Editing with media on an external hard drive

I would like to edit with media on an external hard drive without importing it, like you can do in FCP. It seems like a waste of hard drive space to copy it to another folder on the same drive, or any other drive, and I certainly don't want to edit with the media on my laptop hard drive.
Terry Kelley

Hi Terry,
This can be done by creating an iMovie Library on your external hardrive, as detailed in the article linked below.
iMovie (2013): Work with multiple libraries
https://support.apple.com/kb/PH14745
Cheers,
Allen

Similar Messages

How can I add media from an external hard drive into Premiere Elements? Please answer.

Alright, so I have looked all over the website and the way adobe's frequently asked questions about adding media did nothing for me. I am editing a large full length video in premiere elements 13 and so I would like to add media from my external hard drive and edit from that location. Is that possible? Because I do not have enough space on my laptop to keep hundreds and hundreds of GB of videos on my internal hard drive. I have looked on how to add media from the hard drive location and adobe says to add it using the files and folders tab, but when I select it to add it, it says I need to use the Video Importer. So I go to use the video importer and have no way of figuring out how to select my hard drive. Any ideas?

Spencer WhiteOut
Thank you for the follow up with the information
it is a MacBook pro retina . OS X Operating system. External hard drive is connected by the USB cable. fat32.
It is my understanding, whether you have Premiere Elements on Windows or Mac, if you have files on an external hard drive, you do not select
Add Media and head for a choice that includes Video Importer. Instead, you select Add Media/Files and Folders and navigate to the external hard drive to select your file(s) for import into the project.
But, you seem to be saying that when you do you are met with a message to use the Video Importer. Does the message give you any other related information on why you are being detoured to Video Importer since Video Importer does not import from an external hard drive for me or you. It does for me using Add Media to get the files from my external hard drive into a project. I am strictly an Elements Windows user, so my Mac information is from what I have read. Based on that...
1. Please evaluate the format of your external hard drive. Please review the following if you have not considered this point before.
http://www.cnet.com/how-to/how-to-set-up-an-external-hard-drive-for-use-with-os-x/
There are many online articles on this matter which would point you away from Fat32 as the format for a external hard drive Mac.
2. From what you wrote, you are not dealing with a DVD drive so I see no way to implicate one of them in this issue. You are dealing with an
USB external hard drive and not a USB external DVD/CD drive. Correct?
Please review and consider.
We will be watch for further news from you.
Thank you.
ATR

Is it possible to keep all iTunes media on an external hard drive and not on my Mac Book and have ITunes still function?

Let me begin by saying I'm new to the Mac world as well as to the realm of online forums so I apologize if this is a question that was already asked and/or if it is a very noobish question...
But anyway, I just recently got the new Macbook Pro 15" with RD and I am curious if I can keep all of my Itunes media on an external hard drive without keeping any of it on the Macbook itself and have Itunes still function (when the HD is connected of course). I am trying to keep the computer memory clutter free and not fill it up with music and stuff so I want to keep all of my media on a 1T Buffalo external hard drive so the computer stays like brand new for a long time..Right now I have about 5G worth of music on my hard drive and I thought it was only on the hard drive and I just recently found out that it is also within the music folder on the computer itself. Any thoughts? Sorry if it is an odd question, I can try to rephrase the question if need be. Any tips or advice is greatly appreciated, Thanks!

Quick answer if you use iTunes' default preferences settings: Copy the entire iTunes folder (and in doing so all its subfolders and files) intact to the other drive. Open iTunes and immediately hold down the Option (alt) key (shift on Windows), then guide it to the iTunes Library.itl file in the moved iTunes folder.
If you put the copied iTunes folder in the default location of Macintosh HD > Users > *User Name* > Music then you don't even need to start with the option key held down, iTunes will automatically look for it there. (Make sure there isn't anything already in the iTunes folder there that you want to keep since you will be replacing it with the one you are moving.)
Longer answers if for any reason you do not think all library files are inside your iTunes folder (changed preferences settings at some point):
iTunes: How to move [or copy] your music [library] to a new computer [or another drive] - http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4527 - a somewhat bewildering and not always easily understandable set of options.
For the record there's this reference for iTunes 11 but it really doesn't strike me as having the specifics you need. iTunes 11 for Mac: Move your library to another computer - http://support.apple.com/kb/PH12168
2011 ilounge article: Transferring your iTunes library - http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/articles/comments/moving-your-itunes-library-to -a-new-hard-drive/ - An article with good background information (similar to the links above), particularly if you are not sure your media files are all grouped for quick answer above. Unfortunately under the single term "transferring library" it describes two very different moves; relocating just your media (not really transferring your library and not recommended unless you really need this configuration), and relocating media+database (really your whole "library"). Make sure you understand the difference before electing to move only media.

