My iMovie is stuck on Generating Thumbnails. Timer increases instead of decreasing.

My iMovie11 is stuck on generating thumbnails. Timer increases rather than decreases.Have to force quit.

You might be able to trick iMovie by temporarily moving that project folder out of the following location:
Mac HD > Users > (your home folder) > Movies > iMovie Projects > (look for the name of the project that blew-up)
Drag that project folder to the Desktop for the time being. Launch iMovie and see if it still tries to create the Project Thumbnails. If it gets past any error messages or other house keeping, you can create a new project. Otherwise, quit iMovie. Drag that project folder from the desktop BACK into your iMovie Projects folder. Try launching iMovie again and see if it gets stuck generating the Thumbnails.

Similar Messages

IMovie 11 stuck on "generating thumbnails"

I have 1 TB of movies that worked fine in iMovie09. I open iMovie11 and it gets stuck like in the attached photo.
1. I tried using it after every upgrade, it never worked.
2. iMovie11 works fine with newly imported movies (tape/DV, AVI, MOV, etc) - imports them fine, doesn't get stuck.
3. I could move the old movies to a different directory (not iMovie Events) and import them in iMovie11, but I hate the idea. It took forever to import 500GB from iMovie06/HD into iMovie09 and I accepted it as a one-time backward incompatibility. I expected iMovie11 to be backward compatible with iMovie09.
My question is why does it get stuck and how to fix it. Other than reimporting 100 DV tapes or iMovie 09 events?
Thanks in advance.

Hi
Me just thinking
• Panic Halts = error builds up on Hard Disk - I always do a
- Repair Permissions (Disk Util tool) - and -
- Repair Hard Disk ( I start my Mac from install DVDs and select Disk Util tool from this - as it can not mend the a Disk with a running Mac OS (brain surgery on one self is not recommended))
• Generating Thumbnails
- Can take LONG TIME - I just let it be to do it's job
- If ridiculously long time >2 hour even > one day - then in my cases it's been due to a too full Hard Disk.
I never let Main Start-Up (Mac OS) Hard disk go less than 25Gb free space - ever.
Yours Bengt W

Stuck at Generating Thumbnails

Almost every time I import from my cameras it gets stuck on Generating Thumbnails. It will first say Time Remaining: 2 minutes, and then it will say 2 hours or more and just spin. I have to Force Quit. This time I can't get past this? What should I try?

I'm still stuck on Generating Thumbs. I guess I'll have to call support.

Stuck on "Generating Thumbnails"

I upgraded from the previous version of iLife to iLife '11 today and when I went to use iMovie it has been stuck generating thumbnails all day.
I'm running 10.6.4 and have 4 GB of ram on an iMac. I also have 78 gigs of free space.
Is anyone else having this issue?

Solution for Me: Follow all the above and then open and leave open, iPhoto before opening iMovie.
Background: Attempted to open iMovie-11 after a three week break, only to see it freeze after authorising it to make new Thumbnails of the videos in iPhoto. Allowed 15mins in case it was actually working behind the scenes before 'force-quitting.'
The pattern was repeated many times despite meticulously following all the advice on this thread and several others around the forum. Nothing seemed to fix the snag with many valuable hours wasted.
Usually when solving issues, I close all programmes not directly related to the problem app. (I resaon that memory and resources are better 'concentrated') I recalled that iMovie initially grounded when trying to make thumbnails of my iPhoto videos I think after an update. So out of curiosity I opened iPhoto and iMovie loaded safely. iMovie did stumble one more time after replacing the suspected errant folders from my desktop into the Users / iMovie folder, (as in Bruce EBonus excellent suggestion above) but another 'repair permissions' and re-boot and everything has been fine since.
I hope this helps anyone suffering the same issue.

Stuck on generating thumbnails for imported footage

I've got a problem with importing DV footage from a camcorder using Firewire. In my preferences, I have selected all analysis options. It's my understanding that FCP is supposed to automatically analyze the footage as it's being recorded to disk.
So, after the import process from tape completes and I close the import window, I don't see any evidence of analysis having completed, or even begun. There are no smart folders for People and Synchronization as evidence. When I go to view the background tasks, I see that Transcoding and Analysis is stuck at 0%, while Rendering (specifically, Generating Thumnails) is shown as an active task, but no progress percentage is displayed. And it seems to be stuck like that forever, even if I leave my speedy new quad core alone for hours. I don't know how long this process is supposed to take (I only import up to an hour of DV clips at a time), and whether the analysis is supposed to start after rendering thumbnails is complete, but FCP is giving no indication that it's making any progress at all, which is disconcerting.
The only remedy seems to be to close FCP, re-open it, and then manually choose Analyze and Fix on all the clips in the event browser, which then seems to work. And without a generating thumbnails phase.

