[HN Gopher] Apple introduces new version of iMovie featuring Sto...
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Apple introduces new version of iMovie featuring Storyboards and
Magic Movie
 
Author : todsacerdoti
Score  : 186 points
Date   : 2022-04-12 17:06 UTC (5 hours ago)
 
web link (www.apple.com)
w3m dump (www.apple.com)
 
| shostack wrote:
| Can I work with 2.7k 60fps HEVC videos from my GoPro in it yet?
| Or is that still busted?
| 
| I jumped through endless hoops getting DaVinci Resolve's free
| version setup because I didn't want to degrade my video quality.
 
  | bdlowery wrote:
  | Why not just Buy Final Cut Pro or screenflow? I'd rather pay
  | $149 (screenflow) for for a product that just works vs wasting
  | hours of my time trying to get something setup.
 
    | kranke155 wrote:
    | Resolve is fine and it's free. I work in the moving pictures
    | industry and Resolve has been used at some step for 99% of
    | the films you see out there.
 
  | throwmeariver1 wrote:
  | What hoops are there to jump through besides the forced
  | registration? It's a one click installer.
 
    | shostack wrote:
    | Mostly learning curve and time to render optimized previews
    | (considerable).
    | 
    | My needs are very lightweight and perfect for the iMovie use
    | case beyond it's inability to handle what I consider not
    | uncommon quality with today's rise of higher resolutions and
    | frame rates.
 
  | ArchOversight wrote:
  | Sounds like you are in the best position to give it a shot and
  | see if it works. You have source material, you have iMove...
 
| uuyi wrote:
| I love how Apple just releases these things out of the blue. If
| it was Microsoft they'd be crowing about it loudly on blogs for 6
| months before then underdeliver a broken pile of crap.
 
  | haunter wrote:
  | I don't get this unnecessary flak against MS? Like what's the
  | point? Totally not relevant, they don't even have a similar
  | product on the level of iMovie
 
    | n8cpdx wrote:
    | Were you not burned by the many iterations of Windows Live
    | Movie Maker? It was a 16-year product.
    | https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Movie_Maker
    | 
    | Here's Microsoft's Windows blog post about ClipChamp, their
    | latest attempt: https://blogs.windows.com/windows-
    | insider/2022/03/09/announc...
 
  | seabriez wrote:
  | This has been on Windows since like Windows 8. Probably before
  | that since I haven't been tracking it. But I remmember I used
  | to make these types of movies with storyboards years ago.
 
    | lostgame wrote:
    | iMovie is not on Windows. AFAIK it has never been, unlike
    | Logic.
 
| torstenvl wrote:
| This is great and all, but it's been years and I'm still waiting
| for rebooted QuickTime to catch up to QuickTime 7 Pro.
 
  | galad87 wrote:
  | It mostly did. It can open image sequences, trim, cut, export,
  | merge, remove audio or video tracks, display the timecode
  | track. Cutting a piece of a movie is a bit cumbersome, but it
  | can be done (move to the first time, edit -> split clip, move
  | to a second time and split again, and then delete the clip in
  | the "show clip" mode).
 
    | djxfade wrote:
    | It's a shame it doesn't support third party codecs anymore.
    | That makes it almost useless for all but a few supported
    | formats.
 
| gnicholas wrote:
| FYI: iPhone/iPad only, not MacOS. I have tried editing movies on
| my mobile devices in the past but the experience was never great.
| Even just trimming a clip in Photos is difficult with the touch
| interface.
 
  | mattl wrote:
  | iMovie 3.0 for Mac OS X came out almost 20 years ago.
  | 
  | iMovie for Mac OS X is 10.3 now.
 
    | brimble wrote:
    | I believe the poster meant the release with these features is
    | iOS-only (for now, anyway).
 
      | mattl wrote:
      | Yeah the release is confusing iMovie 3.0
      | 
      | I wish Apple would just let all its numbers in a row
      | (including Numbers)
 
        | brimble wrote:
        | If they're not planning on unifying much of their
        | desktop/mobile dual-platform stuff as soon as the M1 is
        | sufficiently widespread (so, another 5ish years, when the
        | last of the x86 machines are aging out of active
        | support?), I'd be pretty surprised.
 
  | xnx wrote:
  | After trying ~10 different Android apps (all of them pretty
  | bad), I've been very pleased with CapCut (from Tiktok).
 
