Caught between Imovie 09 and FCE

I am caught in between these two programs.
I am a beginner and only need the basic editing tools available in Imovie, yet I have an AVHD camcorder and want to import footage at maximum resolution. I have been importing at full resolution and exporting to Quicktime. There is a significant reduction in quality in the final movie (even when played back on the computer).
Does anyone know if '09 will be updated any time soon to allow for full HD editing?
Are there are editing programs for mac that are simple to use but allow for lossless editing?
Any suggestions would be much appreciated.

So here we are, more than half way through '10 and we're still stuck not having a lossless means for editing without mortgaging the house?
I've got iMovie '06 and I've been trying to use it on Snow Leopard (10.6.4) and I'm getting crashes which detract from my happy life.
Do we have any indications that Apple might be fixing this in the near future?
I've got video of my daughter's HS graduation that is PRECIOUS and I don't want to be dropping bits left and right.
Thanks for everyone's time.

Similar Messages

What's the difference between iMovie and iDVD?

What's the difference between iMovie and iDVD?

iMovie enables you to edit video footage - typically from a video camera - add titles, effects, etc.
iDVD enables you to create an authored DVD of your iMovie, complete with DVD menu, chapters, "extras", etc and can be played in a conventional DVD player.
20" iMac Intel Core Duo 2GHz 1GB RAM Mac OS X (10.4.7)

What are the similarities and differences between iMovie and Final Cut Pro

I have become semi-proficient in iMovie and considering upgrading to Final Cut Pro. I would love to hear from anyone with informatoin pertaining to the learning curve, and the similarities & differences between iMovie and Final Cut Pro.

wvu.gordon wrote:
… the transition is very manageable, even for an amateur.
if you're familiar with iMovie-b, the GUI looks familiar, although tons of new buttons and sliders and knobs to play with ...
There're zillion of features, you probably don't need in the beginning - what gave my projects the most 'boost' is Color Grading/manipulation
for a start, and as a good read on a loooong Sunday afternoon:
http://www.colorgradingcentral.com/final-cut-pro-x-color-grading-table-of-conten ts
offers you free tutorials to the many options to give your videos some professional 'look'.
and don't miss the many & free podcasts of MacBreak Studio, avail in iTunes, or the tutorials at CreativeCow.com
Tom is a gentleman not recommending his own products, so I do:
FCPX - Making the creative leap
… is his actual book for all us 'switchers' from iMovie (or FC/e).

Color fidelity between slides and FCE output

Until the recent past, I have been scanning 35mm slides using a Cannon Canoscan 9900F coupled with Photoshop Elements v 2.0 into FCE v 3.0 on a Mac G-4 with OS 10.4.3. The color fidelity between the slides and final output was reasonably good. Within the past week I have upgraded system software to OS 10.4.8; upgraded Photoshop Elements to v 4.0 and FCE to v3.5.1. Now when I scan slides, the resulting images (both on the desktop and as printed with an Epson stylus 2200) are dark as if the slides were greatly underexposed. The Photoshop Elements correcting or enhancing tools do not solve the problem. I don’t think this is a monitor calibration issue but would welcome any suggestions. Thanks in advance. Jack A

Hi(Bonjour)!
What is the relation with FCE ? It's seem that is more a problem with MAC OS X itself or photoshop or your scanner than FCE.
See MAC OS X forum:
http://discussions.apple.com/category.jspa?categoryID=160
Try to make a new color profile for your monitor.
Michel Boissonneault

IMovie and FCE

Does anyone know where I can find good tutorials on creating a photo montage with both iMovie and Final Cut Express. iMovie's interface is easier for me to use but I don't think it can support the LiveType features that are available with FCE. If someone knows if it is possible to create LiveType Animations and overlay them on images in iMovie that would be the ideal situation.

MikeMiller991 wrote:
... if it is possible to create LiveType Animations and overlay them on images in iMovie that would be the ideal situation.
.. hmmm.. somehow , in a very time-consuming way this is possible, but the much more convenient way is:
• create your show in iM09
• 'Export with Quicktime', choose 'AppleIntermediate' as format ..
• open this file in FC/e, or in LT and add your title-effects ..
and Welcome, MikeMiller991, to the  iMovie boards

What are the main differences in features between FCP and FCE?

I'm buying filmmaking equipment for my teenage son, who has shown himself to be serious about getting started making shorts. One big decision (regarding costs and $$$ allocation for other system elements such as the computer and camcorder)is whether to get Final Cut Pro (studio version) or Final Cut Express. He has used Final Cut in several camps and film school programs. Feedback will be most appreciated!