Solution for Me: Follow all the above and then open and leave open, iPhoto before opening iMovie.
Background: Attempted to open iMovie-11 after a three week break, only to see it freeze after authorising it to make new Thumbnails of the videos in iPhoto. Allowed 15mins in case it was actually working behind the scenes before 'force-quitting.'
The pattern was repeated many times despite meticulously following all the advice on this thread and several others around the forum. Nothing seemed to fix the snag with many valuable hours wasted.
Usually when solving issues, I close all programmes not directly related to the problem app. (I resaon that memory and resources are better 'concentrated') I recalled that iMovie initially grounded when trying to make thumbnails of my iPhoto videos I think after an update. So out of curiosity I opened iPhoto and iMovie loaded safely. iMovie did stumble one more time after replacing the suspected errant folders from my desktop into the Users / iMovie folder, (as in Bruce EBonus excellent suggestion above) but another 'repair permissions' and re-boot and everything has been fine since.
I hope this helps anyone suffering the same issue.

IMovie 11 wont stop generating thumbnails

I imported a couple videos. After they were complete, a window popped up saying "processing event: new event" but it took forever and I had to shut down before it was finished.
Now, every time i open iMovie, that window pops up and it says: "generating thumbnails." The time remaining is 4570 hours and climbing. It never gets anywhere and I can't click on anything. Is there any way to make it stop? Or should I reinstall iMovie 11?
Thanks.

Doubt a reinstall would change anything. Close iMovie and delete your caches and plist is where I would start. http://uimfaq.us/b3aANe
Daniel C. Slagle
Keeper of the "Unofficial" iMovie FAQ
I may receive some form of compensation, financial or otherwise, from my recommendation or link

IMovie gets stuck while creating thumbnails for iPhoto Videos

Hello,
I've just got iLife 09. When I opened iMovie (with all the latest patches) it asked me if I want to create iPhoto thumbnaisl. I said yes and iMovie started to do something. At a certrain point the progress bar stopped moving and didn't move until I killed iMovie. If I do the same now, not even the progress bar show up and "remaining time" keeps empty.
Can anyone tell me how to convince iMovie to create those thumbnails?
My iPhoto contains about 6000 images and 42 iPhone movies.
Thanks
Bernd

Give this sequence a try, it may help you isolate your issue:
_*RUN SOFTWARE UPDATE*_
Before starting the steps below, make sure you are running the latest software update.
_*REMOVE 3RD PARTY PLUGINS*_
Some 3rd party plugins may be interfering with iMovie.
Here are the only 2 files IN MY QUICKTIME FOLDER:
. . . . . . . . . . . . / Library / QuickTime / AppleIntermediateCodec.component
. . . . . . . . . . . . / Library / QuickTime / AppleMPEG2Codec.component
If you do have more than the 2 files listed above, temporarily move the "NON APPLE" components outside of the QuickTime folder, Reboot the Mac.
_*TEMPORARILY CREATE A NEW IPHOTO LIBRARY*_
_ Quit all your Apps
_ Hold-down the [Option] key and click on the iPhoto icon
_ Click "Create New.." and enter a new iPhoto Library name -- I used "Empty_Library"
_ Click "Save"
_ Quit iPhoto
_*FRESH LAUNCH OF IMOVIE*_
_ Delete the iMovie Plist: /Users/ {your username} /Library/Preferences/com.apple.iMovie8.plist
_ Launch iMovie
Does iMovie starts-up properly without your old iPhoto Library?
If so, your old iPhoto Library may contain a video file / files that are not compatible with iMovie.
_*TRY RE-LOADING YOUR OLD IPHOTO LIBRARY*_
_ Quit all your Apps
_ Hold-down the [Option] key and click on the iPhoto icon
_ Select your old iPhoto Library from the list
_ Click "Choose"
_ Quit iPhoto
_ Launch iMovie
Does iMovie starts-up properly with your old iPhoto Library?
If not, try removing the bad video file / files from your iPhoto Library (if you know which one it is).
Just make sure to back-up those files before removing them from your iPhoto Library.
Let me know if that helps.

