imovie not exporting video to file (error 10004)

Same issue here. One video clip, accompanied by an mp3. the audio is placed in there 3 times with a small overlap. Exports about 10 seconds. Doesn't correlate with any transition what so ever. Those are further down the road. #iNomovie

Update: I performed a clean install of High Sierra. Up to now, the problem seems gone. I've exported (to file) 7 videos: 2 with clips coming from only one video, and 5 with clips coming from 2 different videos.

However, compared to my previous attempts when High Sierra was installed as an upgrade of Sierra, also the following things changed:

- I didn't test yet the files that gave me error in my "upgrade-installation" (sorry, I didn't have time).

- The menu bar is always shown. In the previous attempt the manu bar on the top was set to auto-hiding.

- I'm exporting keeping the lid of my MacBook open, otherwise the creation process become very slow and the machine starts to lag while opening folders, app, etc.

Someone could test the last two points of my list, please? If nothing work, I will try to export the files that gave me error in my previous installation, but I will do it during the week-end. During the week-end I will also try to export videos with clips coming from more than 2 files.

Anyway, I will keep you informed.

so what did you do with the ppt? I have a small project containing some video clips with moving text and images... exported from Powerpoint. Does it mean I can not use Videofiles from PowerPoint?

Thanks?

I am having a similar issue. The only thing that has changed in my process for editing is that iMovie was just updated to the newest version so I am convinced it is a bug with the new iMovie and not an actual file/clip issue. I am very frustrated because I've spent 6 months on this project and JUST NEED TO EXPORT IT to finalize things. SOMEONE FROM APPLE PLEASE HELP.

Things I've tried:

- MANUAL frame-by-frame check on all new edits

- New clips individual share attempt (they worked so they are not corrupt files)

- Share 1st half (failed), share 2nd half (failed)

- Apple Support, Facebook plea, Reddit plea

- Remove all transitions

Can someone from Apple please prioritize this? The support line is closed tonight so I will try again tomorrow.

feelingfrustrated, have you tried what the rest of us have found to work? Delete just the very first frame of your project? It has worked for me every single time. Yes, it's definitely something with the update, because it happens to clips I used before the update that worked fine. Frustrating.

Hi,

Yep. I've had this problem all week too. I thought it was a bug in the update but tried a few things to see if I could resolve the issue.

I shared the video to file on my desktop and waited for that lovely message to appear again telling me it had failed.

Then checked my desktop to find the file had been created but when played noticed the sound was there but no video and after 4 seconds this stopped all together.

Re watched the whole original video ini move and couldn't see any glitches but the problem must be within the first 4 seconds..right?

took out my intro video (the part that wasn't playing video but just sound) and then tried to share again to file.

IT SHARED THE WHOLE VIDEO TO FILE !!!! WOOHOO

So even though I couldn't see any glitch in the intro video something had gone wrong.

Tired to mix that file again to the video and guess what?......Failed message reappeared

So....(sorry I do go on)

imported an older video I had shared on you tube and split the intro out of that to finish my new video and .....

WOOHOO its uploading as we speak!

Hopefully thats the problem resolved but I have like the slowest upload connection so won't know for deaf for a good couple of hours.

hope this helps?

Don't give up !

Sorry but no solution. I filmed a musical and need to put all pieces together , cannot take 4 sec off and still have the sound sync. Severe problem I need to have this finished soon.

Next attempt is to go back to 10.0.7 which worked last week.... knock on wood

10.0.7 would load the project. Back to 10.1.7. and guess what... like after several failed attempts, there was indeed a finished movie on the desktop and indeed it was too short. It failed to render the last clip. After removing the first second (an doing some cutting in the audio to keep it lipsync'd) it successfully rendered my video.
I was wondering... could it be that the issue all starts with video files that were re-encoded on the MAC. In my case: I have video material from my SONY camera and have to manually encode them (MPG to m4v) on the MAC before I can import them in iMovie. (to do so I select the files in the finder and do right click and select: Encode Selected Video Files - instead of opening every single one in Quicktime and export...).
Does that sound to - any of you - something that might be part of the problem?

This removing of the first couple of nano seconds has not worked for me at all, again even on previously exported files. It is now a useless app; and Apple do not seem bothered about fixing it, especially as they probably want you to upgrade to some pro software.

Ok, I managed to get the video to share.

Here is what I believe to be the problem everyone . . .

The new iMovie does not seem to be able to work with PPTs that have been exported as .MOV in original format. Meaning, when the PPT .MOV files are imported into iMovie they come in with a BLANK FRAME added to the beginning of them. This was not an issue before the update but now it halts export.

My video had a million of these PPT .MOV files which I had gone through and manually clipped shorter to remove that first blank frame from each one. It still wouldn't export completely and I went to the section that it stopped exporting at and discovered that when certain transitions are in place, they add back in parts of slides even if they have been clipped, so a previously clipped PPT .MOV had actually been automatically added back in via the transition feature. I just deleted the transitions and it was able to export.

It is definitely a serious bug that Apple needs to fix but in the meantime, if you can live without transitions and have the time to manually clip the first frame from every PPT .MOV then it should work.

It's very time consuming though, Apple needs to put in a bug fix ASAP.

This didn't work for me. 😟 I've been re-editing and exporting this particular video for over a year with zero issues until I upgraded to High Sierra and the latest release of iMovie.

It happens 7 seconds into the video. I tried trimming the first few frames, but it didn't help. It's a single file with no transitions, so my only option now is to move the whole project to Premiere Pro CC...which I really don't want to do if possible. 😟

I'm also having a problem exporting. My issue is a bit different, but on one occasion I received the same error messages. The rest of the time I'm simply given the error that imovie can't export the file. When I go to the folder where I tried to place it, there is 7 seconds of audio only. The weirdest part is that the clip I'm using there is an 18 second clip, so I'm puzzled as to why it would randomly pick that spot and only export the audio. I had to use another program to create the clip so I could get the effect I wanted. Maybe I need to save it in a different format.

I miss the old days when Apple stuff worked.

I wish I knew why that worked. I've tried everything. I finally made a new copy of the first clip I used, and chopped off the 1st second. I also adjusted all transitions so there would be no black frames just to be safe. It has taken a lot of time and work, but that seems to be working. Thanks!

Very helpful, thank you ! Seems that faulty clips have a dark line near the top of the clip in the timeline. I managed to replace them and think all’s well now. But i never had this problem before - was it caused by upgrading iMovie to a new version ? VERY frustrating ! Good luck everyone.

Wow. I don't know why this would work, but it does. I literally just cut the first 0.4 seconds of my project that wouldn't export, and now it's working. Thank you!!