Rip Home Movies

Hi,

I'll be darned. I got the same results as you. I'm running iMovie 10.1.7 on Sierra.

The .VOB file opened and played fully with audio in Quicktime Player 10.4. The inspector showed it as an Mpeg-2 video.

However, the video would not import into iMovie either by dragging or by using the import button.

After opening in Quicktime I saved it to desktop. It saved as a .MOV file. The inspector showed it as an Mp2v video.

I was able to drag this video into iMovie where it played fully with video and audio. Interesting that the format is mp2v.

I successfully shared out the movie from iMovie as an Mp4. The inspector showed the shared movie as follows:

The format now is shown a H.264.

You always come up with great stuff. Thanks for pointing this out. I never knew that .VOB files could be converted with Quicktime Player to work in iMovie.

-- Rich

Hi,

To rip a DVD, insert it into your optical drive. Click on the DVD icon when it appears on your desktop. That will open the disc's package contents. (If the DVD automatically opens, just close it.) When you click on the DVD icon you will open a window containing two folders that looks like this:

Ignore the Audio-TS folder. It is not relevant here. Click on the VIDEO-TS folder to open it. You will see a window that looks something like this:

Ignore all the files except for the ones that have the extension .VOB. The .VOB files contain the movie that is on the DVD, including the audio. Option-Drag (that is, COPY, not move) each .VOB file to your desktop. Then use the free download, Handbrake, to convert the .VOB files into the Mp4 format that iMovie can read. You can then drag the Mp4 files into iMovie to edit and share out into a movie.

If you want to preview the .VOB files first, you can play them with the free download app VLC.

-- Rich

Rich

I tried experimenting with .VOB files and QuickTime Player a couple of months ago and was surprised at what I got.

This is with QTP under El Capitan.

I say surprised as it did not work with QTP under Snow Leopard a few years ago.

I double clicked on the .VOB file and it opened in QuickTime Player.

This is what the Inspector shows

I then File >Save

Double clicking on this new saved File opens in QTP.

The Inspector shows this

I then imported this into iMovie 10.1.4 and it appears to work.

Although I have iMovie 10.1.4 I do not use it much at all so don't know if this 'mp2v' file

is fully compatible.

I know that a lot of people use either Handbrake or Mpeg Streamclip to convert .VOB files but could this be an alternative?

Are you able to perform the above process or is it that I have a component installed that I am not aware of?

Hi Rich

Thanks for confirming the above.

Hopefully a more straight forward way of getting .VOB files into iMovie e.t.c

Copy the DVD to your Desktop, then move the TS Folder to the iMovie folder.

Yes. Happy to. You provided a great user tip.

-- Rich

Hi,

Here's the link for the free download of Handbrake:

https://handbrake.fr/

As for your .VOB files, open them in Quicktime Player and save them to your desktop. They will save as a .mov file that you can play anywhere and use in iMovie. So you might not even need Handbrake for your particular situation.

Another popular converter is Streamclip, that also is a free download. These days most people are using Handbrake, but both of these converters work well.