Problems in generating thumbnails in iMovie08

I just downloaded 6GB worth of video from my Sanyo XactiHD camera into my iPhoto. When i launch my iMovie08, it asks for permissions for generating thumbnails and then it closes down. It has imported stills and video into iPhoto perfectly, but fails to generate thumbnails in iMovie (other projects open fine, if i skip the thumbnail generation and postpone importing the new video). I have tried three or four times and it still crashes. I tried importing directly into iMovie and it still crashes with a message "iMovie application quit unexpectedly". Any suggestions on how to deal with it?
Regards
Sanjeev

If you have corrupted thumbnails you can try the suggestion to delete either the whole _iMovie Thumbnails_ folder or individual files in there. Then restart iMovie and let it regenerate the thumbnails.
If iMovie continually fails to generate thumbnails for some clips (as it seems to do for some clips imported from my Sony Cybershot) I figured *as a workaround* you can "manually" generate Thumbnails if you open the movie in Quicktime and can Export in Photo-JPEG at 120x90 resolution and drop the file into the iMovie Thumbnails folder for your event. Note that the movie you export has the same name as the source minus the .mov extension.
Thumbnail format info
!http://picasaweb.google.com/rocketmanblamb/IMovieSupportImages?authkey=5u255cTC 8Tc#5265888220957444242!
iMovie event directory
!http://picasaweb.google.com/rocketmanblamb/IMovieSupportImages?authkey=5u255cTC 8Tc#5265891696441348034!
To do this for many clips this would be annoying I know, I'm thinking that you could create an Automator workflow to do this for all the files but I haven't done this yet. If I work on that I will post more info here.
I also talk about this issue here:
[http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1775462]
[http://splinterinyourmind.com/2008/08/14/workaround-for-imovie-08-taking-a-long -time-forever-to-generate-thumbnails>
Message was edited by: rocketmanblamb

IMovie 08 generating thumbnails every time it's opened

Hello -
I'm hoping someone has the answer for this. When I first started using iMovie 08 everything worked fine. It generated thumbnails the first time it opened, and they were there each time I re-opened the program. Then out-of-the-blue they disappeared, and iMovie needed to regenerate them each time open the program (which takes about 30 minutes).
Helpful info? The only thing I noticed is that I have several types of movie files (.mov,.avi,etc..) all mixed in together, but as far as I can tell they were like that when the program was working well. I have looked for duplicates, and again, any duplicates would have been there when everything was working ok.
I appreciate any advice on this.
:)Christina

Hello there Clayguy7,
If I understand correctly you are unable to use iMovie because it keeps closing on you for no reason as soon as you open it. I would like to recommend the troubleshooting information in the following article to help you out here:
iMovie: How to troubleshoot "Application Unexpectedly Quit" messages
Start with this step, and there is more in the article if you need it:
2) Disable non-essential QuickTime components.
Navigate to /Library/QuickTime/ for a list of components currently installed.
Temporarily disable any components that are not in the list below. You can disable the components by moving them to the Desktop or another folder outside of the /Library/QuickTime/ folder.
Open iMovie and see if the issue is resolved. If iMovie no longer unexpectedly quits, check to see if an updated component is available, or contact the developer of the component for further recommendations.
iMovie uses the following components, and should be left in the QuickTime folder:
AppleIntermediateCodec.component
AppleMPEG2Codec.component
Note: There may also be a similar folder at ~/Library/QuickTime/ depending on the components you have installed. If this folder is available on your Mac, remove any components as instructed in step 2. Both of these locations hold QuickTime components. The components help you encode or decode different types of multimedia content.
Thank you for using Apple Support Communities.
Take care,
Sterling

Imovie 9.09 unable to generate thumbnails on my iMac running 10.6.8

I'm trying to digitise camcorder footage currently saved on vhs tape. Although I'm now using a 27"iMac running Yosemite, I don't have the usb lead with the std usb connector on the computer end to connect the digitiser to it, so I'm using my old iMac running 10.6.8 and iMovie 9 as I have the correct lead for that iMac.
I did a test one minute file transfer and this digitised, opening it in iMovie 10, ok so I saved it onto a USB stick and transferred it to the 27" iMac though without any content displayed in the clip. Even so, it plays ok so I'd be content if the remaining tapes got digitised with this problem. But.....
When I tried to import 2 hours as one file the conversion appeared to be going ok until I stopped it. I then got a message saying that it was generating thumbnails and would take a minute. this changed to 2, then 9, then 2 hours, then 4 hours. After it had been running for 12 hours with no change in the 4 hours estimated for generating the thumbnails i did a force quite, then tried to get back into iMovie.
When it opened, it went straight into generating thumbnails, estimating the time needed as 9 minutes. It's now been stuck on "less than a minute" for about 30 mins so I'm about to do another force quit.
All suggestions welcomed, ideally to generate thumbails in the shortest time possible - though I'd be content just to get the file transferred with no thumbnails.
Advice please.

Save the photos to the camera roll on the iPad, then connect it to your computer with a USB cable. You can import the photos using iPhoto if you have it or image capture if you don't.

