run exclusivity period end with different requirements).
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I'm having some old home movie Hi8 tapes digitized by a local video shop and saved to DVD. I intend to import the digitized footage into iMovie to edit and create DVDs.
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From an editing standpoint DV would be preferable.
However MPEG 4 would work. MPEG4 is really a playback codec, not an editing codec, because it is highly compressed. However, iMovie will edit it and if necessary, convert it to an editing codec.
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Best format for iMovie input: DV or AppleIntermetiateCodec

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