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Importing

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Hey guys!
New to the site, and new to iMovie..
I've had my mac nearly a year now, and I'm pretty much in love with it..
But I can honestly say I haven't used iMovie much, and today I decided to
play around with it!
So, here I am.. with a question, of course..
Forgive me if this is the most ridiculous question ever..

I'm trying to import a movie from PhotoBooth to iMovie..
But for the first time ever, drag and drop isn't working and it WILL NOT
import from the file menu.
I've tried putting it in iPhoto, but it still doesn't show up.. and STILL won't import from that location.. help, anyone? :Smirk:
Thanksss
 
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what format is the movie in - what is its file extension (like avi or wmv)
 
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A test shows that the file is a QuickTime movie in MPEG-4 with ACC audio, at 640x480 pixels. Also, it imports fine into iMovie HD and iMovie 08.

Photo Booth places the recordings in your "Pictures/Photo Booth" folder. Just use the appropriate Import option from the iMovie menu and navigate to that location to find the file.

A word of warning when using iM08. You have the option upon import to copy or move the movie. If you move it, deleting it while from iMovie will remove the file to the trash. Also, Photo Booth will no longer see it.
 
OP
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A test shows that the file is a QuickTime movie in MPEG-4 with ACC audio, at 640x480 pixels. Also, it imports fine into iMovie HD and iMovie 08.

Photo Booth places the recordings in your "Pictures/Photo Booth" folder. Just use the appropriate Import option from the iMovie menu and navigate to that location to find the file.

A word of warning when using iM08. You have the option upon import to copy or move the movie. If you move it, deleting it while from iMovie will remove the file to the trash. Also, Photo Booth will no longer see it.

I used the approriate import option, but yet it still didn't work.
I tried importing it from not only "Pictures/Photo Booth" but also from different locations, such as the desktop.

Still need HELP.:Oops:
 
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Well, I described it all as it worked for me with the most current versions of the software. If you are using something older that might be affecting this, I'd recommend you mention those versions. Personally I'm at a loss right now.

Does it play in QuickTime? I'd open the movie into QuickTime and use the "Show Movie Inspector" to see what type it thinks the video and audio are.

For future iSight recordings I'd recommend against using Photo Booth to record because it flips the picture from left to right and right to left. Use iMovie to record instead because it gets the picture right.
 
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Hi everybody. I'm having the same exact issue actually. My mac is less than a year old, so the versions are all pretty new if not the newest (I'm unaware as to anything that has come out since).

I realize that recording a movie in photo booth is not the ideal way. However, I happened to have recorded something that I would really like to import into imovie so that I can take a piece from it.

The extension is .mov and it will not import into imovie. I have copied it onto my desktop and I'm selecting all of the appropriate options and it acts like it is importing it. A screen comes up and says that it's copying files and whatnot, but then when I click on the event, there is nothing there. It says "no matches."

Any ideas?

Thanks.
 
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First, do what I said above regarding opening and inspecting your content in QuickTime and to confirm it plays there. To further debug this, we would want to know the full specs of the video file including its length.

Second, if QT plays it, then download iMovie HD from Apple and try importing your content into it. Again, does it play, and if you get that far, place the content into the time line and try an export.

If the above worked, then we at least have isolated the problem to using iMovie 08.

If the above did not work, then start with a movie I know works and you can retrieve from Apple. Try the first sample movie from this Apple link. I just imported and used it in iMovie 08.

As for what versions of software you are running. Run Software Update from the System Preferences and you'll know quick enough if you are up to date.

P.S. A random thought I had was to open up Disk Utility and perform a Repair Disk Permissions. Sometimes this fixes strange problems. You could also try deleting the com.apple.iMovie7.plist file found in your personal Library/Preferences folder.
 
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I appreciate your response. A few things: I always play the movies in quicktime so I didn't even think to tell you that. As well, I don't have the com.apple.iMovie7.plist file that you mentioned. And last, I always update my my software, I was more talking about if new version of something had come out.

Anyway, I figured out that this giltch is definitely JUST this video. I recorded a short video in photo booth and tried importing that and it worked fine. So then I was thinking that maybe there is some length limit? It's 20 minutes long. I wonder if natashab17 was trying to import and long video from photo booth as well. Another thing is that the sound doesn't work on that video so maybe there is something else wrong with it. I find that with photo booth that sometimes the sound doesn't get recorded. I don't usually use the recording option in there but had accidentally recorded this video and there is some pretty funny stuff (even without the sound) so I'd really like it. Perhaps this is the issue!

I hate downloading excess stuff onto my computer - a bit ocd that way. So I'm trying to avoid that until last resort.

Thanks again.
 
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Okay... I don't know what the problem was since I was able to import other .mov files from photo booth, but I have found a simple solution that I thought I would share with the original thread poster. All you need to do is convert the file to an .mp4 with something like isquint. Then import it. Mine worked fine that way. I'll try not to make anymore accidental videos on photo booth though!
 

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