Reverting to Earlier Version in iMovie

[Matthew Lybanon]

I'm not sure whether this is a system-specific or application-specific
question, which is why I am posting to both newsgroups.

The Mac OS usually makes it easy to revert to an earlier version of a
saved file. For example, in Pages the File Menu has a "Revert To"
choice.

However, some programs are different. In iMovie there is not even a
Save in the File menu; iMovie takes care of saving your work for you.
And also, there is no Revert To in the File Menu list (or anywhere else,
as far as I can tell). Presumably iMovie saves the current state of
things whenever it "needs to." If I start up iMovie I get exactly what
I saw when I last quit it (there is no OpenŠ either). But in some cases
I might want to go back in history to an earlier version. Is there any
straightforward way (or any way at all) of doing this?

[John Varela]

On Fri, 22 Feb 2013 18:25:22 UTC, Matthew Lybanon
<lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:

> I'm not sure whether this is a system-specific or application-specific
> question, which is why I am posting to both newsgroups.
>
> The Mac OS usually makes it easy to revert to an earlier version of a
> saved file. For example, in Pages the File Menu has a "Revert To"
> choice.
>
> However, some programs are different. In iMovie there is not even a
> Save in the File menu; iMovie takes care of saving your work for you.
> And also, there is no Revert To in the File Menu list (or anywhere else,
> as far as I can tell). Presumably iMovie saves the current state of
> things whenever it "needs to." If I start up iMovie I get exactly what

> I saw when I last quit it (there is no Open� either). But in some cases

> I might want to go back in history to an earlier version. Is there any
> straightforward way (or any way at all) of doing this?

Cause iMovie to save your file. If that means closing iMovie, do
that.

Go to the file in Finder and Duplicate it. Change the name of the
Dupe to identify what version you're saving and you're done.

--
John Varela

[Matthew Lybanon]

In article <51W5y0sPNk52-pn2-PpNbGbEGqC6d@localhost>,

"John Varela" <newl...@verizon.net> wrote:

> On Fri, 22 Feb 2013 18:25:22 UTC, Matthew Lybanon
> <lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> > I'm not sure whether this is a system-specific or application-specific
> > question, which is why I am posting to both newsgroups.
> >
> > The Mac OS usually makes it easy to revert to an earlier version of a
> > saved file. For example, in Pages the File Menu has a "Revert To"
> > choice.
> >
> > However, some programs are different. In iMovie there is not even a
> > Save in the File menu; iMovie takes care of saving your work for you.
> > And also, there is no Revert To in the File Menu list (or anywhere else,
> > as far as I can tell). Presumably iMovie saves the current state of
> > things whenever it "needs to." If I start up iMovie I get exactly what

> > I saw when I last quit it (there is no Openè either). But in some cases

> > I might want to go back in history to an earlier version. Is there any
> > straightforward way (or any way at all) of doing this?
>
> Cause iMovie to save your file. If that means closing iMovie, do
> that.
>
> Go to the file in Finder and Duplicate it. Change the name of the
> Dupe to identify what version you're saving and you're done.

As far as I can tell, the only way I can "cause" iMovie to save the file
is to close it. But suppose I would like to get to a version of my
project before I added the last ten items. If the only way I can do
this is to quit and restart iMovie after I make each change (or small
number of changes), and duplicate the file before restarting each time,
that's not what I want. That's not what anybody wants. How many high
school students working on a last-minute homework project are going to
go to the trouble of performing all those extra steps?

In most programs the OS does this for me (in some cases there are
autosaves as well as the versions I save). This kind of routine,
labor-intensive stuff is just what computers are supposed to do for you.
Is there any way to get this behavior from iMovie (and presumably the
other iLife programs)?

[JF Mezei]

On 13-02-23 12:06, Matthew Lybanon wrote:

> project before I added the last ten items. If the only way I can do
> this is to quit and restart iMovie after I make each change (or small
> number of changes), and duplicate the file before restarting each time,
> that's not what I want. That's not what anybody wants.

One thing ou can do is to "Save as" and give the file name a time stamp.

So you have "my movie 19:30".

When you get to another step you are happy with, you save it as "my
movie 20:15" etc etc

Periodically, you go into finder and delete older versions once you know
you wont need to revert back.

If iMovie removed "save as", then you're screwed and use some other
software.

Instead of a time stamp, you can also qualify the file. "my movie scene
1 done". So you can identify a movie version by where the work was
ended in it.

[John Varela]

On Sat, 23 Feb 2013 17:06:41 UTC, Matthew Lybanon

<lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:

> In article <51W5y0sPNk52-pn2-PpNbGbEGqC6d@localhost>,
> "John Varela" <newl...@verizon.net> wrote:
>
> > On Fri, 22 Feb 2013 18:25:22 UTC, Matthew Lybanon
> > <lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> >
> > > I'm not sure whether this is a system-specific or application-specific
> > > question, which is why I am posting to both newsgroups.
> > >
> > > The Mac OS usually makes it easy to revert to an earlier version of a
> > > saved file. For example, in Pages the File Menu has a "Revert To"
> > > choice.
> > >
> > > However, some programs are different. In iMovie there is not even a
> > > Save in the File menu; iMovie takes care of saving your work for you.
> > > And also, there is no Revert To in the File Menu list (or anywhere else,
> > > as far as I can tell). Presumably iMovie saves the current state of
> > > things whenever it "needs to." If I start up iMovie I get exactly what

> > > I saw when I last quit it (there is no Open� either). But in some cases

> > > I might want to go back in history to an earlier version. Is there any
> > > straightforward way (or any way at all) of doing this?
> >
> > Cause iMovie to save your file. If that means closing iMovie, do
> > that.
> >
> > Go to the file in Finder and Duplicate it. Change the name of the
> > Dupe to identify what version you're saving and you're done.
>
> As far as I can tell, the only way I can "cause" iMovie to save the file
> is to close it. But suppose I would like to get to a version of my
> project before I added the last ten items.

