iMovie (2013)
I've been a old fan of iMovie since version 1.0 when it was first came bundled with my beloved iMac DV Special Edition. It was specifically designed to work with FireWire and DV cameras that were prevalent at the time and was a relatively inexpensive way to edit digital videos without having to invest in a more costly Avid/Premier/Final Cut Pro solution.
Although I was quite proficient using the old versions up to iMovie HD 6, I never got around to using the newer iMovie '08. A lot of that had to do with the drastically new UI that was introduced as well as the horrible reviews the product received. Basically Apple took out a lot of solid editing features (no timeline or advanced audio features) of the old version, replaced them with just a few good ones (zero rendering time for titles and effects, skim to preview), and ended up upsetting the Mac faithful during the process. Apple ended up conceding that this perhaps wasn't the best idea and quickly allowed anybody the option to download the old version for free.
What made this drastic change so puzzling was that the inventor of iMovie '08 was none other than Randy Ubillos, one of the co-creators of Adobe Premier and was part of the original team that produced Final Cut Pro. You would think with his years of digital video experience he would know the type of items video editors would want.
To their credit, Apple didn't rest on their laurels and slowly added back in many of the missing features with each new revision. When I bought my last iMac (Mid 2011) it came bundled with iMovie '11, so I decided to give it another try. By then I had since replaced my old DV camcorder with a newer AVCHD Sony model (thanks to Rob's generous Best Buy gift card!) and was anxious to start editing my HD videos.
I found out right away that although iMovie supported AVCHD video importing (for most consumer type cameras), it wouldn't let you edit the AVCHD files natively. Instead it forced you to transcode the video to Apple Intermediate Codec (AIC) which has the nasty side effect of taking the storage efficient file format of AVCHD and blowing it up ten times the original file size. With my limited hard drive space there was no way I could support that so I gave up on iMovie and used the free Windows based software that came with my Sony camera. It had an awful interface and it forced me to use Windows (the horror!) but it did allow me to edit AVCHD natively and gave me the option to create near Blu-Ray quality AVCHD DVDs.
Queue in iMovie 10.0 (Apple confusingly just calls it iMovie and has dropped the HD suffix and year moniker), which was introduced back in October 2013 along side with Mavericks. Not only did it finally allow you to natively edit in AVCHD, it had the slick space gray interface of its older brother Final Cut Pro X. I didn't end up using it though until I decided to edit my sister in law's recent wedding video. Coming from an iMovie HD 6 background, the UI still threw me off so I had to watch some YouTube video tutorials and read the sparse online documentation to get me up to speed (I really couldn't wait until late May for David Pogue's Missing Manual).
After the initial hump I found the new iMovie to be very intuitive and blazing fast. It takes advantage of every CPU core and I love the non-destructive editing process. I ended up completing the rough edit in about 2 nights which surprised me on how little effort it required.
There were two hiccups I had which I didn't expect. The first was that the new version enforces DRM restrictions on commercial music. I had a lot of pre-DRM iTunes purchases that it refused to import so I had to download some new tracks to put in the movie.
The second issue was the limited export options. I wanted to create some standard DVDs and AVCHD DVDs for the bride and groom, however I could only export to a QuickTime friendly MP4 file. Apple has other online options such as YouTube, Facebook, Vimeo, ect... but come on, this obviously restricts you to smaller sized clips. Apple's recommended solution is to export your home movies to iMovie Theater or iTunes which is playable on your Apple TV but unfortunately I don't own this device nor do I know anybody else that does.
This led me to a lot of online research which included advice such as transcoding the MP4 file or purchasing a 3rd party product to convert/create the DVD. I used to be a big fan of Roxio's Toast but after reading the horrible online reviews for the latest Titanium product I decided against it. Plus they wanted an extra $20 for the High-Def/Blu-ray plug-in which I would expect to be included in the base price.
I then found a free open source product called Burn to create the basic DVD but the interface and features were lacking. The DVD menu option was almost comical with no customization options. Looking for a more Apple like solution I ended up downloading a free 30 day trial of Final Cut Pro X which has a native Send to DVD option. This worked great but I needed a more long term solution without having to fork over $300.
It turns out the answer was another little known to me Apple product called Compressor. Not only does it feature a burn to DVD option but also contains a Blu-ray authoring solution that includes creating AVCHD DVDs. It had a recent update that brings the UI a modern FCPX look and feel, all for $49.99.
For now all my in-laws wanted was just the DVD, but for my next HD project I will be sure to download Compressor. Once that happens look for another blog review.
