Apple iMovie User Manual download pdf (Page 4)

ITS - Technology & Learning Services Page 1

Luanne Eris Fose, Ph.D.

Introduction

iMovie 4, for Mac OS X users, is a user-friendly digital video editing application that allows

movie creation from DV camcorder footage and/or digital camera photos. Workshop

participants will learn the steps in creating a short documentary for classroom use.

Topics covered in this workshop include: Importing footage; adding visual effects; working with

audio tracks, narration tracks, and integrating music from iTunes 4; adding sound effects;

adding text, titles, and rolling credits; importing photos from iPhoto 4 and implementing the

Ken Burn’s effect; what’s new in iMovie 4; how iMovie 4 integrates with iDVD; and suggested

pedagogical tips for using iMovie in the college classroom.

Planning the Documentary Project

The iLife 4 series is a great tool for making your own documentary for one of your courses.

With a combination of techniques from iMovie 4, iPhoto 4, iTunes and Garage Band, you can

create a video in your discipline based upon your own expert knowledge of a topic or you can

address a topic that you wish to cover in class but you can’t find good coverage of anywhere

else.

Planning for your documentary is the most important part of the process. It is also the most

time-consuming! Be prepared to spend several hours doing this before you even attempt to

open iMovie and put all the content together. From my experience, here are the things you

should gather before you even attempt to work on your documentary in iMovie:

1. Make a main folder on your Mac’s Desktop to hold all the materials you will gather

for your documentary. Name the folder by the title of your documentary (e.g.,

Ventriloquism Documentary)

2. Decide on a topic and the scope of the topic you wish to cover. Try to keep the

scope short (2-3 pages of scripted text). With lots of photos and several video

and/or audio clips, 2-3 pages will end up to be about 10 minutes in length.

3. Research and write the script in a word processing program such as Microsoft Word.

Make clear paragraph breaks in the script for various sections of the narration. It is

easiest to manage the narration when you break the script up into smaller segments.

Include notes to yourself in brackets about video, audio, and music clips that you

want to remember to insert at various places in the documentary. Make notes in the

script of what types of titles and credits you wish to use and where they should be

inserted. Save this document in your main folder.

4. Gather any past video clips in QuickTime movie format that you might wish to

import and later edit in iMovie. Create a folder within your main folder called Video

Clips and place the video clips there for later reference.

5. Gather any audio clips for demonstration that you might want to use in your

documentary (e.g., an effective speech of a important historical figure, etc.). Create a

folder within your main folder called Audio and place the audio clips in this folder.

6. You will need a USB microphone to create your narrative audio tracks. Cheap ones

are available for as low as $15 and are generally plug & play without the need for

special plugins. Be sure to adjust the volume in the Sound portion of System

Preferences on your Mac. You can use the narration record button within the Audio

Pane of iMovie to record from your script (although sometimes this audio tool has

problems if you have a particular large iMovie file or if you only have minimum RAM

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 ... 42 43

Comments to this Manuals

No comments

Apple iMovie User Manual Page 4

Comments to this Manuals

Related products and manuals for Software Apple iMovie