iMovie 09 crashing using Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 1080p files too large?

Question

iMovie 09 crashing using Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 1080p files too large?

Constantly crashing; have repeatedly: repaired permissions, restarted, ran latest Disk Warrior. Largest .MOV files 380.6MB, smallest 4.6. The project file size (unfinished) is 6.78GB.
Does that sound beyond iMovie 09's capacity?
............................................
Unit info:
Model Identifier: iMac8,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 3.06 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 6 MB
Memory: 4 GB
Bus Speed: 1.07 GHz
Boot ROM Version: IM81.00C1.B00
SMC Version: 1.30f1

iMac, Intel Core 2 Duo, Mac OS X (10.5.6), 4 GB DDR2 SDRAM

Posted on Feb 2, 2009 6:36 AM

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Answer 1

Feb 2, 2009 9:20 AM in response to George Widman

For what it's worth my machines, a 5G Dual and a iMac Intel Duo both crash with iMovie 08 on 5DII files. Not large ones but it seems to chock on them right away when moving around the Event Library. I tried setting things up with smaller clips and it seems to work well. I'm getting suspicious that it is a not compatible with 5DII files. I would like more feedback though. I was just ready to order iMovie 09 in hopes this was a iMovie 08 issue but since seeing your post it doesn't look like it.

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Answer 2

Feb 2, 2009 9:32 AM in response to Peter Chigmaroff

Peter, thanks for the feedback. I'm beginning to suspect iM09 just can't handle the 5DII files also. For that matter, I'm also wondering if even FCP or FC Express can do the job.
FWIW, I don't plant to use the 5DII in a way that would involve me making an edited video; my plan is simply to supply clients with B-roll on a shoot where I'm actually there to shoot stills. Then I would hand over a DVD of the UNedited video take, for them to take to a production house.
But first, I'll need a demo of the 5DII's video capacity - which is so amazing, most clients can't believe it! I'll post it here:
<http://georgewidman.com/George Widman_PhotographyLLC/Home.html>
Thanks again!

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Answer 3

emdru

Level 1

0 points

Feb 2, 2009 2:10 PM in response to George Widman

I owe this response to others somewhere else on this forum, and general web searching to resolve this issue. The Canon 5d MKii records in h.264 format, which is not generally an editable format in iMovie 09 or 08. Apple Support suggests importing in 960 x 540 size, which really seems to reduce significantly the resolution achievable by the Canon dSLR. The simplest and cheapest solution is to download the free program MPEG Streamclip. Open the Canon 5d mkii clips with this program, and then export as a Quicktime Apple Intermediate Codec File. You can then import these files directly into iMovie 09 at full resolution, and fully editable. iMovie has not crashed since I converted the h.264 files.
Hope this is helpful.

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Answer 4

Feb 2, 2009 2:20 PM in response to emdru

That sound very good, and thanks! Will give that a try asap and get back here with results, to see if they match. As great as the 5DMKII video files are, they are a bear to process, and I think you've nailed it.

BTW, in trying to process withOUT going to the MPEG Streamclip first, I've noticed my prime drive space remaining dropping rapidly. That seems to be because of all the instructions iM09 is storing, and they make up huge files.

Anyone else notice that?

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Answer 5

Feb 2, 2009 2:23 PM in response to emdru

Thank you for this information and this is not at all meant as a slight against you in any way but merely to point out this document to you where Apple speaks of h.264 as something analogous to the second coming. Which makes the need to do away with h.264 in one of their products seem ludicrous.

http://images.apple.com/quicktime/pdf/H264TechnologyBrief.pdf

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Answer 6

Feb 2, 2009 2:33 PM in response to Peter Chigmaroff

Peter, thanks, and I too had seen a similar note from Apple in the recent past. It all seems very strange to me, like one office in Cupertino (maybe the FCP people) aren't talking to the "consumer-level" (iMovie) people. Or the decision had been made to blow off iMovie buyers who had the audacity to try to run high-end files thru a low-end pipe.
Cheers!
George Widman

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Answer 7

emdru

Level 1

0 points

Feb 2, 2009 2:39 PM in response to Peter Chigmaroff

No offense taken at all. Having just read Apple's h.264 document, it seems that they have not carried out their promise to implement this codec across their software platforms. I know next to nothing about digital video imaging, have been a serious photographer (amateur) for years, and bought the 5D MKii to be able to create DVDs of my diving trips, using the movie clips interspersed with the high quality still images that the 5d MKii can produce. Researching this on the various websites that discuss the video capabilities of the 5d MKii, it seems that some solutions can cost $1000's in software. Finding this solution only took me 4 days of web crawling.

