Ken Burns Effect Pollutes Everything

Question

If you're putting together a slideshow, do not turn on the KB Effect for anything. Ever. I hate to say this, for I love this feature. It has enhanced many of my slides. However, it's a sorcerer's apprentice.
It causes nightmares once it's in your timeline. You can't update its durations, unless you delete the slide & start all over. I've found, oddly, that if a transition is connected, and you try to reduce the duration of the slide, after the transition is rendered, the slide, instead of having reduced duration, is actually increased by the amount of the reduction you wanted!
Beware of using KBE for any photo in your iPhoto imported album. Once you invoke KBE on any photo, it pollutes every photo you click on, thereafter, whether you turn it off or not. Karl Petersen posted a message last month, praising this polluting feature of KBE:
"The most important is that all of the Ken Burns settings, the KB checkbox, zoom, pan and duration are controlled by the LAST imported clip you made, or a previously-imported clip you clicked on. THAT's what sets the default setting for your next import(s). (A very nice feature, by the way, for it lets you apply the Ken Burns settings of one clip to the next photos you import. You don't have to reconfigure settings each time.)"
First, it's boring to an audience to have repetitious effects. Second, I don't know what he means by "import." iM4, in moving a photo from the Pane to the Viewer (timeline), says it's importing it, but I already imported it from iPhoto4. Third, I'm not so lazy as to resent having to reconfigure individual photos, if it means I have control over what I want to reconfigure & what I don't want to reconfigure.
Third, I wish Apple would realize users do have a brain: They don't need everything automated. There should be two buttons: KBE on for all, another KBE off for all. KBE off would allow the user to select which photos KBE is confined to. One thing I like about Microsoft is, it doesn't assume anything about the user. The user has choice & is always in control.
I'm really at the point of not invoking KBE for anything, anymore. It's causing too much frustration, & it's not worth the time trying to figure it out, especially once the photo is in the timeline.
BTW, what's the relationship between the Monitor, the Timeline, & the window in the upper right corner of the Photo Pane?

Answer 1

The conclusions you've reached about the Ken Burns Effect are so strange it makes me wonder if you've understood how it works. Unlike the Ken Burns Effect in iPhoto — which adds the effect on-the-fly as a sequence of photos is played — the Ken Burns Effect in iMovie affects how the photo is imported and rendered. iMovie renders video — creates a movie clip — based on your Ken Burns settings.
Remember, iMovie is all about creating video clips that play as part of a movie. iPhoto, on the other hand, has no movie. It simply displays a series of images. It never creates a movie until we export the slideshow to a QuickTime movie.
Changing the Ken Burns settings of a photo in iPhoto simply changes how that image is played in the iPhoto slideshow. Changing the Ken Burns settings of an iMovie clip, on the other hand, changes how it is (immediately) rendered into a new video clip.
You can't update its durations, unless you delete the slide & start all over
Of course you can change a duration. Click on the rendered clip in the Timeline, change the duration, and Update the clip.
Of course, if you've edited a previously-rendered clip — added a title or transition, for example — then it is no longer a KB clip. But if you remove the title or transition you can update the KB settings normally.
First, it's boring to an audience to have repetitious effects.
I never suggested you use the same KB effect on all your clips. I suggested that if you want to avoid having to reconfigure your Ken Burns settings before importing a photo, first click on a clip that already uses those KB settings. This saves time and considerable aggravation. I find this especially useful because the KB settings window is so clumsy (and buggy).
Second, I don't know what he means by "import." iM
Each time you add a photo from the iPhoto list to your iMovie project it is imported to the project. iMovie adds the photo to the project, then renders the video clip, if needed. (The imported photo is retained so you can Update the clip later, if you want.)
Third, I'm not so lazy as to resent having to reconfigure individual photos, if it means I have control over what I want to reconfigure & what I don't want to reconfigure.
Fine, iMovie lets you do that. There's nothing preventing you from configuring new Ken Burns settings for each photo. (My suggestion was to avoid having to do that unnecessarily.)
Third, I wish Apple would realize users do have a brain:
Apple DOES assume we have brains. And that we use them to learn how the program actually works, and why.
There should be two buttons: KBE on for all, another KBE off for all. KBE off would allow the user to select which photos KBE is confined to.
It's that point which makes me wonder if you've misunderstood something important. The Ken Burns settings we apply in iMovie do NOT control how the movie PLAYS in iMovie, at least not directly, like it does in iPhoto (and other slideshow software). The KB settings control how a clip is RENDERED when the photo is imported to iMovie. Once rendered, that clip is FIXED unless we re-render (Update) it. Changing its Ken Burns settings changes the clip ONLY if we re-render the clip.
Another way to think about it is that the Ken Burns Effect affects how a photo is imported. Once imported, it does not affect how it plays.
Once you invoke KBE on any photo, it pollutes every photo you click on, thereafter, whether you turn it off or not
There's no pollution of anything. For the reasons I mentioned earlier, the settings do NOT change anything about existing photos or clips until you Apply those settings, which (usually) causes iMovie to re-render the clip.
Try to re-think how Ken Burns works, where you assume iMovie is creating video, not just a series of images it plays in sequence. Those are two very different things.
Karl