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iMovie Editing Basics (iMovie versions 4-6) Materials: Laptops with iMovie, Video Cameras, 1394 cable Topic 1: Downloading • Connect the camera with the computer using the 1394 cable, making sure the camera is on playback or VCR mode. • Open iMovie program and create a new project. To capture or download the movie footage to the program, make sure the selector switch just be- low the video window is clicked over toward the movie camera icon, not the scissors icon. You can play, rewind or fast forward using the controls in iMovie. Once you’re at the point in the video you wish to begin capturing, press “import” and the program will begin logging the clips (portions of video). A separate clip will open in the clip area of iMovie (upper right area) for each segment of video filmed. Remember, each time the record- ing mechanism was stopped and started again, a separate clip will register in iMovie. • When all the video you need is captured, press stop. Topic 2: iMovie basics • Now that you have the clips, you are ready to begin moving them into the timeline area where they can be edited together. The timeline is the bar area at the bottom of the screen. • First, make sure the selector switch is moved to the right so that it is near the scissors icon. To the left of the movie camera/scissors selector switch is a timeline mode switch. Select the film- strip icon, not the clock icon. This will allow you to move the clips onto the timeline and arrange them in the order you would like. • To move the clips to the timeline, simply click and grab the clip you wish to use. It is important to leave a master copy of the clip in the clip area when you do this, so press option while moving the clip and a copy will remain in the clip area for later use if need be. • A specific clip is selected when it is blue in col- or. Which ever clip is selected at the time, that is the clip that will play in the preview window to the left. This is a way to look at the clips before moving them to the timeline. Topic 3: Editing basics • Once you have a sequence of raw clips, you’ll need to edit them down into smaller chunks. Your aim should be to create a sequence of 3-5 second clips that transition from wide to medium to tight shots of the subject. Cutting the shots from say 15 or 20 second clips to 3-5 second clips is called “crop- ping”. To crop a clip, highlight the clip on the timeline (click on it and it will turn blue), then used the tabs under the preview window (a starting tab and stopping tab will appear when you drag your mouse across the scale under the window) Pull the stop tab (called the out point) to the point on the scale where you want the video clip to end and then pull the start tab (called the in point) to the point where you want it to stop. This should create a yellow area of the scale to appear. This will be the remaining length of film after you crop the clip. A readout of the time length of the crop should appear next to the out point. The aim, again, is a 3-5 second piece. Once the area you want is in yellow, use the shortcut key “apple+k” to crop, or go to the edit menu above to find the commands. • Repeat the same procedure for the following clips. The cropping process demonstrates the value of keeping a copy of larger clips in the clip area. You may crop the larger, longer clips into several smaller clips. • Once you have the clips cropped and in the order you desire, you can begin working on sound and transitions.
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iMovie 6 Editing Guide

Mar 13, 2016

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Jeff Achen

A step-by-step guide to basic editing in iMoive versions 4-6 for journalists.
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Page 1: iMovie 6 Editing Guide

iMovie Editing Basics (iMovie versions 4-6)Materials: Laptops with iMovie, Video Cameras, 1394 cable

Topic 1: Downloading • Connect the camera with the computer using the 1394 cable, making sure the camera is on playback or VCR mode.• Open iMovie program and create a new project. To capture or download the movie footage to the program, make sure the selector switch just be-low the video window is clicked over toward the movie camera icon, not the scissors icon. You can play, rewind or fast forward using the controls in iMovie. Once you’re at the point in the video you wish to begin capturing, press “import” and the program will begin logging the clips (portions of video). A separate clip will open in the clip area of iMovie (upper right area) for each segment of video filmed. Remember, each time the record-ing mechanism was stopped and started again, a separate clip will register in iMovie.• When all the video you need is captured, press stop.