FCP can't be bought by itself, however Final Cut Studio includes Color, Motion, and DVD Studio Pro.... FCE will not edit any format except DV and HDV. FCP will edit most every format. FCP is keyframeable, where FCE really isn't. There really is a ton of difference between the two apps. FCE has no media management, has fewer effects, etc... One's an enthusiasts' program and the other (Final Cut Studio) is a full professional suite of software... it's certainly worth the difference, but might be more than you want to spend. FCE is a subset of code taken from FCP, so learning it will help with learning FCP... the interface is nearly identical.
Jerry

Difference between iMovie and Movies

What is the differance between the 2

Also, in iMovie terms, a Movie is a kind of a Project as distinguised from a Trailer.
In a Trailer you add you clips to a pre-built template with graphic, title and music to simulate a Hollywood-style movie trailer.
In a Movie you either add your clips to a pre-built Theme with titles and graphics or start with no Theme and build a movie from scratch just you your clips.
Matt

Exporting between LiveType and FCE

Having difficulty importing files I created in LiveType into FCE. The qt movie I import is just a black screen. Same thing happens if I try to open it in Imovie.

Look back through several months of pages here and see wht you can find in the subjects for FCE. The version of LT that comes with FCE seems to be slightly different than the one that comes with the Final Cut Studio.
Has this ever worked for you? Are you sure you're interpreting the alpha properly in FCE?
Have you read the FCE manual and are you following the procedure precisely?
Most such posts are simple user errors but without more information we can't really help you yet.
bogiesan

Sudden problem between iMovie and my Graphics Card?

Hello all-
Please forgive any omissions, first time posting.
I'm running Tiger 10.4.9 on a G4 iMac Desktop, 800 MHz w 768 MBram.
My graphics info is apparently: NVIDIA GeForce2 MX:
I only recently had iMovie HD 6.0.3 start displaying an alert message detailing it's requirement of a 'Quartz Extreme Compatible' graphics card. This is news to me, since I've been using this version of iMovie since October 06 without this alert cropping up. So this seems Out Of The Blue.
Funny thing: I've booted the computer from the Tiger startup disk a couple of times since this error began - to check if a disk repair is needed - and with each assisted reboot the graphics card is correctly recognized/supported... once. One unassisted boot. After which it reverts to 'Quartz Extreme Compatible' unsupported once again.
I swung the problem briefly past a genius at a MacGenius bar, who felt the problem was probably not the card itself going bad, (as she thought the card would fail entirely if it was having problems) but either corrupted software in the system, or a HardDrive problem. I have no other evidence that my HD might be failing, so I'm left with her other advice, to do an Archive and Install.
Honestly, nothing's been installed or updated recently. If I had to guess, it
-may- have started after Quicktime failed to play an .avi file off CD this week, but I can't be sure, as I hadn't tried HD for a little while before then. Could QT bombing out have corrupted a system file?
Would you also suggest an Archive and Install? And what sort of system clean-up can I expect after such a procedure? Is there a less radical fix?
Thanks for any thoughts,
Andrew
Minneapolis
iMac G4 Desktop Mac OS X (10.4.9) Graphics : NVIDIA GeForce2 MX:

Hi Folks,
I am running a G-4, 1.25 Gz, 2 gigs ram, running 10.4.9, and a Radeon 9800 pro graphics card. I am having the same problems. I have tried the solutions mentioned here and still have the same problem. I have tried saving the iMovie to to my desk top, run permisions. The Graphics/Dispalys in system profile says
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro:
Chipset Model: ATY,R350
Type: Display
Bus: AGP
Slot: SLOT-1
VRAM (Total): 128 MB
Vendor: ATI (0x1002)
Device ID: 0x4e48
Revision ID: 0x0000
ROM Revision: 113-A07525-130
Displays:
CPD-E540:
Resolution: 1344 x 1008 @ 60 Hz
Depth: 32-bit Color
Core Image: Supported
Main Display: Yes
Mirror: Off
Online: Yes
Quartz Extreme: Supported
So what is the solution...Do I have to retrograde back to iMovie 5?

GE 31591 Phone - caught between Skype and GE_conti...

