Skimming problems in Imovie 11

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Skimming problems in Imovie 11

Hello,

I have a small problem with Imovie. When I am composing a project I normally can skim a video footage in the Event window. When I have dragged a couple of fragments into the Project window and have a preview of what I have composed, the skimming in the Event window does not work anymore. I can only skim the audio but the video is not being skimmed. When I press the space bar a fragment is played, but when I move my cursor over the footage notthing is showed.

When I restart Imovie it is working again.

Has anyone encountered this problem? I have a Macbook Pro Retina 15" 2,3 Ghz and the latest version of Imovie.

Thanks

iMovie '11, OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.2)

Posted on Jan 11, 2013 1:53 AM

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Answer 1

Jan 11, 2013 5:54 AM in response to SanderVlug

Sounds like memory is getting congested. Shutting down and restarting your Mac should help.

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Answer 2

SanderVlug Author

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Jan 11, 2013 6:25 AM in response to AppleMan1958

HI Appleman1958,

Unfortunately this did not help. Seams to me like a bug in Imovie.

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Answer 3

Jan 11, 2013 6:58 AM in response to SanderVlug

Wouldn't hurt to trash the com.Apple.iMovieApp.plist preferences file.

For instructions, see here.

https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-4061

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Answer 4

SanderVlug Author

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Jan 11, 2013 7:13 AM in response to AppleMan1958

Also did'nt work.

Could it have to do anything with the size of the HD movie in the event? It is about one and a half hours about 20gb.

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Answer 5

Jan 11, 2013 7:22 AM in response to SanderVlug

Size could matter, but it should be OK. Is it one long clip or a bunch of shorter clips that add up to 20 GB?

One more thing to try...

Close iMovie.

Go to this Event folder in the Finder.

Taking care not to delete your original clips, drag the iMovie Thumbnails folder, iMovie Cache Folder, and iMovie Stabilization folder (if applicable) to the trash.

Then restart iMovie and let it regenerate the thumbnails. It may take some time. Let it finish.

That may help if the thumbnail creation was interrupted when you first imported.

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Answer 6

SanderVlug Author

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Jan 12, 2013 12:42 AM in response to AppleMan1958

There are about 400 clips wich add up to 20gb. I also tried your last suggestion. I found that sollution on the internet. Also did not work.

The only thing I can do is finish my movie without previewing in the Project window. If I don't do that than the skimming will work.

I have edited severall movies now and encountered this problem before but than the audio skimming would work. Restarting Imovie always solves the problem but I think it might be a bug or something.

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Answer 7

Jan 12, 2013 5:28 AM in response to SanderVlug

There is a Contact Us link at the bottom right of this page. You can click it and ask Apple for help with this issue. If your purchase was recent or if you have AppleCare on your Mac, the call is probably free. Otherwise, there is a charge but they should tell you first.

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Answer 8

SanderVlug Author

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Jan 15, 2013 7:11 AM in response to AppleMan1958

Thnx Appleman1958

I have contacted Apple. I had three days of free support left. They helped me by restarting my Mac by pressing the keys: P+R+CMD+SHIFT en than the power button. (I don't know what that is for). After that my Mac played the start up sound twice. Then I did a "Repair Disk Permissions" excersise in the Disk Utility programm.

After that my Mac was much faster in starting up. The problem was probably that I rarely shut down OSX. Usually I just put my Mac to sleep. They advised me to just Shut down my Mac every night.

One more thing.... I am using Imovie a lot. I have read that when the programm is working slower I can empty the cache folder. I also read that this can harm the programm and make it even work slower.

What is the wisest thing to do?

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Answer 9

Jan 15, 2013 7:54 AM in response to SanderVlug

As for me, I never shut my Mac off, because there are things that it does at night to keep itself healthy, and I have automatic backup routines that run at night. I just shut down the display and the disk drive and let it run.

About once every week or two, I will shut it down and restart, to clear out the memory.

I have an iMac. If you have a MacBook, people may do different things. There are discussions for every type of Mac. I suggest you ask the regulars for the type of Mac you have what they do.

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