  | uuyi wrote:
  | I'm using lumafusion on my iPad Pro without any problems.
 
    | wenc wrote:
    | Thanks for the recommendation. I've used iMovie for years for
    | simple movie editing on my iPad but recently I found myself
    | needing something just a tiny bit more sophisticated.
    | 
    | I just bought Luma Fusion ($40) and so far it feels intuitive
    | but I can already tell it has more controls than iMovie --
    | the ones I wished iMovie had (like quick audio fixes and
    | equalizer). This is super useful because I can't run Audacity
    | on an iPad and sometimes I just need quick audio fixes done.
 
      | armadsen wrote:
      | I'm an engineer on LumaFusion, and one of my specialities
      | is audio. If you run into things that could be better, let
      | us know. support@luma-touch.com (real humans read every
      | email, we're a small team).
 
  | [deleted]
 
| scanr wrote:
| It doesn't look like it can make vertical videos in the iPhone
| app yet which is a little disappointing.
| 
| I've been looking for a simple video editing app for a family
| member who needs to post short form videos to social media.
| 
| Fortunately there are alternatives. Clips looks pretty good.
| Other suggestions welcome.
| 
| Just seems like a useful feature for iMovie to have.
 
  | mung wrote:
  | My god it's tragic that vertical video has become a legitimate
  | format when it really just arose from people holding their
  | phones wrong.
 
    | derefr wrote:
    | "Holding their phones wrong" -- you mean, holding a
    | rectangular affordance ergonomically in their hands?
    | 
    | The odd thing to me is that you can't just tell your
    | vertically-oriented phone to produce landscape video. The
    | imaging sensor is square.
 
  | smortaz wrote:
  | yes it's quite bizarre that key functionalities are split
  | between the built in Editor and iMovie. almost all videos have
  | to be done using both. doing vertical videos + text is very
  | awkward.
 
  | armadsen wrote:
  | LumaFusion is the obvious step up from iMovie. It's _much_ more
  | powerful than iMovie, but aims to also be very approachable for
  | complete beginners.
  | 
  | Disclaimer: My day job is as an engineer working on LumaFusion.
 
  | wunderflix wrote:
  | We've developed a simple video camera app. We focus on parents
  | who are beginners in creating videos like most people. And: we
  | only do vertical videos.
  | 
  | https://www.wunderflix.com/en/
  | 
  | PS: let me know what you think if you give it a try!
 
  | savolai wrote:
  | Wow, this is the one feature I expected would be the raison
  | d'etre for an update of iMovie. Now it's still useless. That's
  | really odd.
 
  | [deleted]
 
  | nobrains wrote:
  | 1) Rotate the video to landscape in Photos app.
  | 
  | 2) Import that video in iMovie and do all the editing you need
  | to do.
  | 
  | 3) Export the final video.
  | 
  | 4) Rotate the final video back to portrait in Photo app.
 
    | andruby wrote:
    | I assume that would break the orientation of text insertions?
 
      | jdironman wrote:
      | Aren't they hard-coded into frames?
 
| vimy wrote:
| > Availability iMovie 3.0, including the new Storyboards and
| Magic Movie features, is available today as a free update on the
| App Store for devices running iOS 15.2 or later and iPadOS 15.2
| or later.
| 
| Not for Mac?
 
  | Shadonototra wrote:
  | You can run iOS/iPad apps natively on every Mac since the
  | switch to ARM
 
    | gumby wrote:
    | _Some_ iOS apps. The dev has to enable it when submitting to
    | the iOS App Store.
 
    | djxfade wrote:
    | Only if the developer has flagged that it is supported.
 
| olah_1 wrote:
| The old Windows Movie Maker was the best. So straightforward. No
| nonsense trying to "help" you. Just give me a basic timeline
| system please!
 
| lekevicius wrote:
| This is the part of Apple that I love. iLife, enabling creativity
| with great results out of the box.
| 
| Even makes me forget, for a second, that they still run a
| monopoly on kid casino in form of an App Store.
 
