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Question abt transferring home movie from DVD disk to iMovie, to edit & make new copy

C

connieran

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 8, 2011
13
0
I finally got all my old home movies on DVD disks. I want to now put it on iMovie (never used it before) and do some "editing" to take out certain parts of it, etc, and then make a copy for another person.

Is it self-explanatory and easy to do? I have iMovie '11. Do I need any other programs? someone told me I might need "Handbrake"??? but why would I need that if I have iMovie already? and does iMovie also make copies of the movie on a new disk when I'm done?

I have never done this before and have NO clue! Any help is appreciated. thanks
 
A bit of help

Its been some time since I have edited a DVD instead of from a tape or from a camera (won't get into all those formats since its useless at the moment).

I'm assuming the DVDs were made into a "normal" DVD format which does cause some problems when moving them into iMovie. The reason being iMovie will think its like a studio DVD. So handbreak may be an option, though I like Cinimatize, it's an older program but works for me. The main thing is getting your DVDs into QuickTime files, just a warning making them into a QuickTime file can take up a lot of hard drive space (there maybe another program that gets suggested to work better, and use less drive space). From my expierence QuickTime files work great, granted I started doing this pre handbreak.

I would try handbreak first since its free and hear from others before buying anything. Once the files are ready for iMovie then just import them into iMovie. You shouldn't loose any quality.

I can answer your second question with ease. Yes iMovie will make a new DVD, well technically it will send it to iDVD where you make the menus, other little things you may or may not care about. Not sure what size DVDs you use but most home videos can get on your typical 4.7GB, though you may need to get a larger size depending on how long the video is, and if your DVD drive can burn dual layers, most new apples can.

Yes the whole thing can be done with ease after the first disc, the first is the learning curve, not that it's much to learn, just an easy program then iDVD (guessing you already know iMovie, if not imovie is pretty simplr, after about an hour of messing around with it you should know it well)

Let us know the format of the DVDs, again sounds like a simple DVD we all make, kinda like mine after I use Toast. I hope you get more replies that are simple. There may be a easier way to do this since there shouldn't be any copy protection, again my way is kinda old by about 5 years ....except , you should have it no matter what, great application. Also people on here can help if you get stuck along the way. Good luck, hope to hear something you tried works since editing can be fun...to us sick and twisted editors.

I would also pick up MacTheRipper or ripit (Mactheripper is free) to have a backup of your home DVDs, and Toast or Popcorn if it's in your budget, then you don't need to worry about doing the whole process of getting home movies to DVDs again.
 
thanks.. my response...

Thank you so much for taking the time to reply and for all that helpful info. I really appreciate that. I took my 8mm camcorder tapes to a reputable local camera shop and they made them into dvd's for me. I don't know what format it is though? just a regular dvd is all I know. I played it on my home dvd player on tv and it worked fine. As you can tell, I am pretty clueless about all this, which I why I had decided to bring them to get transferred, since I didn't want to take a chance on messing them up.

You mentioned that the iMovie might think it is a studio dvd and i might want to try Handbrake. Now that you know what I mentioned in the above paragraph, would you still give that same advice?

Also - whey you said the main thing is to make them into a 'quicktime' file and that may take up a lot of space... what program would do that?? I have no idea how to make them into a quicktime file. OR should I just go directly to downloading "handbrake" instead?? and is Handbrake where I would copy the dvd?? or is that the program to edit? I guess I would (hopefully) figure that all out when I tried to do it.

Also- what does Macktheripper do? (i guess i should go google it, but any explanation is appreciated).

AND to show you how "clueless" I really am (although I DO know some things about computers and am extremely comfortable using computers and being online),, I couldn't figure out what you meant by "Toast" and "Popcorn" and for a second, thought you meant to get some popcorn (the real kind) to sit and watch my movies with! haha. but I had a feeling it was a program and googled it and saw it was!! learn something new every day! THANKS AGAIN!!!!
 
Handbrake will rip the DVD to H.264, which you can edit in iMovie. H.264 isn't ideal for this but if you use a bitrate of 4Mbps, image quality shouldn't take too much of a hit.

An alternative would be to buy the MPEG-2 Quicktime Component from Apple. Pair this with MPEG Streamclip and you can rip your DVD to Apple Intermediate Codec, which is better suited to this job than H.264. You may not see much of a difference between this and Handbrake, however, so see if Handbrake satisfies you first.

One potential issue is how iMovie treats interlaced video. I haven't used iMovie '11, so I can't advise you on that. (My apologies if I'm introducing you to the term "interlaced video".)
 
My reply...

Keith -thank you for taking the time to reply. I am not familiar with all of this and sorry to say I don't even know what H.264 is? I am going into this kinda "blindly". Can't I just do it all on my Mac with the iMovie or Movie Maker, whatever it's called? And I think if I understood the other poster, I can use iDVD to edit it or whatever?? If I can use my Mac without buying any more programs or downloading any... WHAT would be the steps? Do I just turn on Movie Maker thing and it's all self explanatory? I haven't done anything at all yet. thanks and sorry for my 'clueless' knowledge on this if it seems I am asking dumb questions. haha
 
Can this help? It requires the QT MPEG-2 Playback Component for 20 USD, though you could go via Handbrake and create an .mp4 file*.


*

In HandBrake just select a preset like shown below, and once you have the .m4v file, you can then just rename it to .mp4 and then try to import that into iMovie (Movie Maker is for Windows).
image is clickable for a larger version
HandBrake_iPad-preset.png
If the .mp4 file does not work, you could use MPEG Streamclip as shown in the guides above.

If that is still not explanatory enough, have a look at Advanced Search, as that topic has been covered several dozens times already.

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connieran said:
I don't even know what H.264 is?
Click to expand...

H.264 is a video codec. YouTube and Blu-ray use it.

And I think if I understood the other poster, I can use iDVD to edit it or whatever??
Click to expand...

iDVD is not for editing. It's for taking a movie you've edited in iMovie and burning it to DVD.

If I can use my Mac without buying any more programs or downloading any... WHAT would be the steps? Do I just turn on Movie Maker thing and it's all self explanatory?
Click to expand...

Broadly, the steps are as follows:

Step 1: Take the video off the DVD and convert it into a format iMovie understands. iMovie can't do this, so you'll have to download Handbrake.

Step 2: Edit in iMovie.

Step 3: Use iDVD to make a DVD.
 
Thanks and...

Simsaladimbamba - thanks for your help! I appreciate you taking the time to send all the detailed info for me!! I am not experienced with this at all and just wanted to make sure I had some good info before I tried doing it. What you and also Keith Pratt gave me will help a lot!! Thanks again for the easy steps since I'm a beginner!


KeithPratt -- Thank you also for taking the time to help me! I do appreciate it, and appreciate your replies to my continued questions. I've never done this before and wanted to make sure I had good info before starting. And that i understood it correctly. Between the info from you and also from Simsaladimbamba, I should hopefully be able to do this!!

I will come back and post once I get one done and let yall know how it went! It won't be right away though, cuz I have other pressing issues that came up that I have to take care of, so probably not for a few months. But again, THANK YOU BOTH! I really appreciate the easy steps you both sent for me to follow since I'm a beginner at it! :) take care
 
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