IMovie
iMovie is a
video editing software, created by
Apple Computer as part of the
iLife suite of applications for the
Macintosh, which allows users to edit their own home movies. Earlier versions of iMovie (2.0.3 and earlier) run in
Mac OS 9. iMovie 3 and later versions run only in
Mac OS X.
When iMovie was first released, it proved popular due to its simplicity, with most tasks easily accomplished by clicking and dragging. Its praise was so widespread that even PC magazines gave it reviews, one even giving it the front page.
Jonathan Caouette's film
Tarnation, edited entirely with iMovie, was shown at the
Cannes film festival in
2004.
Integrated with
FireWire, iMovie takes the raw footage from most digital video cameras (or analog to digital converters) and loads it onto the Mac. From there, iMovie can edit, add titles, and music. Effects cover basic color correction and video enhancement tools, and transitions such as fade-in, fade-out, and slides are included by default.
iMovie 1.0 also marks a important change in Apple software that remains in effect to this day. iMovie 1.0 included credits of its creators as did most of apples software up to that time, but head hunters calling into apple requesting to speak with these employees sparked Steve Jobs to eliminate all credits from Apple software products that remains in effect to this day. A practice he carried over from his days at Atari.
In early
2005, Apple introduced
iMovie HD as part of
iLife '05, including support for editing
high-definition video.
iMovie 6 was released in January 2006 as part of the
iLife '06 suite. It is integrated with
iPhoto,
iTunes,
iDVD,
Garageband and
iWeb.New features include:
*Five Apple-designed iMovie "Themes". Designed for ease of use, the user can easily drop movie clips or photos into preset themes to give the project a professional look. Each theme includes full motion-graphic bumpers and transitions.
*Real-time effects. There is no longer the need to wait for rendering because iMovie takes advantage of the user's graphic processing unit in their computer.
*Cinematic real-time titling
*Enhanced Audio tools and effects
*Multiple open projects
*Video Podcasts and blogs (using integration with iWeb)
*Refined look based on iTunes 5.0 and up.
iMovie 5 boasts integration with the rest of the
iLife suite, with toolbox buttons allowing the importing of images from
iPhoto, music from
iTunes and the setting of chapter markers ready for exporting to
iDVD. Other features include:
*Full-screen previewing.
*One video track, two audio tracks.
*Sample sound effects included, some from
Skywalker Sound.
*Voice-over narration can be recorded from a
microphone and added to an audio track.
*Titles with effects such as
3D spin, converge, bounce across and ending
credits motion.
*Transitions, such as cross dissolve, disintegrate, twirl, scale down and warp out.
*Video effects, including fast motion,
slow motion, reverse fast/slow motion, brightness and contrast,
electricity and fairy dust effects.
*Creation of still frames from video.
*Splitting and trimming clips.
*Showing and editing audio waveforms.
*Extracting audio from clips.
*Exporting a movie or scene as a
QuickTime movie, or sharing it via
e-mail,
Bluetooth or
.Mac homepage, or sending it back to a
digital camera.
Another new feature is 'Magic iMovie', which attempts to automate the whole process of video editing, by allowing a common transition to be added between scenes, a music track to be synchronised with the video and a
DVD to be created with the accompanying iDVD software.
There are a number of third party plugins available for iMovie, such as the
Geethree Slick series.
*
Apple: iMovie*
The "Unofficial" iMovie FAQ*
QuickTimeBroadcast.com the iMovie resource
