Imported Video has "lines" that are visible

iM is a DV-editor, copying (=lossless transfer) video via firewire from miniDV devices ...
and: iM produces for TV-delivery...

do you see those lines, when you playout your project back to tape/connect camera to TV... ? I'm sure, you will not...

the 'i' stands for interlaced; a computer, any computer can not show such video; plus, QTplayer and iM are both set to a 'low' playback quality (you can change that in QTpro.. but, you will see interlace lines on a Mac anyhow) ...

the 'web' export a) deinterlaces, b) is probably to low in resolution to show such lines.. 😉

"..I can see lines in the video.."

What sort of lines? ..Horizontal lines, vertical lines? ..Imaging chips generally produce bright vertical lines which appear above and beneath very bright highlights (..when you catch the sun or a bright reflection..) as in the second shot in this movie, at the right-hand edge of the video, where the boat's rudder is ..as the camera catches reflections from the water below.

Do you mean white lines, like those, or dark lines? ..Or do you mean that you see a kind of "twinkling" in the video, where very small, detailed highlights 'ripple' ..like in the last shot in that video, before it fades to black? ..That's where highlights in the water (in the still shot of the two pilot boats) 'ripple' (..quite appropriately, really!..) as the movie pans across the still photo.

That "highlight ripple" is the result of fine detail in the original HD movie (..or fine detail in the original still photo..) carrying across the 'scan lines' of the finished movie. It's called 'aliasing' (or 'line twitter').

So, er, which kind of lines are you seeing? ..Or some other kind altogether?

I'm having the same (or similar) trouble. I shot a dance recital on a canon xl2. I brought it into iMovie (I have FCP, but it doesn't work on the MP). I have reason to believe that imovie doesn't actually export at "full quality".

I'm seeing vertical lines...especially when there is a solid diagonal line with two contrasting colors..ex: a dancers leg in front of a blue lit scrim. The lines are apparent both in the regular iMovie viewer and also in the full screen preview. I exported the clip in several different formats and settings (don't really know what I'm doing here) but none of them work...even the simple "full quality" export leaves me with a .dv file with vertical lines (as well as the horizontal interlacing? lines that I see when viewing it as a .dv quicktime file...but these aren't there when watching the dvd)

I burnt a dvd with the clip and it has the vertical lines on both the computer and actual dvd player. I thought maybe it was the camera (aliasing?) but when I plug the camera directly into the tv, there is no problem. Even when I export from iMovie back out to the camera the vertical lines are gone.

This is why I have reason to believe it is a problem with iMovie's export to "full quality". I have yet to get the FCP upgrade and test it against this problem. I also have not used footage from that camera with FCP when I had it on my G5.

Thank you for your help.


MacPro Dual core 3 GHz Ram Mac OS X (10.4.10)

Once there, I can see lines in the video. The Canon
HV20 is set to record in its standard HDV mode and
iMovie says the video is (HD-1080i-30) which I
believe is correct.

I have a similar problem:
I have a Panasonic miniDV camcorder and the import of the PAL DV streams works fine. No lines on video.
Only at the export (iDVD, Quicktime...) I have horizontal lines in the videos.
I think, it is an interlace problem. But how can I bypass this problem?

First of all, you shouldn't export do iDVD. Just send it over.
Second, make sure iDVD is set to PAL and then create a new project. (You can't change an existing project)