I bought a GE 31591 Phone with Amazon. Phone worked perfectly since February 2012. Contact list simply disappeared from the phone weeks ago. However, I logged in with my wife account and her contact list was there! A subscriber called EbuyNow_PRO started to try to solve my problem and afterwards they gave up.
This message is to Skype. My phone doesn´t have hardware problem. My ACCOUNT (not my phone) has a problem with Skype system. Skype, I want a solution to my problem!

Dear Readers and utonium01,
Please accept my apologies. I am not an autobot, and have been known to err as indeed I am only human. Copy and paste and switching between various open tabs in my internet browser was the culprit.
My enquiry, above, still stands -- as I am continuing to diagnose and assist in resolving issues with this phone set.
Warm regards,
Elaine
Was your question answered? Please click on the Accept as a Solution link so everyone can quickly find what works! Like a post or want to say, "Thank You" - ?? Click on the Kudos button!
Trustworthy information: Brian Krebs: 3 Basic Rules for Online Safety and Consumer Reports: Guide to Internet Security Online Safety Tip: Change your passwords often!

Caught between DW and Flash

I'm trying to make links to show and then play a few
slideshows. I have multiple layers in DW that show or hide
depending on which selection is made on the menu bar. The problem
is that I wanted the text on each "page" (layer) to slide in
horizontally, and I wanted the non-standard font to be embedded, so
I used Flash which I put in the layers instead of plain text. What
I need to be able to do is somehow make the text that is in the
Flash activate the layer that holds the slideshow. I tried making
the text a hyperlink while in Flash, but it only opens a new
browser instance with the slideshow in it. I know that's because of
the _blank option as target, but I tried typing in the name on the
layer as the target and it didn't work. I feel like I'm stuck
between two programs. I know that if I was really good I could make
an entire site out of Flash, but I've got a long way to go before I
can do that and I need to get this site at least functioning in a
week. Please help! The site, as I have it so far, is at
www.brickley.org. If you go there you can see what I'm referring to
by clicking on the "gallery" link on the menu bar.
Thanks,
David

David,
Sounds like you are over complicating your layout. I
understand you really would love to have a Flashy site. But, from
my limited experience integrating Flash into Dreamweaver, you are
using it in a way that will not work. I have designed a site in
Flash, for the purpose of animated text fields and all of the
bell's and whistles. Learning Flash like everything else, is a
learning curve. But, your layout is very simple, and with a good
tutorial you could design your site in Flash very easily. But there
are so many negatives to making your site a "Flash site", that I
personally wouldn't recommend it. Have you read up on Fireworks? I
really only use the program to optimize graphics. From my limited
experience with the program on a deeper level, I do believe it does
animate text. But, I don't know if it will let you do the show /
hide layers behavior in dreamweaver.
Here is my two cents. Get your site up styling with CSS, and
then worry about the heavier programing when you can sit with some
tutorials and sort it out. I really don't think the animated text
fields will make or break the design of your site.

Speeding up issue between LiveType and FCE

Hello, would so appreciate help with this! - When I'm playing my project back in Live Type, it is the perfect speed. I save, then import the actual project into Final Cut Express, but it is speeding up and the clip is half the amount of time it is in Live Type - I have used livetype before without this problem and can't figure it out. Even when I save this particular file to .mov, it is sped up. Just did this with a number of files with no problems and can't figure out what I must have hit to make it do this

What is the frame rate of your LiveType project? Does it match the frame rate of your FCE Sequence?
-DH

The difference between FCP and FCE...

What does FCE not have that makes it "express"

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1150384&tstart=0

What is the difference between QuickTime and iMovie?

Why would I need to upgrade my QuickTime to QuickTime Pro if I have iMovie? If I did have these two programs wouldn't that be redundant? They both edit the same kind of information, right? If you use both programs, please provide pros and cons. Thank you.
iMac G5 Mac OS X (10.4.4)

It would take a book to describe the differences between iMovie and QuickTime Pro, so I won't go down that road. Here's Apple's QT Pro Tutorial, which will help introduce its features:
http://www.apple.com/quicktime/pro/tutorials.html
I use QuickTime Pro every day to help with one task or another. It's a very useful tool, which gets you closer to the basic functions of QuickTime than does iMovie. It also helps you learn more about QuickTime software, the heart of iMovie. Like most other things, the more you understand the fundamentals the more you understand the program using them.
There's one important difference: Unlike iMovie, whatever task you want to perform with QuickTime Pro can also be done with an AppleScript script. So if you have repetitive tasks with movies, QuickTime Pro is a must. Just write a script that you call from within QuickTime Pro to perform just about any task, or collection of tasks. The script literally "tells" QuickTime Pro to perform the task.
I strongly recommend QT Pro for anyone who uses iMovie HD a lot, or who is interesting in understanding the underlying structure of QuickTime movies.
Karl

Problems importing into iMovie and which is the required space..