  | basisword wrote:
  | iLife was fantastic. It was the main selling point in
  | convincing me to buy a Mac. When I was younger (before I could
  | afford to buy a Mac) I would watch the iLife updates each year
  | so jealous given the lack of comparative software on Windows at
  | the time.
  | 
  | Edit: Just had a flashback to iWeb. That was really great. Such
  | a simple way for a kid to build and publish a website before
  | things like Wix (which are still nowhere near as easy to use).
 
    | breakfastduck wrote:
    | I remember submitting countless work in school, magazines,
    | websites etc that were all done using iLife. It was so easy
    | to produce stuff that looked fantastic. iWeb in particular
    | was brilliant for kids.
 
| freecodyx wrote:
| I personally use apple keynotes to produce videos. It's a
| powerful tool, and just yesterday i was wondering why imovie was
| lacking so much features. And that is what i like about apple,
| they target consumers, not professionals
 
  | auggierose wrote:
  | Is there a good way to blend in your face during a slideshow? I
  | am using a third-party app for that now, and then use QuickTime
  | Player to record the screen. It works, but it is a little bit
  | more convoluted than I expected.
 
    | killerdhmo wrote:
    | Live Video? https://support.apple.com/guide/keynote/add-live-
    | video-tan6a...
 
| [deleted]
 
| whatever1 wrote:
| Who is the target user for this? All video editing happens within
| the TikTok app nowadays.
 
  | killerdhmo wrote:
  | Would it surprise you to know that not everyone is editing or
  | making (or even consuming) TikTok videos?
 
  | zitterbewegung wrote:
  | Apple will probably add more and more features to iMovie than
  | porting over Final Cut Pro.
 
  | laurent92 wrote:
  | Maybe Youtubers, as soon as you want to do something barely
  | elaborate. Sometimes free tools don't benefit the user, but
  | their audience ;)
 
| lesgobrandon wrote:
 
| npunt wrote:
| The cool part about iMovie and Garageband is they're basically a
| more approachable UI layer to Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro. They
| share a lot of the same core code, and teach you the same
| concepts just without the fiddly pro bits.
| 
| I love that bifurcation because it really makes the pro apps more
| approachable without compromising their usefulness (pro apps
| require info density, consumer apps avoid it), and it allows
| their power be scaled down to iPhone and iPad.
| 
| I wish more software was made this way!
 
| dmarcos wrote:
| Apple has been always about empowering creatives. They have
| world-class camera hardware and editing software. It always made
| sense to me that at some point they would close the circle and
| try to compete against YouTube. They instead went with Apple TV+
| that feels more like yet another streaming platform and doesn't
| leverage many of other Apple's strengths and costumer base. Apple
| seems to have low tolerance for content they cannot tightly
| control. YouTube reactive style curation and permission-less
| publication probably feels alien and scary to them.
 
  | foobarian wrote:
  | > YouTube reactive style curation and permission-less
  | publication probably feels alien and scary to them.
  | 
  | Now that you put it this way, I'd bet no established enterprise
  | would have what it takes to start something like YouTube now.
  | Heck I doubt even Google would be able to given the amount of
  | "doing things by the book" these kinds of orgs require.
 
  | spoonjim wrote:
  | Apple stands for a tightly curated user experience overall.
  | Want that weird app? No. Want user-generated content? No. Want
  | to isntall some weird software to make your home screen swipe
  | up-and-down rather than left-to-right? No.
  | 
  | For desktop computing I would find it frustrating (and use a
  | Windows box with a ton of malware/weirdware on it) but for my
  | phone I prefer it this way.
 
  | dagmx wrote:
  | I don't think Apple has any interest in social networks (and
  | that's effectively what YouTube is these days)
  | 
  | The risk to reward ratio for the brand itself is not something
  | they'd want to undertake.
  | 
  | You see it all the time with other tech stories. If Apple does
  | something bad or is even associated with something bad, that is
  | standard across other tech companies too, the news articles
  | will focus on Apple.
  | 
  | Imagine that with user posted comments. Google can get away
  | with it because they have YouTube under a separate brand, and
  | they've established that it's looser. Apple would never want to
  | do it as a separate brand if they can help it (beats and
  | FileMaker not withstanding because they existed prior) and the
  | amount of vitriol that the brand would receive over any
  | contentious content would negate any benefit.
 
  | lotsofpulp wrote:
  | > YouTube reactive style curation and permission-less
  | publication probably feels alien and scary to them.
  | 
  | And to everyone else. Who wants to deal with the headache of
  | moderating PR liability of moderating all the crap that gets
  | uploaded?
 
