An iMovie project has completely disappeared; corrupted? Desperately need help.

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An iMovie project has completely disappeared; corrupted? Desperately need help.

I've spent weeks and weeks working on a video in iMovie, upwards of 25 minutes. Multiple days' worth of hours went into this, and now it's gone.

So, to explain, I was editing the video and suddenly iMovie just shut down instantaneously. No error message appeared after it happened. I reopened iMovie, and this project (LMAG_P_Part1) was at 0:00. An error message popped up about not being able to repair this specific project when I reopened iMovie. The timeline was completely empty, 0:00, nothing in the timeline, but all the footage I used to create the video was still up in the event above.

Another project I was working on (the other half of the corrupted/deleted project) is still fine, functions correctly, no issues.

I tried opening old backups from the iMovie library (caches > iMovie Backup >iMovie Library), and the same "can't repair" message pops up, even when I load backups from before the crash/corruption.

I really don't know what to do. I'm losing my mind, I've worked so hard on this and now it's just completely gone. I've included a few pictures, if you can help, please do, because I'm kind of having a meltdown. Thank you in advance.

I believe I'm working on a 2015 iMac with the most recent version of iMovie, the one that requires you to hold "R" when highlighting specific parts of clips.

iMac Line (2012 and Later)

Posted on Jan 20, 2019 11:02 PM

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Answer 1

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Rich839

Level 8

48,156 points

Jan 21, 2019 9:57 AM in response to ininja2

Hi,

Yes, I can see that it is a pretty scary situation. The iMovie backups folder won't help, as you have found, if the media itself has been destroyed. If you have a Time Machine backup, you can restore your library to an earlier time before the corruption happened. I think that the Finder Help menu would explain how to do that. If that doesn't work, you might have to resort to recovery software.

Find out if the media in your project still exists. To do that, go to your Movies folder and Control-click on the iMovie library's icon. In the drop down menu click on Show Package Contents. You should see a list of the projects and events that are in the library. The listed projects are just data files, not projects that you can play, except through the iMovie app itself. See if your Part 1 project is listed there. If it is, open its folder by clicking on it. You should then see a sub-folder titled Original Media. Open that folder and see if the media that was in your project is still there. Note: Do not change, move, retitle, or do anything to the contents, projects, or subfolders in the Show Package Contents, or you risk corrupting your library even further. If there is no media in the Original Media folder of the project, then you are pretty much out of luck. If there is media in there, you can copy (not move or otherwise change) that media to a desktop folder and then reimport it into iMovie and re-edit the project.

As an aside, the library you are working with is a bit squirrely. You might want to back up your Part 2 project, and other projects, into a newly created library as a safety precaution against further project corruption. Also, make sure that you have at least 25GB of free space on your drive when you work on projects. Insufficient space can sometimes cause crashes.

-- Rich

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Answer 2

ininja2 Author

Level 1

5 points

Jan 20, 2019 11:45 PM in response to ininja2

Some small clarifications, if it helps;

The project was around 27 minutes, and the timeline was packed full of stuff. It's not like all the clips in the timeline are blackened (representing clips that can't be located), it's that the entire 27 minute timeline is just empty, 0:00, as if I never even started editing.

The first picture is what the corrupted (?) project looks like now, and the second picture is another file I'm working on (related, it's the 2nd half of the corrupted video, I divided the video into sections to make tackling the project as a whole a bit simpler).

My computer's hard drive has the exact same amount of space left in it as it did 2 hours ago (around when the crash happened), so nothing's been deleted. Maybe I could somehow find the source files of what I worked on in the timeline, or something?

Again, many, many thanks in advance for any suggestions!

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Answer 3

ininja2 Author

Level 1

5 points

Jan 21, 2019 11:57 AM in response to Rich839

Thanks so much for the help, Rich.

All of my original media files are still in the Part 1 project folder, so that's all good. I'm just curious if there's any way for me to find the data for the timeline, the actual editing part, because thinking about the prospect of having to re-edit nearly half an hour of stuff with cuts every 2-3 seconds is killing me.

Any recommendations of recovery software, and if you've heard of it working in situations like this? I didn't set up my Time Machine when I got this computer a few months back, like a freakin' dummy, so I don't have that safety net to fall back on.

Again, many thanks for any advice you have to give.

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Answer 4

Rich839

Level 8

48,156 points

Jan 22, 2019 10:28 AM in response to ininja2

Hi,

I have never had the occasion to use third party data recovery software, so cannot recommend anything from personal experience. I don't know if this type of software works to recover Projects versus just raw data like your original media files. Wouldn't hurt to try.

In doing a brief internet search I found this link that might be of some help in finding a data recovery app:

https://www.anysoftwaretools.com/best-mac-data-recovery/

-- Rich

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An iMovie project has completely disappeared; corrupted? Desperately need help.

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