Imovie exporting to final cut express issues

S

stel

Member
Hello,
Last week I made a video with Imovie and transferred it over to final cut express with no issues at all. Everything came out the same frame size 1920x1080. I was using 3 different cams. The reason I did this is because FCE would not allow me to import my videos for some odd reason so I used Imovie.

Because I had no issues last week, I did the same thing today. I really like how Imovie keeps all video files in order unlike FCE. For this video, I was using 2 out of the 3 cameras I own. Once I was done with the story line, I tried transferring the footage over to FCE. Here is where the trouble starts. 20% of my videos come up with the frame size of 1920x1080. The rest come up as 1440x1080.

I am going on hour 10 of trying to figure out why it's doing this with no success. I have exported it many different way using XML, or just simply exporting movie.


I am about to sell all this editing crap because every time I edit something I have a new issue that stops me from following my dream. Sorry, that is how frustrated I am. If anyone has any idea what is going on, I would really appreciate it. I really don't want to spend another day on this project.

Thanks,
Dan
 
To begin, FCE is extremely limited on what frame rates and codecs can be used. 1440x1080 is DVCPRO HD frame size, which is odd (and something that FCE shouldn't like too much). FCE probably won't let you import your footage from the camera because it doesn't like the codec. The simple fix here is to get the free download of MPEG StreamClip (www.squared5.com) and use it to transcode your source footage to AIC, which FCE will handle perfectly.

Answer these important questions and we'll have a better idea of what's going on:

What cameras are you using?
What frame rate(s) are you using?
What format(s) (or codecs) are they in when they've moved from iMovie to FCE?

Don't give up just yet. The fix can be pretty simple here. iMovie and FCE both have limits, and you just have to figure out what those limits are and learn how to work within them.
 
That is the thing, nothing has been changed that I am aware of and everything has came from the same cameras that I used in the first video. It's almost like things change by them selves.

Thank you for the site recommendation. I have been looking for a site like that. Hopefully my issues will go away.

The cameras I am using our a HVR-V1U, Nikon D5100 SLR, and a Kodak Playsport.
The V1U is using the frame rate of 1440x1080.
The playsport is using 1920x1080.

I want everything to look like what the playsport is putting up. The V1U is making everything squarish and making the video look smashed and horrible.
The V1U is using a format of apple intermediate code while the playsport is using H.264

I just noticed that last week when I made the first video, the compressor was H.264 and made the video exactly that way I wanted. Also, everything from the playsport on the new video is exactly how I want it.

I am still kind of new with all this stuff. This is just really frustrating that every time I try to do something I have new issues. I am trying to make money doing this and there is no way I can when I keep having new issue with every new video.

Thanks Alex for the help and any new help you can provide.
 
You're working with a hodgepodge of formats, and that's not good. You're also trying to edit with h.264, which is one of your biggest issues. FCE does not like h.264, and it doesn't like to mix formats.

The HVR-V1U records in HDV format, so if it's showing up as AIC that means iMovie is doing the conversion. Since I haven't used iMovie in 9 years, I have no idea how it treats footage these days.

You need to download MPEG StreamClip. You need to shoot everything at 29.97. And then you need to use MPEG StreamClip to convert everything to the same Apple Intermediate Codec. Then, you can bring your footage into FCE without a problem.
 
Thanks Alex.


This is confusing! I don't really understand how H.264 would be a bad thing because the first video used that as a compressor and came out great.

Hopefully I can figure this out quick.
 
h.264 was designed as a distribution format, not an editing format. It's a tricky beast, and not all NLEs like to work with it. Some will work with it, some won't, and some will be hit or miss.

I'll try to simplify this so as not to confuse you any further, but we're talking about a GOP (Group Of Pictures) codec. You see, h.264 is heavily compressed, allowing lots of HD video information to be stored in a very small package. To do that, lots of data has to be removed (this is what compression is), leaving holes in the stream. On playback, the computer fills in those holes. With h.264, you have an I frame every so often, and the computer uses those frames to "connect the dots" in between and guess what the missing frames should look like. It does a pretty darn good job of it, but again this is meant for the end-viewer and not for the editor.

Some NLEs have now been updated to where they can "fill in the holes" on the fly while the clips are edited. The downfall here is that there are so many holes that the signal can fall apart fast when lots of effects and filters are added. FCE does not support h.264 editing. iMovie does.

The best thing to do is to convert everything to an i-frame codec (like AIC or ProRes, or even DVCPRO HD), where there is data recorded for every actual frame of video. Again, FCE is a fickle beast (and one that Apple dropped a couple years ago in preparation for FCP X) and has a limited selection of codecs.

It's not very confusing if you convert everything to the same format and work from there.
 
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