| alsetmusic wrote:
| Just in time for a video project I've been considering. Oh,
| wait... for iPad and iPhone. Not at all how I want to cut
| together ~100 video files stored on my Mac and NAS. C'mon,
| Apple...
| 
| When people diagnose Apple's software business as wilting, that's
| no joke.
 
  | scyzoryk_xyz wrote:
  | Well, you could just do a YT tutorial and do it with DaVinci
  | Resolve.
  | 
  | Apple is clearly thinking about the kind of user here who
  | doesn't know what a "Mac with NAS" is. Someone who maybe
  | doesn't even know how to get video files from their iOS device
  | into their Mac.
 
  | killerdhmo wrote:
  | iMovie exists on a Mac? And there's Final Cut Pro?
 
  | jackomelon wrote:
  | These features probably aren't for you and your use case, and
  | that's okay.
 
| etchalon wrote:
| I love that iMovie just keeps existing.
 
  | Tsiklon wrote:
  | I think Apple see iMovie and GarageBand as the entry point into
  | funnelling interested users towards Final Cut and Logic Pro
  | when they're ready to reach for something more capable
 
    | Angostura wrote:
    | They are also the reason that Macs turn up in secondary
    | schools in the UK
 
    | spoonjim wrote:
    | Not just Final Cut and Logic Pro, but the Apple ecosystem
    | itself. I've long lusted after Google Pixel's camera quality
    | but the three reasons I will never switch are iMessage,
    | GarageBand, and iMovie. My literal 4 year old son can use
    | iMovie on the iPad and it is a great way for us to construct
    | family memories (I load in the clips and then he decides the
    | order, the music, and the editing)
 
    | Y-bar wrote:
    | Yup, and I am still a bit salty Apple discontinued Aperture,
    | which was to iPhoto as Final Cut Pro is to iMovie. I am
    | paying for Lightroom Classic and there are still UI
    | idiosyncrasies that makes no sense to me that just clicked in
    | Aperture (Lightroom CC? Let's not even talk about that
    | version...)
 
      | spacedcowboy wrote:
      | As someone who designed the replacement database layer
      | (that literally improved the speed of access by an order of
      | magnitude, after I promised the VP it would do in an off-
      | the-cuff meeting, and my director face-palmed at hearing me
      | say it) and then managed the new graphics engine team, I
      | feel your pain.
      | 
      | Aperture was fundamentally too small a market for Apple to
      | justify keeping a 'pro-app' team working on it. The concept
      | was a high-cost semi-pro feature-set, and the market soon
      | decided it cost too much and the price had to fall. Once
      | that ball started rolling, the doom was set.
      | 
      | Still, I went on to do more interesting things at Apple -
      | the latest being writing the client<-->server team bridge
      | for 'Hide My Email' to let apps like Safari and Mail
      | integrate into the server-side anonymous-email-mapping-to-
      | a-known-address facility. Lots of cool tech in there, under
      | the skin.
 
        | kranke155 wrote:
        | The reason why I love apple is exactly because the tech
        | is there, but "under the skin".
        | 
        | They are probably using ML or AI whatever to get this new
        | Magic Movie thing working. But that's not their press
        | release, unlike Google which would be parroting this as a
        | major tech thing. Apple goes for the human.
 
      | Ancapistani wrote:
      | Me too.
      | 
      | I'm using Lightroom CC, because I'd migrated away from
      | Lightroom Classic several years before.
      | 
      | I can't begin to understand why things like "open selected
      | images as layers in Photoshop" _still_ isn't possible in
      | Lightroom CC. It works really well on my iPad Pro, though,
      | and gives me 90%+ of the features I need for my workflow
      | there. I just wish they provided an accessible scripting
      | environment that I could use to automate things.
 
        | webmobdev wrote:
        | DarkTable - https://www.darktable.org/ - is a free and
        | opensource alternative to Lightroom but the UI takes some
        | time getting used to.
 
        | Dracophoenix wrote:
        | What stopped you from sticking with Classic or moving to
        | Davinci Resolve?
 
        | c0nsumer wrote:
        | Resolve? How is that a replacement for Lightroom Classic?
        | 
        | I've been looking at CaptureOne myself as a
        | replacement...
 
