Review: iMovie ‘08
In my previous post, I touched briefly upon the newly released iMovie ‘08, part of Apple’s iLife software package. San commented on that post, asking me to elaborate on my thoughts, especially since he’d read mainly negative feedback from users on Apple’s support forums. Well San, here it is… My review of iMovie ‘08.
I bought iLife ‘08 only a few days after it was announced. Only now, having already used it, have I realised there are many, many users who are very dissatisfied with iMovie ‘08 in particular. This is in stark contrast to what I think of iMovie. I think it’s great. Really great!
Personally, iMovie does everything I want it to do. I film stuff using my digital still camera. When I plug my camera in on my Mac, the movie files get pulled into iPhoto. Before, I used to have to drag my movie files into iMovie. Not anymore. iMovie ‘08 does this for me automatically. Already, iMovie ‘08 is winning and all I’ve done is opened it. Obviously, if you film using a camcorder, you can pull footage off of that as you could from within iMovie ‘06.
So, the movie files are now in iMovie waiting to be edited. Before, you had to play movies clips from the start to see which bits you wanted to keep and which bits you wanted to get rid off. Once you’d decided you wanted to use part of a clip, you’d have to drag the whole clip onto the timeline and then trim off the bits you didn’t want. If you wanted to use other parts of that clip, you’d have to import another version of the same clip and repeat this process. For me, this was always like stuffing as much food into your mouth as possible and using a knife to cut off the bits that you couldn’t swallow in one go. Now though, it’s much better. You can preview each clip by simply running your mouse over them. When you see a bit you like, click and drag over that bit of the clip and then drag the yellow box you’ve created into the “timeline”. That bit of the clip and the clip as a whole is still available to be used elsewhere in your movie. This is a much easier, more sensible way of working.
One of the major complaints from iMovie ‘08 users is that there is no longer a timeline. This is true. I used the term “timeline” above simply because I couldn’t think of a better word to use. For me, this is not a problem. You can still see the order and length of each clip and the movie as a whole. Personally, I think the ‘timeline” is better. For instance, if you add a music track to the movie, you won’t see it as a separate clip. You’ll see it encompassing the movie clips in a green box which you can then drag around and change the length of. Incidentally, if a music track overruns the length of the movie, iMovie cuts off the end for you and fades it out automatically.
Another complaint is that there are no VideoFX anymore. This is also true. But who used these things? And who still wants to watch movies in sepia tones? I’m sure for some movies, the FX’s work well, but for 99% of them, they looked rubbish and amateurish and only added tackiness. Seriously people, if you want to produce sepia movies, get you video camera to do it for you. Most of them now give you that option (but please don’t select it, it’s looks terrible)!
The same goes for Themes, which is another things people appear to be missing. There were only a few in iMovie ‘06 and while they looked quite smart, I’d never seen them used by anyone and had never used them myself. They were more of a gimmick than anything else and clearly Apple agrees.
Having now used iMovie ‘08, I’ve realised just how poor iMovie ‘06 was by comparison. I was never really satisfied with it. There was always something in the editing process that aggravated me and upon exporting movies, I’d more often than not find frames missing or the end inexplicably chopped off. Half an hour after installing iMovie ‘08, I’d created a 5 minute movie and the exported clip was perfect. This is what I want from a movie editing package. I want the whole process to be quick and straightforward and for the outcome to be a slick, professional looking movie that’s easy to export. iMovie does this and, as a bonus, looks absolutely gorgeous doing it.
So I suppose it comes down to a simple set of questions. If you want straightforward, inexpensive movie making software that doesn’t muck about and helps you get your movies out there so that people can see them, iMovie is for you. If you want tonnes of options along every step of the movie making process, fork out a great deal more for something else.
Oh, and it should be remembered, you don’t just get iMovie as part of the iLife suite. You get all the others too, which have all been greatly improved.
