Apple iMovie '08 - Manual (Page 7)

Chapter 1 Welcome to iMovie ’08 7
Exploring and Playing Video
Enjoying your video library has never been easier. The moment you select an Event
you’ll see your video displayed as though it were a series of filmstrips, unrolled,
allowing you to see the images within the individual movie frames. When you move
the pointer over the images, they move. This is called “skimming,” and it allows you to
watch any moment you want instantly, without having to fast-forward or rewind a tape
or even select and play individual clips.
You can also press the Space bar or double-click anywhere in your video to play it
through at normal speed.
Creating Video Slideshows
iMovie makes it easy to create better movies, faster. The easiest way to create a great
home video is by building a “video slideshow”—a series of very short video clips of
equal length, representing only the best seconds of video in your library. iMovie lets
you do this almost effortlessly, and then drop in background music, to create snappy,
evenly paced home movies you’ll be proud to share.
About Video File Formats
Today you can use a multitude of video devices to shoot video almost everywhere you
go. The camcorder has branched out to new formats that record to mini-DVD, hard
disks, or flash memory cards. Even most digital still cameras record video, as do many
other mobile devices. And each of these devices may record video in different video file
formats. iMovie works with the emerging generation of video recording devices. You
can import video from any of the following sources into your iMovie video library:
In addition to these video sources, you can also add video from movie files already
stored on a hard disk (including from projects created in iMovie HD).
Note: An Intel processor is required for AVCHD video support. For more information
about AVCHD camcorders, go to www.apple.com/ilife/systemrequirements.html.
Camera Type Recording Medium Video File Format
USB camcorders
(random access devices)
Hard disk drive (HDD) MPEG-2 and AVCHD
DVD (small, 8 cm DVD)
Flash (Memory card)
FireWire camcorders Mini DV tape DV (standard) and HDV
(High Definition Video)
iSight camera Hard disk drive
(on your computer)
QuickTime movie
Digital still cameras Flash MPEG-2, MPEG-4, and others
Camera phones
(automatically added through
iPhoto)