Streaming media from wireless external hard drive and MBP to TV?

Hi everyone. I have a retina MBP and have recently bought a Sony Bravia smart tv with wireless. I have a time machine (the new one) with an external hard drive connected to it with all my media, photo, movies etc. My tv is connected to my wireless from the time machine and I'm wondering how do I stream media from my external hard drive to my tv? And how do I stream media from my MBP to my tv wirelessly? I can't seem to figure it out. Also mirroring my MBP desktop to my tv wirelessly, can it be done without an apple tv? Thanks in advance.

I had the same issue. It was due to the appalling performance of the USB connection to the disk, not any issue with the wireless connection itself. My iMac was within 7m of the router, on the same floor, with a clear line of sight and good reported connection speed. I have the latest late-2009 version of the AEBS running the 7.5 firmware. This has loads of performance problems (read these forums). I'm hoping that Apple will release the new firmware (7.51) for download soon and then the issue may be resolved.

Where do the MEDIA FILES live after I import them from camera to iMovie (Mac Mini OS X 10.9.2)? I need to MOVE MEDIA FILES to external hard drive.

Where do the MEDIA FILES live after I import them from camera to iMovie (Mac Mini OS X 10.9.2)? I need to MOVE MEDIA FILES to external hard drive.

Hello bbryson68,
Thanks for using Apple Support Communities.
From your post I understand you're wanting to move iMovie project and event data to another drive. I found the following information in the iMovie help that answers your question.
Copy or move projects, events, or clips between libraries or storage devices
Connect a storage device that contains the target library to your Mac, or copy the target library to your Mac.
Choose File > Open Library, and choose an option from the submenu.You can choose from recently opened libraries, locate an existing library on your Mac, or create a new library.The selected library is opened in the Libraries list, with the first event selected and its contents displayed in the browser.
In the Libraries list, select the event that contains the item you want to move or copy.
In the browser, select the item you want to move or copy.Tip: To select multiple clips or projects in the same library, hold down the Command key as you click the items you want to select, or drag a selection rectangle around the items.
Do one of the following:
To move items between events or libraries: Drag the clip or project to another event or library.
To copy items between events or libraries: Option-drag the clip or project to another event or library by first starting to drag and then holding down the Option key as you drag.
Work with multiple libraries
http://help.apple.com/imovie/mac/10.0/#mov3fa25bae7
Take care,
Alex H.

Shifting media files between external hard drives

Hi
I need to shift all my TV and Movie files from one external hard drive to a new bigger hard drive. I tied just copying them, but iTunes couldnt find any of the files when I went to play them. I have found a few threads dealing with cpoying to an external hard drive but none that actually explain how to shift between external hard drives.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Cheers
Pete

Don't import anything and don't move it yourself. This will simply allow iTunes to lose it all.
peteflynn wrote:
Hi
I need to shift all my TV and Movie files from one external hard drive to a new bigger hard drive. I tied just copying them, but iTunes couldnt find any of the files when I went to play them. I have found a few threads dealing with cpoying to an external hard drive but none that actually explain how to shift between external hard drives.
iTunes prefs Advanced. Set the iTunes media folder location to the new drive.
iTunes menu File > Library > Organize library - Consolidate.
This will copy all iTunes media to the new location you set in step 1 and use this location from now on.