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Answer 8

Feb 2, 2009 2:45 PM in response to Peter Chigmaroff

h.264 is Apple's premier Playback codec. It is provides high quality and high compression at low data rates.

The qualities that make it great for the output of a project make it less useful as a codec for editing.

When you convert to AIC, you are converting all frames to I-frames. iMovie is a frame level editor, so editing is fast while preserving full quality.

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Answer 9

Feb 2, 2009 3:30 PM in response to AppleMan1958

I gave Streamclip a try and it certainly fixes the crashing issue. I loaded up with 4 clips and slide the slider all over the place with no problems. Soon as I introduced a non converted clip to the batch the crashes resumed. Another very notable advantage is the video no longer jutters. It now plays smoothly. However the video has increased in density (it's darker)* and contrast from the original and I'm hoping some setting may fix this. It's a bit too dense for my liking.

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Answer 10

Feb 2, 2009 3:32 PM in response to Peter Chigmaroff

Have you tried the color correction features of iMovie?
Pick a clip in your Project and open the Inspector.

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Answer 11

Feb 2, 2009 4:30 PM in response to George Widman

Hi all,

Please keep this thread rolling. I've been pursuing this issue for two months now and have spent 100's of hours on it. I don't want to purchase and then educate myself on FCP, I just want to edit some footage for short DVD's in high resolution. iMovie is a dream to use and it is so frustrating that it won't use the raw footage from the Canon 5D Mark 11. At least this thread has offered a work-around, but it sounds like it may adversely affect the quality of the footage.

Do we know if Apple intend to offer an upgrade of iMovie 09 so that the H.26 footage can be edited without converting?

Scott

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Answer 12

Feb 2, 2009 4:42 PM in response to Peter Chigmaroff

"Another very notable advantage is the video no longer jutters. It now plays smoothly."
One thing I discovered by accident in trying to work with iM9 and my 5DII .mov files is that when shortening a clip, it's then essential to make a smoothing adjustment to the clip (this is NOT the stabilization adjustment). Failure to make that adjustment also affects the quality of the transitions.

Without the smoothing adjustment, the clip plays dreadfully, with "jumpy" motion; with it, it's very smooth, and the transition work well.

Am looking for, but haven't yet found a way to "batch smooth" the shortened clips. That would greatly shorten the edit time (I would hit the "batch smooth" button and go get a coffee or something.

Same with the stabilization correction. If ONLY that could also be done as a batch function.
-gw

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Answer 13

Feb 2, 2009 4:55 PM in response to Dogtooth Phtography

Let me give you a hint. If you purchase final cut pro, you will also have to convert the h.264 files to AIC, although you might have some other target codecs available to you as well, such as ProRes 422.

iMovie will edit h.264 in small dimensions, like those used for the iPhone or movies downloaded from iTunes. When you try to do this in 1080P, you need an exponentially bigger processor, and very few people have them. In another thread it was mentioned that you would need a quad core processor with 2.8ghz on each core to natively edit AVCHD 1080P, and h.264 is the codec which is embedded in the AVCHD wrapper.

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Answer 14

Feb 2, 2009 4:55 PM in response to AppleMan1958

"Have you tried the color correction features of iMovie?
Pick a clip in your Project and open the Inspector.

Yes but I have to imagine that allowing one application to deeply blacken dark shadow then trying to dig detail back out of those areas will only yield noise.

Another detail I noticed if you do allow even a single short non converted h.264 5DII clip into the sequence you can kiss the stability goodbye. I didn't even touch the clip with the cursor yet the stability was shot. Erased the h.264 clip and the stability is gone. Somehow the shear presence of a h.264 clip makes iMovie go wonky.

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Answer 15

Feb 2, 2009 5:11 PM in response to AppleMan1958

Thanks Appleman,

I went to dig around MPEG Streamclip more and was very pleased to see an Adjustments button in the Output to QT menu. It's all there; Brightness, contrast etc. I tried a quick test with +15% Brightness and -10% contrast and I overdid it a bit but it shouldn't take long to produce acceptable results. I do not like to have to make intermediate files. All I'm doing is filling up hard drives twice as fast BUT at least I can edit on my old G5. I am no video expert but I do shoot photos professionally and the video after conversion look good at full size on my 30 incher. Perhaps there are more problems to come but so far so good. Thanks to Squared 5

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