Topic 2: iMovie basics • Now that you have the clips, you are ready to begin moving them into the timeline area where they can be edited together. The timeline is the bar area at the bottom of the screen. • First, make sure the selector switch is moved to the right so that it is near the scissors icon. To the left of the movie camera/scissors selector switch is a timeline mode switch. Select the film-strip icon, not the clock icon. This will allow you to move the clips onto the timeline and arrange them in the order you would like. • To move the clips to the timeline, simply click and grab the clip you wish to use. It is important to leave a master copy of the clip in the clip area when you do this, so press option while moving the clip and a copy will remain in the clip area for later use if need be. • A specific clip is selected when it is blue in col-or. Which ever clip is selected at the time, that is the clip that will play in the preview window to the left. This is a way to look at the clips before moving them to the timeline.

Topic 3: Editing basics• Once you have a sequence of raw clips, you’ll need to edit them down into smaller chunks. Your aim should be to create a sequence of 3-5 second clips that transition from wide to medium to tight shots of the subject. Cutting the shots from say 15 or 20 second clips to 3-5 second clips is called “crop-ping”. To crop a clip, highlight the clip on the timeline (click on it and it will turn blue), then used the tabs under the preview window (a starting tab and stopping tab will appear when you drag your mouse across the scale under the window) Pull the stop tab (called the out point) to the point on the scale where you want the video clip to end and then pull the start tab (called the in point) to the point where you want it to stop. This should create a yellow area of the scale to appear. This will be the remaining length of film after you crop the clip. A readout of the time length of the crop should appear next to the out point. The aim, again, is a 3-5 second piece. Once the area you want is in yellow, use the shortcut key “apple+k” to crop, or go to the edit menu above to find the commands.• Repeat the same procedure for the following clips. The cropping process demonstrates the value of keeping a copy of larger clips in the clip area. You may crop the larger, longer clips into several smaller clips.• Once you have the clips cropped and in the order you desire, you can begin working on sound and transitions.

Page 2: iMovie 6 Editing Guide

Topic 4: Sound and transitions• In most cases you’ll want to have one dominant sound to cover the entire series of clips. This requires that we “extract” a length of audio from a longer clip. For instance, you may have music that you recorded in the background or an interview that would serve as a voice over narration. To extract the audio, simply highlight the clip you wish to extract from and use the shortcut key “apple+j” or “extract audio” from the advanced menu. You then have a separate audio track below the video tracks on your timeline. You can delete the original video track and place your series of clips over the audio track.

• To add transitions, simply click on the transition menu under the clip area. Add a fade in and fade out at the beginning and end of your video. If you need cross dissolve transitions, simply click and drag the cross dissolve transition between the two clips you wish to transition from/to.

• Lastly, you’ll want to add a stripe subtitle that identifies the video as belonging to your newspa-per web site and the name of the producer. Un-der the clip area, select titles. Scroll down to the “stripe subtitle” and type in your web site name on top and produced by (your name) on bottom. Make sure to check the box that reads “QT mar-gins”.

Topic 5: Downloading for the Web• To share or export your video as a file for use on the Internet, you’ll need to save the project, then select “export” or “share” (depending on your version of iMovie).

Page 3: iMovie 6 Editing Guide

This will prompt another menu. Select “Quicktime” from the menu and compress the movie for “expert settings”. This allows you to select the bandwidth and achieve the right size file for upload to video hosting sites like YouTube or Blip.tv. Under expert settings, select “share” after which you’ll be prompted to name the file and select a place to save the file to. I often save it to my desktop or a folder where I archive all my videos.

You should also make sure that the “export” selector is for “movie to quicktime movie” and the “use” selector is for “broadband - high”.

Next you’ll want to fine tune the file export settings. Click “options”. This will bring up the “Movie settings” tab.

Page 4: iMovie 6 Editing Guide

Next, click “size”. Then select 1280 x 720 HD from the “Dimensions” drop down menu (if you filmed in widescreen mode. If you filmed in standard 4:3 mode, then use NTSC 720 x 480 4:3) Click ok.

Next, click on the settings button. Under “Data rate” select automatic. Then make sure the “Qual-ity” slider is set to “high”. You can set it to “me-dium” for longer videos to ensure they playback on the web reasonably. Click ok.

Now you’re done. Just give your movie a name and select a destination for the file to be created and in a few minutes you’ll have your movie ready to upload to the web!