HT1751 My win8 pc hard drive failed. After the hard drive was replaced, I copied iTunes Media backupfiles from external hard drive (Karen's Replicator was used). ITunes does not recognize the back up files - help! (it does show cloud & recently burned m

My win8 pc hard drive failed. After the hard drive was replaced, I copied iTunes Media backupfiles from external hard drive (Karen's Replicator backup software was used). ITunes does not recognize these back up files even though the location is the same as cloud & recently burned music that does show- help! The backup files consist of 34,000+ songs; almost all burned from my own CD collection. I do have most of the songs on an ipod classic but hesitate to try to restore from that. Can someone tell me how to get these 34,000 songs to show up in iTunes? Thanks!!

This diagram shows how a typical iTunes library ought to be set out (click on it to enlarge)
The red outline highlights the media folder and its contents, the various subfolders are only created if that kind of content is in your library. The right-hand side shows the files that should be found in the iTunes library folder; sentinel is normally hidden so may not be visible. The core of your iTunes library is the file iTunes Library.itl, you need to restore this, the other library files and the Album Artwork folder, as well as the media folder, to restore your library.
tt2

I have a new Windows tablet computer with limited hard drive space, and cannot transfer my itunes library to the hard drive. Can I run t media from an external hard drive? If so, how do I transfer my files?

I have a new Windows tablet computer with limited hard drive space (32 GB), and cannot transfer my itunes library to the hard drive. Can I run itunes from an external hard drive? I have tried to follow some of the directions on this site, but am having no success. Thanks.

iTunes will run fine with the media on an external drive.
However, I suggest that a tablet computer with a tiny hard drive is not ideal as the primary computer for managing an iTunes library, even a small one. If you have another machine, perhaps a big, boxy, inexpensive old desktop with a decent amount of storage, that might be a better choice.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1364

Media on new external hard drive causing problems with FCP 4.1

Hi gang
I bought a new 160 gig external hard drive due to my internal media drives becoming fairly full of media (20 gigs left on each). The external is being used only for media. I removed ownership permissions on all the media drives but now when I boot up the computer, the external won't show on the desktop (am using the encryption keys that came with the drive). If this is the case I can open any FCP project. If I can get the external drive up on the desktop (usually by switching the firewire port from back to front), then none of my FCP projects will open up (have to force quit due to "not responding"). This is drivng me nuts!!
Any ideas ??
thanks . . . .

Thanks for the replies. I bought the drive from an Apple reseller, told him it was for media storage and he sold me the drive with a Macally hardware encrypted "enclosure". I guess I could (or should have) increased the size of my three internal drives but will return this sucker as the replies I have received all indicate the encryption "feature" is one I don't need. Taking it back and thanks for the advice . . . as always this forum is extremely helpful !!
Craig

How do I run HD Media from an External Hard Drive?

I have a Macbook Pro, with Final Cut 7. I'm editing clips in HD shot with Canon 7d. I have a 250GB external Hard Drive. How do I set it up as my "Scratch Disk" and able to run all the media I'm editing from there too (for Playback, ect). And in the end is it going to effect how I export it for YouTube or anything?

I don't know how to pull media from the hard drive to edit with.
File>Import. Or drag the media from the scratch drive (after you copy it there from wherever) into your project.
But you are specifically talking about Canon DSLR footage. These files aren't huge...they are pretty small in fact. But what they are is a codec that isn't editable. You need to convert these to ProRes, THEN edit. You can use the Canon DSLR plugin for FCP to Log and Transfer them (therefore putting them onto your Capture Scratch), or use Clipwrap or MPEG STREAMCLIP to convert them to ProRes. Google "Canon 5D and Final Cut Pro" and find the wealth of people talking about this.
http://provideocoalition.com/index.php/ssimmons/story/canonreleases_a_dslr_plug_in_for_final_cut_pros_log_and_transfertool/
Shane

ILife with both internal and external hard drives?