Imovie is stuck - I was importing video, then imovie "shut down unexpectedly", now each time I re-start it automatically tried to process the Event, and "unexpectedly" shuts down again, etc, etc. Any thoughts?

The imovie window that keeps comig up after I restart the program is "Generating Thumbnails". I would like to just stop the action, but am not sure where to go, or do I go thru the imac, or the imovie program. It just keeps shutting itself down, and when i reboot the program it keeps going through the same cycle. I've tried restarting the computer, and force quitting the program. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

You might be able to trick iMovie by temporarily moving that project folder out of the following location:
Mac HD > Users > (your home folder) > Movies > iMovie Projects > (look for the name of the project that blew-up)
Drag that project folder to the Desktop for the time being. Launch iMovie and see if it still tries to create the Project Thumbnails. If it gets past any error messages or other house keeping, you can create a new project. Otherwise, quit iMovie. Drag that project folder from the desktop BACK into your iMovie Projects folder. Try launching iMovie again and see if it gets stuck generating the Thumbnails.

IMovie update 7.1.2 crashes at start while generating thumbnails

Since I updated iMovie to v7.1.2 it crashes every time I open it. First shows a message saying that a camera has been detected (although there is no camera connected) Then it starts generating thumbnails and crashes.
I re-installed version 7.1.1 and works wonderfully

After a very patient work I could make my iMovie work.
When the iMovie 7.1.4 update starts (7.1.2 had the same issue) it checks your HD (and all other storage devices you may have connected) for video files. This is different from version 7.1.1. If during the check, for any reason, cannot access a file, it crashes.
In my case I had to check permissions for every video file and/or folder containing them until I solved the problem. Fixing permissions with Disk Utility or changing permissions for a folder and all enclosed subfolders, it is not enough. You have to check each individual file. Not very difficult but time consuming.
Now iMovie is working fine. I really regret that Apple made a change in the two last updates without any warning. After all the turmoil provoked in this and in other related forums by desperate iMovie users experiencing this problem, they should have acknowledged the issue. By the way. it started last June. I would have expected that they publish some suggestions in their support website.
I spent almost 4 hours doing what finally was the answer to the problem. Not to mention the timeless trials I made during the last months.

IMovie 11: issues generating thumbnails with large import

I have a HDV tape that was in a flood, and is not in great condition (It's a sentimental family movie). It imported OK, but iMovie recognized scenes really weird, in that it separated the 60 minute tape into so many segments (157) that it's causing fits for iMovie to generate thumbnails. At the import, it got all the way to the point where it said it had 1 minute left -- but it stayed there for over 3 hours. So I "forced quite" iMovie. I relaunched it, and it did basically the same thing -- it got to a minute left, then stayed there for several hours. So I forced quit it again. This time it got to the point where it said 4 hours left, and I left it over night. It was in the exact same spot this morning. So I forced quit, then rebooted the whole computer. When it came up this time, it said it had less than a minute, but it's now growing in time (the bar is moving towards the right, so maybe it's working...we'll see).
The problem is now, as soon as I boot up iMovie, it automatically goes into the generate thumbnails mode, and I can't do anything else with it. So, my question is 3 part.
1. Is there a way to get the import process done, so that I can start to edit the video.
2. If I can't, how can I clear this project, so that when I start iMovie, I can do something else with it?
3. I have 8 HDV tapes in similar condition (some worse than others) -- what is the best course of action to extracting all the movie that I can from the tapes?
Thanks

By the way, here's a video of my issue:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGHjiv0-5y0&feature=youtu.be

Importing video while iMovie generates thumbnails

I am in the midst of importing analog video via my Canopus ADVC110. My question is this: Once you've imported the video and iMovie starts to generate thumbnails, is it possible to begin importing a new tape during this time?
Russ
Altadena, CA

Not to my knowledge.

Trying to import video files. Clock on files and hit import. Imovie says generating thumbnails and importing. Then after loading, no movies there. help?

My 14 year old son is trying to import videos into iMovie. He's done this a dozen times before with no problem. Here is what he's doing "I went to import movies, clicked on the idv files and hit import. On iMovie it said "generating thumbnails, and importing". Then it gave the loading sign. When it was done, none of the movies/videos were in Imovie. He needs to have this done as a xmas gift for a friend by Thursday .

After much research and troubleshooting, GoToMeeting replied with the final answer: We do not support the uploading of recordings to editing software. If you are having issues uploading a recording, unfortunately, we do not have tools or steps to resolve this. It is not a supported feature. I am sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused you.
The no longer plan to support editing of recordings made with their software. So, we are planning to find a new meeting provider.

My iMovie is stuck on Generating Thumbnails. Timer increases instead of decreasing.

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for