Does a Canon Vixia HF R21 HD Flash Memory Camcorder work with iMovie??!!

I'd stay away from it. It looks like it may be in some Canon proprietary format. The Vixia HG series camras all say AVCHD on the side. This one doesn't. It may work, but it doesn't look as if it's been tested.

I took the plunge and picked up a Canon Vixia HF R21 yesterday. I'm glad I did. As I thought - it does work with iMovie. I have iMovie '09. I would think iMovie '11 would work as well.

I'd be interested too - I bought a Canon Vixia HFR20 thinking there's only two home computer formats - PC and Mac - surely they must provide software for both? Lo and behold they don't - just windows based PC's. However, I'm reading on line conflicting stories - something about converting the file formats? Anyone help?

It definitely works. I have had the HF s21 for a few months and it works well. You may be a bit confused about HOW to use it with iMovie. You must plug in the USB and then the camera will ask how you want to use the connected device. You pick the one on the right. You will need to show which clips you wish to share. Then go to your Mac and start iMovie. Click the import button and it will show the clips you can import. If it doesn't work the first time, just reboot iMovie again. I have imported fp30 and 60i. I have not tried the other formats. I understand that the 24 will not work, but haven't tried it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fnop9N8fX1U
Here is a link to a video I made with the HF s21 and edited with iMovie 11. The dancers at the end and the last music group were videoed in fp30. All the rest of the clips were 60i. iMovie renders them all as 1080, 30p.

why is it only 720p also what data rate did you use? or did you just use the default export to youtube option ?

I have a 1080 version of it on my thumb drive. I had to export it in 720 in order to upload the full 15 minutes to Youtube. I tried uploading the 1080 version, but Youtube would not let me. I suppose it was too large. I used the 17 mps data rate when making the original recording.

AGNJ,

If by 'formats' you mean 'drivers' then....maybe. Here is a simplified description:

Mac tries to bundle all the drivers it needs with the install, and so there are typically no drivers available as they come with the OS. For video cameras they don't supply Mac 'drivers' but instead rely on iMovie since all new macs come with iMovie. Apple bundles the drivers with OS X, and in essence that means your camera either works with iMovie or it doesn't. So you have to check the list from Apple.

You would think that you could hook up the camera and copy off the HD video files and then play them in Quicktime. But Quicktime doesn't play many AVCHD formats from the various camera companies (e.g. videos from a Sony camera). (I've found that the free VideoLAN Player does, though). So what most folks do is to use iMovie to import the camera's videos, then use iMovie save as a movie of some kind, encoding into some quicktime friendly format.

On PC the cameras are bundled with some kind of movie editing program that can use the camera's drivers. Hope that helps. Others chime in and correct me

hi - i need help with the same question - i just bought the Canon VIXIX HFR20, and noticed on the box it says it is not compatible with Mac OS.....before i unwrap it and plug it in, etc., rendering it non-returnable, i need to know if my son will be able to use it on his 3-year old mac laptop...help, please!
thanks...

The camera should be compatible. The camera may come with some rudimentary editing software for Windows. This will not run, but you will not need it if you have iMovie.

thank you - so, in other words, the MAC is "smart enough" to figure out how to edit/save the videos, once the camcorder is plugged into it?
thanks you so much
🙂

Yes. Connect with USB.
The easiest way is to put your SD card into a USB card reader with iMovie open.

Alternatively, you can connect your camera directly with the USB cable that should come with your camera.
In this case, you most likely need to have your camera plugged in to wall power, not batteries only.

you are so awesome, thanks!
🙂

Yes, it does work. However, it's simply a matter of having the latest version of iMovie. You need v8.0.6 or later. The earlier versions don't work for some unknown reason.

I have an early version on one Mac (doesn't work) and a later version on another (does work).

Hope this helps.

Alan