I've been considering switching from a homebrew, multi-boot desktop to a MacBook for my primary computer, in part so I can hang out with my family in the living room rather than be exiled to the home office when I want to compute.
But here's my concern: I have media. We have about 50 GB of iTunes; maybe 30 GB of iPhoto; and tons and tons of digital video that would be stored in iMovie. Obviously the libraries are all interlinked. And it's all growing. I also like to rip DVDs and re-encode them for my iPod and AppleTV. Right now, my desktop has 480 GB of internal storage and that's just about enough.
I have discovered that the MacBook only comes with an option up to 250 GB. I absolutely need AppleCare, so I can't get an aftermarket hard drive. (All my Macs break - this one from the office that I'm on right now has a bum DVD drive, and my wife's has needed both fan and logic board replacements.)
While I'm aware of the existence of external hard drives, I'm concerned about Apple's non-external-hard-drive-friendly way of storing iLife data. If I wanted to keep more recent or useful music and photos on the internal drive but older stuff on an external, and still be able to use iLife seamlessly, would that be possible? (I see myself editing recent video in the living room, but then hooking back into the external HD in the office if I need older stuff.)
What solutions are out there for integrating data stores on both internal and external hard drives into an iLifestyle?
Thanks!

Sascha Segan1 wrote:
.. What solutions are out there for integrating data stores on both internal and external hard drives into an iLifestyle?
all iApps (iPhoto, iTunes, iM08) support usage of external drives as 'mass storage' devices.. you can tell all apps which drive to use for the Libraries.. there some tools out there, which even allow the usage of 2/many different Libraries in iTunes/iPhoto..
for iM in detail: the Projects are small files, and should stay internal (allthough I'm discribing a 'hack' on my site: http://karsten.schluter.googlepages.com/im08tricks Project Library (and Events) on External Harddrive); the Events (=GBs) could be located on as much ext. HDDs as you want..
but ...
all iApps are single-user .. you can NOT 'share' Libraries to 2/many different users; the idea of a 'media server' which hosts/shares all kind of data to all kind of users is not 'on concept' of iLife ..

How do I keep my media on an external hard drive but still access it in iTunes?

I just recently purchased a new Macbook Air and I had my itunes media library on an external hard drive. How do I access my itunes media on the macbook air from the external hard drive without transferring all the media onto my macbook air? I also want to be able to add and download media to my itunes and have it saved on my external hard drive. I have been trying to figure this out for weeks and need some assistance. Any advise would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

hey, basically i had the same problem as you. i had all of my itunes on an external hard drive and just bought a macbook pro, so here is what i was told to do....plug in the external hard drive to your MBA and then when you open itunes hold down the option button while you click and hold it down till you see a pop up window, it will ask you what library you want to use, click choose library and choose the itunes file that is on your external hard drive. and then all of your stuff will be in the itunes.
what i have seemed to run into though is, when the external hard drive isn't plugged in itunes won't open unless you choose another library or plug in the external hard drive. - my question is this, should i open another library on my macbook pro's internal hard drive so i can at least look at itunes when i don't have my external hard drive connected. my old macbook did this, it would point to another library on my macbook and i would still be able to see all of my media but couldn't play it without the external hooked up, is there a way to do this on lion?
i hope i was able to answer your question sam and hopefully can have my question answered too.
thanks!
- sorry sam, don't mean to hijack your thread but hopefully it will help us both - i don't want to store any media )movies, music, podcasts, apps, any of that stuff on my macbook pro's hard drive, so say there is a way to get itunes to open without my external hooked up and i can still see my media, or not see my media and i want to download a song or a app that i see when i am not near my external....what is the easiest way to get that file onto the external and not have it taking up space on my macbook pro's hard drive? sorry for all the long questions
Message was edited by: thenumbersarebad - thought of one more thing - sorry

How do I access my iTunes media from an external hard drive?

I have a new MacBook Air and want to access my media files from an external drive. I previously had a MacBook Pro and had to move all media to an external drive because I ran out of space. I've tried launching iTunes, going to Preferences, going to the Advanced Tab and then moving the location to the external drive and got this question: Would you like iTunes to move and rename the files in your new iTunes Media folder to match the “Keep iTunes Media folder organized” preference? Should I say yes? If I say yes, will iTunes be able to automatically find my files on the external drive?

