iMovie only captures 20 mins???

This is normal. There are two contributing factors that could be at work here. The first could be the import scene length limitation. Open the iMovie Preferences and click the Import item. There is a check box with a scene limit. See what this is set to.

Another limitation is file size. I believe the maximum single clip size is 2 gigabytes. Usually when you do import from DV, if you have your camera setup correctly, the large import will break into smaller clips at scene breaks. This is of course the case IF you recorded from the camera. If you are transferring another videotape that you didn't record, it is possible that there won't be the timecode information required for scene breaking.

So if you have something that doesnt scene break on import, you will have to sit and watch it import, and stop when you approach twenty minutes. Then start a new import, which will start a new clip.

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The most probable cause for this problem is that the iMovie project volume (i.e. your external drive) is not formatted as Mac OS Extended as it really should be:

Some other incompatible formats have an upper file size limit of 4 GB which equals ~20 minutes of DV.

I'm a new mac user. I switched b/c I was sick of using 4 separate programs to convert my camcorder footage into a DVD. I used to have no issues capturing in Windows using basic shareware software. I have a JVC miniDV camcorder. I've tried twice now to import a 60 minute tape. The first time, the capture stopped at 30 minutes. The second time, the captures topped at something like 45 minutes. I have over 60gb of space on my hard drive, and my recollection is that the file for 1 hour of footage should be no more than 12-13gb. I don't have the preferences set to limit clip size. I had a few questions:

1) I was wondering if there's a way to capture w/o having to monitor the download for one hour?

2) Can I just restart the capture from where the camcorder stopped to continue the capture?

3) What file format does iMovie save my footage?

Thanks and much appreciation from a new convert. Thanks.

Macbook Pro Mac OS X (10.0.x)