*******************************************************************
Addendum - 3/2/2014
How could I forget one of the most unforgivable problems with iMovie that was introduced with the '08 version. For reasons unknown (perhaps to allow it to run on slower computers?) it deinterlaces all your AVCHD video, no matter if your camera supported progressive or not, and using a process that degrades the video quality. It looks like this problem has been finally fixed with the new iMovie 10.0 (2003) version which is welcome news. I've noticed no quality issues with my exported videos.
What made this drastic change so puzzling was that the inventor of iMovie '08 was none other than Randy Ubillos, one of the co-creators of Adobe Premier and was part of the original team that produced Final Cut Pro. You would think with his years of digital video experience he would know the type of items video editors would want.
To their credit, Apple didn't rest on their laurels and slowly added back in many of the missing features with each new revision. When I bought my last iMac (Mid 2011) it came bundled with iMovie '11, so I decided to give it another try. By then I had since replaced my old DV camcorder with a newer AVCHD Sony model (thanks to Rob's generous Best Buy gift card!) and was anxious to start editing my HD videos.
I found out right away that although iMovie supported AVCHD video importing (for most consumer type cameras), it wouldn't let you edit the AVCHD files natively. Instead it forced you to transcode the video to Apple Intermediate Codec (AIC) which has the nasty side effect of taking the storage efficient file format of AVCHD and blowing it up ten times the original file size. With my limited hard drive space there was no way I could support that so I gave up on iMovie and used the free Windows based software that came with my Sony camera. It had an awful interface and it forced me to use Windows (the horror!) but it did allow me to edit AVCHD natively and gave me the option to create near Blu-Ray quality AVCHD DVDs.
Queue in iMovie 10.0 (Apple confusingly just calls it iMovie and has dropped the HD suffix and year moniker), which was introduced back in October 2013 along side with Mavericks. Not only did it finally allow you to natively edit in AVCHD, it had the slick space gray interface of its older brother Final Cut Pro X. I didn't end up using it though until I decided to edit my sister in law's recent wedding video. Coming from an iMovie HD 6 background, the UI still threw me off so I had to watch some YouTube video tutorials and read the sparse online documentation to get me up to speed (I really couldn't wait until late May for David Pogue's Missing Manual).
After the initial hump I found the new iMovie to be very intuitive and blazing fast. It takes advantage of every CPU core and I love the non-destructive editing process. I ended up completing the rough edit in about 2 nights which surprised me on how little effort it required.
There were two hiccups I had which I didn't expect. The first was that the new version enforces DRM restrictions on commercial music. I had a lot of pre-DRM iTunes purchases that it refused to import so I had to download some new tracks to put in the movie.
The second issue was the limited export options. I wanted to create some standard DVDs and AVCHD DVDs for the bride and groom, however I could only export to a QuickTime friendly MP4 file. Apple has other online options such as YouTube, Facebook, Vimeo, ect... but come on, this obviously restricts you to smaller sized clips. Apple's recommended solution is to export your home movies to iMovie Theater or iTunes which is playable on your Apple TV but unfortunately I don't own this device nor do I know anybody else that does.
This led me to a lot of online research which included advice such as transcoding the MP4 file or purchasing a 3rd party product to convert/create the DVD. I used to be a big fan of Roxio's Toast but after reading the horrible online reviews for the latest Titanium product I decided against it. Plus they wanted an extra $20 for the High-Def/Blu-ray plug-in which I would expect to be included in the base price.
I then found a free open source product called Burn to create the basic DVD but the interface and features were lacking. The DVD menu option was almost comical with no customization options. Looking for a more Apple like solution I ended up downloading a free 30 day trial of Final Cut Pro X which has a native Send to DVD option. This worked great but I needed a more long term solution without having to fork over $300.It turns out the answer was another little known to me Apple product called Compressor. Not only does it feature a burn to DVD option but also contains a Blu-ray authoring solution that includes creating AVCHD DVDs. It had a recent update that brings the UI a modern FCPX look and feel, all for $49.99.
For now all my in-laws wanted was just the DVD, but for my next HD project I will be sure to download Compressor. Once that happens look for another blog review.
*******************************************************************
Addendum - 3/2/2014
How could I forget one of the most unforgivable problems with iMovie that was introduced with the '08 version. For reasons unknown (perhaps to allow it to run on slower computers?) it deinterlaces all your AVCHD video, no matter if your camera supported progressive or not, and using a process that degrades the video quality. It looks like this problem has been finally fixed with the new iMovie 10.0 (2003) version which is welcome news. I've noticed no quality issues with my exported videos.
posted by Marcos at February 27, 2014
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