Add a background in iMovie after the fact

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Level 1

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Add a background in iMovie after the fact

I just spent an hour cropping together different iPhone clips with titles and transitions on many of the slides... I realized afterwards the video looks terrible with the black bars on the sides.

i have tried to add a background now but it shows up on the same bar and not on the background.

I’ve watched a bunch of videos and they all say to add the background first... is there any way to add it after the fact?? Or conversely is it possible to add this project into My Media without losing all of the transitions and titles. If not I guess it’s just another hour of work, but I thought I’d reach out to some smart people first and see if I can save some time.

Regards!

Posted on Nov 11, 2019 4:47 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Rich839

Level 8

47,670 points

Nov 12, 2019 9:18 AM in response to Dockta_Love

O.K. I see the problem.

One way you can eliminate the black background bars in an edited movie is to share out the movie "as is" to your desktop. That will leave you with a movie with black bars on each side. Then open the movie in QuickTimePlayer and use the the screen recording feature to crop out the black background. (In other words, drag-select and record only the video portion, leaving out the black bars.) Save the cropped movie to your desktop. Then import the saved movie into a new iMovie project. Place a background that you prefer in the timeline of the new project and move your video above it as a cutaway. The black bars will be replaced by the background that you inserted.

If the sound quality is not what you want you can go back to your original project and share out the audio track as an audio only video, and then import the new track into your second project.

-- Rich

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Answer 2

Rich839

Level 8

47,670 points

Nov 12, 2019 1:21 AM in response to Dockta_Love

If you could post some screen shots of what you are doing it would be very helpful.

It appears that you have placed some iPhone photos in the time line that are displaying black bars to make the photo fit iMovie’s 16:9 aspect ratio screen. Or you have cropped some photos that are displaying black bars. If that’s the case you could eliminate the black bars by using the Picture in Picture feature to overlay the photo onto a different color background or another photo in the timeline.

You cannot add your project to My Media and retain the edits, but you can duplicate the project. and work with the duplicate while still retaining the original with all of your edits.

— Rich

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Answer 3

Dockta_Love Author

Level 1

8 points

Nov 12, 2019 7:24 AM in response to Rich839

Thanks, I will send some pics when I get home, but I’ll try to explain it better. I have a few short videos shot with iPhone in vertical orientation that I have added together into one longer continuous video and the final video has the black lines on either side of it due to the vertical orientation... I have seen people add a background so the black sides have some texture or color, but all the videos I’ve seen have the background added first (even the pic in pic video) can it be done after all the formatting (combining videos, transitions, and titles) has been completed without having to redo the formatting? I’ve also never seen it done on a project usually only a single unedited video...

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Answer 4

Rich839

Level 8

47,670 points

Nov 14, 2019 11:11 AM in response to Rich839

Revisiting this, you might just be able to eliminate the QuickTime step of removing the black bars from the final video. Try just placing your video with the black bars above a preferred background and see it that works. I tried it and it did.

-- Rich

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