iMovie - How can I select a frame to be the thumbnail?

You are welcome. Yes, it would be nice to have a feature whereby one could select the poster frame.

Someone on this forum did devise a method to change the poster thumbnail in the Theater display. The only thing is that I am not sure that the reset thumbnail will stay when the movie is dragged from the Theater library onto the desktop. I did a test myself but the thumbnail did not hold. However, if you want to try it you can take a look at this link:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5484658

-- Rich

I believe that something can be done.Not within iMovie but after the share /export process.

After you have shared/exported your movie open it in QuickTime.

Place the playhead on the frame that you want to choose (left and right arrows if needed for precision) .

Now go up to Edit>copy.

Now quit QTP.

Control click on the video file and select Get Info.

Click on the movie image shown arrowed red and then go up to Edit >Paste .

Your poster frame should now change to what you selected.

You can in fact copy a poster frame from a video and paste it into a different video if you want.

I have not had occasion to change poster frames but hope this is what you required.

I am not aware if poster frames are used for other purposes so do not know if this process affects those processes.

This is on El Capitan 10.11.6 .

Rich ,would be interested if you could confirm on your system.

Changing the icon for the thumbnails in the Finder by pasting a new icon into the Info panel is still working in Mojave as well. It is great when browsing video clips in the Finder.

But I am not sure, if this will remain, if the video is shared in any way and uploaded.

In older versions of QuickTime we could set a poster frame. I can no longer find this option.

I am importing my finished videos to iPhoto. There I can set a poster frame in the Editor. But this poster frame will not be used as a thumbnail, when I export the video from Photos.

Unfortunately there is no option in iMovie 10 to change the poster frame. As you have found, many others have posed your question. iMovie randomly selects a frame in the middle of the movie to use as the poster frame. The only workaround that I have seen that works with any consistency for your purpose is to add a black background of suitable duration to the end of the movie to change the midpoint and thus change the poster frame. You can also add or delete a photo or clip, or rearrange them, or add or subtract transitions to change the midpoint.

-- Rich

thesurreyfriends,

Your Quicktime/paste-in-Get Info method worked to change the poster frame of the movie on my desktop. As Lėonie said, I am not sure that the poster frame will hold when shared to other apps. When the movie with the new poster frame is dragged into a movie project and saved to the Projects library, the frame didn't carry over. Likewise when shared to Theater.

I see that in a later post that the original poster did some experimenting and managed to get it to work in a FaceBook upload, with a little fiddling. Unknown whether it will work with exports to other websites.

In any event, good work. :)

-- Rich

Hi, Léonie,

Looks like it will not go well for the guy in the yellow-green shirt. :)

-- Rich