Importing films via an old MacBookPro with firewire...can't seem to move the files to an external hard drive!

Question

realfood2003 Author

Level 1

5 points

Importing films via an old MacBookPro with firewire...can't seem to move the files to an external hard drive!

Hi, I'm importing digital video tapes from an old Canon Elura video camera, that only has firewire as a computer interface. I have an old Mac that still uses firewire (my new MacBook hardware won't even accept firewire with an adapter, unfortunately) but I want the movies to land in an external hard drive to be saved.

I've been able to transfer three tapes as "events" in two different libraries, and one of them works (when plugged into my new computer). The other two, however, only come up with missing files, and it says "try reimporting the original source media." The weird thing is that when I first opened the events, all of the images flashed in for a moment, and then were suddenly gone. Also, the hard drive says these two events take up 9 GB of space, so the files must be there.

I have no idea what I did differently in the case that works...it was the first one and I thought I did the others exactly the same.

Are the files on my external hard drive, and if so, how can I get them to work in my new computer? I don't want to spend any more time importing until I know I'm doing it the right way!

Thanks!

Macbook (2016 or later)

Posted on Jan 11, 2019 2:38 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Best reply

Rich839

Level 8

47,250 points

Jan 12, 2019 11:06 AM in response to realfood2003

I can't tell what went wrong with the transfers. It could be that there

wasn't enough free space on your old computer to complete the transfer.

However, your new Mac should be able to import with a firewire to

thunderbolt adapter. If it can't, maybe there is something wrong with the

adapter -- it happens.

In any event, and assuming you have enough free space on your old Mac, try

opening the Image Capture app on your old Mac and re-importing your tapes to a

folder on your desk top. Then open iMovie in the Library that is on your

external drive, create new events, and drag each movie from your desktop

folder into a separate new event. Now you should have your movies stored in the

external drive library.

Here's the link that didn't work in my previous post. Hopefully it will work this time.

https://help.apple.com/imovie/mac/10.1/#/mov3fa25bae7

-- Rich

Reply

Answer 2

Rich839

Level 8

47,250 points

Jan 12, 2019 8:35 AM in response to realfood2003

Hi, LeAnn,

Please forgive my fog but I am having trouble following your work flow. As I

understand it, you imported 3 tapes from your camera into 3 separate iMovie

events on your old Mac. You "created a new event" (three, I assume?)

and copied the three created events to a library on your external Lacie drive.

When you plug the Lacie into your new computer, one of the events plays but the

other two show "missing files"? The two events that do not play take

up 9GB of space. The iMovie library on the Lacie shows 30.9GB, but the library

is invisible when you open iMovie. Please correct if not accurate to this

point.

Why did you create a new event when you could have simply copied the original

events to the external library? Did you copy the media from the original events

into the created events before copying to the external drive?

In any event, you might find it helpful, as a trouble shooting method, to

review the procedures in the following help link about copying events to other

libraries.

https://help.apple.com/imovie/mac/10.1/#/mov3fa25bae7

-- Rich

Reply

Answer 3

Rich839

Level 8

47,250 points

Jan 11, 2019 4:48 PM in response to realfood2003

What are the formats of the external drives that are not working? Also, describe what you are talking about when you say "events". Are you importing directly into an event in iMovie 10? What operating system are you using?

-- Rich

Reply

Answer 4

realfood2003 Author

Level 1

5 points

Jan 12, 2019 4:08 AM in response to Rich839

Hi, Rich,

I'm using a new 5TB LaCie external drive, formatted for Mac. I imported directly from the camera into iMovie 10.1.10 on the MacBookPro. I created a new event, and then moved it to a library that I created on the LaCie. Both computers are using Mohave 10.14.2.

Looking closer, I see that even when I don't have the LaCie plugged into my new computer (MacBook) there is now an iMovie Library that says it takes up 30.9 GB, but it's invisible when I open iMovie. Thanks for your help :-)

LeAnn

Reply

Answer 5

realfood2003 Author

Level 1

5 points

Jan 12, 2019 8:58 AM in response to Rich839

Hi, Rich,

Sorry about any confusion (although I find the whole process confusing!) Yes, there are three events on the LaCie, in two libraries (which happened as I was figuring out how to do this), and only one of them is visible when I plug it into my new Mac and use iMovie. Yes, the second library (with two tapes' worth of video) says it takes up 30.9 GB on the LaCie but flashes thumbnails for a moment and then goes blank and says the data is missing. The other mystery is that the iMovie library resident on the internal hard drive of my new Mac (which I don't remember creating anyway) says it takes up 9GB but nothing can be found of that from iMovie...it's blank when I try to open it.

The bottom line is that I only want to use the old MacBookPro as a throughput device...it has very little storage left and I would like to go straight from the camera onto the LaCie, and I can't use my new MacBook for that because the hardware's no longer supported. Do you know how to set that up? I appreciate your help :-)

I tried to follow your link, but I get a 404 Not Found message.

-LeAnn

Reply

Importing films via an old MacBookPro with firewire...can't seem to move the files to an external hard drive!

Similar questions