        | Dracophoenix wrote:
        | My mistake
 
        | modoc wrote:
        | Do it. CaptureOne is the only thing I've found after
        | Aperture that I like. Still miss Aperture, but CaptureOne
        | is great, and they improve it frequently.
 
      | bayindirh wrote:
      | I really miss Aperture. It was a very nice piece of
      | software, however I'm using Darktable in these days, and
      | it's seriously no slouch either.
 
    | cactus2093 wrote:
    | I honestly don't understand their strategy with Final Cut and
    | Logic Pro. These apps can't make very much money, they are a
    | suspiciously good value and they never upsell you on
    | anything. Logic Pro cost like $300 over a decade ago, it
    | still costs $300 today, and all major updates in that time
    | have been free for existing users. Compare that to a
    | competitor like Ableton Live which has cost like $800 since
    | Ableton Suite 8 and major upgrades have come out every 3-5
    | years and cost a few hundred dollars to upgrade. Or compare
    | it to Pro Tools which now costs $300 for 1 year of a
    | subscription license.
    | 
    | So it really doesn't seem like funneling Garage Band users to
    | Logic is a very high priority for Apple. More likely Garage
    | Band and maybe even Logic Pro are loss leaders to show that
    | the mac is a platform for creatives.
    | 
    | On a related note I never understood why they killed off
    | Aperture which was beloved by many photographers, why didn't
    | they keep a similar upgrade path from the free Photos app ->
    | Aperture like they did for Garage Band -> Logic Pro? Seems
    | like another indication that they really don't like to be in
    | the pro software business, they are only there reluctantly at
    | this point.
 
      | whazor wrote:
      | Final cut pro supposedly has around 2.5 Million users. Many
      | of them buy expensive Macs and other Apple products. The
      | software uses the latest features from Apple's hardware,
      | which gives users an incentive to keep upgrading.
      | 
      | I think they keep the software more affordable to attract
      | new (starting out) users. Then eventually they will
      | hopefully go for a Mac studio or something.
      | 
      | Another question you could ask: why not make these pro
      | tools free? I am guessing that they are using the income as
      | an internal development budget. Should be sufficient to
      | afford the development I think.
 
      | jkestner wrote:
      | The pro apps are probably paying for themselves, but their
      | purpose is to sell hardware, both directly because you want
      | that functionality, and to serve as a benchmark for other
      | pro apps especially when you have shiny new silicon to take
      | advantage of.
 
      | spideymans wrote:
      | 1. FCP sells Apple hardware.
      | 
      | 2. It's also a "halo" product. A showcase of what Apple's
      | computers are capable of.
 
      | avar wrote:
      | It probably has a small dedicated team, and the sales
      | revenue easily covers their salaries and any overhead.
      | 
      | I don't get why niche programs like that within larger
      | companies are the exception.
 
    | dlivingston wrote:
    | You also can't discount how effective they are as marketing
    | tools to signal "Apple is the computer company for artists
    | and creatives".
 
      | adammenges wrote:
      | Yeah that's fair too
 
    | adammenges wrote:
    | Yeah maybe, I think most other companies tho would recognize
    | that all of that is such a small part of their business and
    | cut it off.
    | 
    | I'm so happy Apple doesn't.
 
      | spoonjim wrote:
      | Yes, this is one of the ways Apple succeeds -- by being
      | able to make management decisions like spending money on
      | GarageBand and iMovie that would get cut in any other type
      | of typical Corporate America VP structure.
 
        | rchaud wrote:
        | So who made the call to kill iWeb? Or other iLife
        | products that disappeared?
 
    | savoytruffle wrote:
    | Alas for Aperture
 
  | michelb wrote:
  | Apps like iMovie, pages, numbers etc are 'required' to have
  | people switch to the mac, so you don't have to pay for
  | thirdparty apps to do basic stuff with all your media. It's
  | really nice that these apps are also quite powerful to the
  | average user. It ties the whole experience together.
 
  | Wowfunhappy wrote:
  | I suspect that iMovie still sells Macs. Maybe not
  | singlehandedly, but it's an important factor.
  | 
  | I don't want to say "there's nothing like iMovie available for
  | PC's", because I frankly suspect there is these days--but I
  | don't think there's anything normal people _know about_ as many
  | of them know about iMovie.
 
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