Hi Karsten!
I could see that you know about video editing. And I have some problems and doubts I would like to ask.
The thing is that I have just bougth an ibook of 80 Gb hard disk RAM 512 MB Speed 1.67 GHz and I am trying to edit a documentary with it. The thing is that I started to importing images from a HDV 1080i Sony Camcorder into iMovie and the speed wasnt in real time, was slowing down to half of the original speed. I went to visit the help of iMovie it was saying when it happens is due to the desfragmentation of the disk, but I dont know if it is the real problem, it is a new computer, and how I can solve it.
And I also would like to know if I could have better results in the video importing and editing with an external hard driver other wise I could add more ram and more memory for the hard disk in the computer...
And the last thing, I would like to know how much space would I need in my computer for install and using Final Cut Pro and if it would be easy with more memory or an external hard drive...
Please Karsten or whoever who can have knowledge about these matter could help me. I really need it so much to start with my docu...
Thank you
Mac OS X (10.4) 80 Gb hard disk RAM 512 MB Velocidad 1.67 GHz

"..which is the difference between FCP and FCE?.."
FCE is Final Cut Express, a cheaper and 'cut-down' version of FCP (Final Cut Pro).
FCE changes HDV (hi-definition) video into a slightly different format called 'Apple Intermediate Codec' when it's importing HDV material - just like iMovie HD does. This means that importing is generally slower than importing ordinary DV, because the movie has to be converted while it's importing. On a G4 PowerBook or iBook HDV might import at half-speed, or take even longer (..maybe 4x 'real time'), as you've found.
The latest version of FCP can import HDV, and edit it, without any conversion, Apple says. But I don't know if that applies on any Mac, or if that needs a special capture card to be fitted into a PowerMac. In theory, I'd expect that importing and editing HDV using FCP HD 5 (..the latest version..) would be faster than on a PowerBook - because there's no conversion involved - but I can't say for certain till I receive my latest version of FCP (..I just did an Apple "cross-grade" to convert my FCP HD 4.5 into FCP HD 5).
HDV doesn't take up any more room on a tape than normal DV, because the high-definition is 'squashed' onto the tape, using MPEG-2 compression. Because iMovie HD and FCE HD can't handle this kind of compressed material directly, they convert it into the Apple Intermediate Codec, and that form of the video takes up more storage on a hard disc than the normal DV does!
So although normal DV uses about 13 gigabytes of hard disc space per hour of running time, the converted HDV (..converted into 'AIC'..) takes up, er ..I'm looking for a recent project ..most are on an external disc ..are here's a simple one: one-and-a-quarter minutes' worth uses 904 megabytes; nearly 1 gigabyte! ..Here's another: four-and-a-half minutes' worth takes up 6.5 gigabytes!
Using normal DV, 6.5 gigabytes would hold half an hour's worth of video, not 4.5 minutes' worth!
So you will need a big external hard disc to store hi-def footage. At least, with iMovie HD or FCE HD.
I don't know if FCP HD 5 would store imported footage in the original HDV format, that is with the same storage requirements of ordinary DV - like HDV tapes. If so, that means that you could store hi-def (..if you're using FCP HD 5..) in just the same amount of space as normal DV ..but I don't know for sure. Maybe you could ask in the FCP Discussions. I probably can't tell you till next week or so..
Where to get a 300gb hard disc? I'm sure there must be at least one shop, or electronics store, in Istanbul which sells them at reasonable prices. Otherwise, look online. There are many companies which now sell 300gb discs: Maxtor and LaCie, for example. But you do need one with a FireWire connection; not just USB. You don't need to buy from an Apple store: buy one from any computer shop ..an external hard disc for a PC works exactly the same ..but you must format it for use with a Mac, as described before.
All I know of Istanbul is Cumhuriyet Caddesi, Taksim Square, and the areas around what used to be the floating bridge, and the Spice Market, and round Haigha Sophia, but there must be lots of computer shops somewhere in the city.
"..I have never used iMovie for editing, I understood it is only good for capturing, sample and concise.." and it's also good for transitions, titles, adding photos and audio, adding video effects and for audio tweaking. And it integrates perfectly with iPhoto, iDVD, GarageBand ..and now 'iWeb'.

Caught between Imovie 09 and FCE

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for