hey, basically i had the same problem as you. i had all of my itunes on an external hard drive and just bought a macbook pro, so here is what i was told to do....plug in the external hard drive to your MBA and then when you open itunes hold down the option button while you click and hold it down till you see a pop up window, it will ask you what library you want to use, click choose library and choose the itunes file that is on your external hard drive. and then all of your stuff will be in the itunes.
what i have seemed to run into though is, when the external hard drive isn't plugged in itunes won't open unless you choose another library or plug in the external hard drive. - my question is this, should i open another library on my macbook pro's internal hard drive so i can at least look at itunes when i don't have my external hard drive connected. my old macbook did this, it would point to another library on my macbook and i would still be able to see all of my media but couldn't play it without the external hooked up, is there a way to do this on lion?
i hope i was able to answer your question sam and hopefully can have my question answered too.
thanks!
- sorry sam, don't mean to hijack your thread but hopefully it will help us both - i don't want to store any media )movies, music, podcasts, apps, any of that stuff on my macbook pro's hard drive, so say there is a way to get itunes to open without my external hooked up and i can still see my media, or not see my media and i want to download a song or a app that i see when i am not near my external....what is the easiest way to get that file onto the external and not have it taking up space on my macbook pro's hard drive? sorry for all the long questions
Message was edited by: thenumbersarebad - thought of one more thing - sorry

Using iphoto with iphoto library on external hard drive

My Imac is running snow leopard with ilife '11. I have imported way too many photos into Iphoto which is really slowing it down. I'd like to put all of my photos on an external hard drive and use that as my iphoto library--which should be possible, as I gather from reading various other related posts. Another reason to put it on an external drive is so that I can use my new macbook air to edit/organize while on the go.
1. How do I set up my Iphoto library on an external hard drive?
2. How do I make sure that all future photos go to the library on that external hard drive?
3. How do I run Iphoto with the library on an external hard drive?
THANK YOU for your help!

Hello. I just transferred my iPhoto library to a Western Digital My Book for Mac external hard drive. Do you know if I needed to format this drive even though it says it's for Mac. I did not format it and there were not any instructions with the drive that said I needed to do it. The transfer seems to have worked ok but my backups from Time Machine onto Time Capsule are inconsistent. I already posed a question regarding this problem but I noticed this message regarding formating the external disk and I wonder if that is causing the problem. Thanks.

IMac Media Server, or External Hard Drive Connected to Airport Extreme?

I would like to create a central repository for all of my movies/music which I would like to stream to an apple tv. For now, it is all iTunes compatible stuff. At the same time, i want to be able to access those media files from my iPad, iPhone, and other Mac machines throughout my house.
I currently have an iMac that is not often used. I had an idea to use it as a media server through which I could stream all of my media to the apple tv. The plan would be to buy a 3 or 4 TB hard drive, and connect the hard drive directly to the iMac (ideally via firewire), and then upload all of my movies/music to the hard drive, while keeping the libraries intact on the iMac. In addition, I would like to keep the library on my MBP, but direct the hard drive to utilize the media files on that same hard drive (so, essentially, using one set of media files, in two iTunes libraries). This way (I'm thinking), I should be able to stream my media from either library on my Apple TV (but in reality, the media is all on the one hard drive) and to my iDevices in my home.
The other option I have come up with is to connect a hard drive on the network, directly to the airport extreme (probably via USB, unless someone knows of a GE drive that is not a pre-formatted NAS server). Then I would hope to link the media libraries on both computers through to the media files stored on the hard drive.
So the questions I have are:
Which is the better set up for home streaming? Will one be faster than the other?
Is there a better way of doing this?
If I downloaded the Plex Media server to the iMac in the first option, would I be able to access all of the media on my Smart TV w/o the Apple TV?
Thanks in advance for your input.

Which is the better set up for home streaming? Will one be faster than the other?
Both will be about the same. The issue I would be sure to look at is how well the external hard drive's wake from sleep mode works. It is annoying if the drive sometimes goes to sleep and will not wake up without you waking over to the computer.
The direct connect via firewire is a slightly faster more reliable option, but not really something you will notice given the ATV would only need a fraction of the bandwith either have.
The more important thing for performace woudl be to use eithernet instead of WiFi. You will make your life a lot easer if you do not try to do streaming HD video over WiFi.
If I downloaded the Plex Media server to the iMac in the first option, would I be able to access all of the media on my Smart TV w/o the Apple TV?
No. ATV can only see content that is in your local iTunes setup or in iCloud. So in of these setups you will need the content on these drives to be added to iTunes.

Editing with media on an external hard drive

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