I thought you wanted to save an interim version.

For example, I made a movie of our vacation last fall, but wanted a
separate video of the portion that we spent with a tour group. So I
did the tour group first, saved it under a separate name, and then
continued with the complete movie including visits to relatives and
so forth. Later, I wanted to extract the tour of Canyon de Chelly to
send to someone else, so duplicated the whole movie, then removed
everything but that one episode. (All that in iMovie HD, not
iMovie.)

If all you want is to undo a few actions then use Undo.

> If the only way I can do
> this is to quit and restart iMovie after I make each change (or small
> number of changes), and duplicate the file before restarting each time,
> that's not what I want. That's not what anybody wants.

Doesn't command-Z work in iMovie?

The iMovie Help says: "If you make a mistake or don't like a change
you've made to a project, including photos you've added, or to an
Event (source video), you can progressively undo all of the actions
you've performed in a project up to the last time you quit iMovie
and reopened it."

> How many high
> school students working on a last-minute homework project are going to
> go to the trouble of performing all those extra steps?

I'll bet those high school students know how to undo.

> In most programs the OS does this for me (in some cases there are
> autosaves as well as the versions I save). This kind of routine,
> labor-intensive stuff is just what computers are supposed to do for you.
> Is there any way to get this behavior from iMovie (and presumably the
> other iLife programs)?

--
John Varela

[Matthew Lybanon]

In article <51290055$0$15363$c3e8da3$9f40...@news.astraweb.com>,

JF Mezei <jfmezei...@vaxination.ca> wrote:

> On 13-02-23 12:06, Matthew Lybanon wrote:
>
> > project before I added the last ten items. If the only way I can do
> > this is to quit and restart iMovie after I make each change (or small
> > number of changes), and duplicate the file before restarting each time,
> > that's not what I want. That's not what anybody wants.
>
>
> One thing ou can do is to "Save as" and give the file name a time stamp.

That is just the problem. There is no "Save As" (or SaveŠ) in iMovie.
The user has NO control over saving his work in iMovie.

>
> So you have "my movie 19:30".
>
> When you get to another step you are happy with, you save it as "my
> movie 20:15" etc etc
>
> Periodically, you go into finder and delete older versions once you know
> you wont need to revert back.
>
> If iMovie removed "save as", then you're screwed and use some other
> software.

iMovie is essentially a "toy" compared to "real" movie editing software.
But it is easy to use for making relatively simple movies, and is very
popular for this--particularly among young people. For what it costs,
it's great. I am trying to help some high school students who have run
into the problem I described in my original post.

[Matthew Lybanon]

In article <51W5y0sPNk52-pn2-KWTz97Scidvd@localhost>,

"John Varela" <newl...@verizon.net> wrote:

> On Sat, 23 Feb 2013 17:06:41 UTC, Matthew Lybanon
> <lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> > In article <51W5y0sPNk52-pn2-PpNbGbEGqC6d@localhost>,
> > "John Varela" <newl...@verizon.net> wrote:
> >
> > > On Fri, 22 Feb 2013 18:25:22 UTC, Matthew Lybanon
> > > <lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> > >
> > > > I'm not sure whether this is a system-specific or application-specific
> > > > question, which is why I am posting to both newsgroups.
> > > >
> > > > The Mac OS usually makes it easy to revert to an earlier version of a
> > > > saved file. For example, in Pages the File Menu has a "Revert To"
> > > > choice.
> > > >
> > > > However, some programs are different. In iMovie there is not even a
> > > > Save in the File menu; iMovie takes care of saving your work for you.
> > > > And also, there is no Revert To in the File Menu list (or anywhere
> > > > else,
> > > > as far as I can tell). Presumably iMovie saves the current state of
> > > > things whenever it "needs to." If I start up iMovie I get exactly what

> > > > I saw when I last quit it (there is no OpenÞ either). But in some

> > > > cases
> > > > I might want to go back in history to an earlier version. Is there any
> > > > straightforward way (or any way at all) of doing this?
> > >
> > > Cause iMovie to save your file. If that means closing iMovie, do
> > > that.
> > >
> > > Go to the file in Finder and Duplicate it. Change the name of the
> > > Dupe to identify what version you're saving and you're done.
> >
> > As far as I can tell, the only way I can "cause" iMovie to save the file
> > is to close it. But suppose I would like to get to a version of my
> > project before I added the last ten items.
>
> I thought you wanted to save an interim version.
>
> For example, I made a movie of our vacation last fall, but wanted a
> separate video of the portion that we spent with a tour group. So I
> did the tour group first, saved it under a separate name, and then
> continued with the complete movie including visits to relatives and
> so forth. Later, I wanted to extract the tour of Canyon de Chelly to
> send to someone else, so duplicated the whole movie, then removed
> everything but that one episode. (All that in iMovie HD, not
> iMovie.)

I understand that iMovie HD is more capable than later versions of
iMovie. There was so much public outcry when iMovie was "dumbed down"
that Apple made it possible to run both versions on the same Mac.

But I'm trying to help some high school students with a brand new Mac
(and no iMovie HD) who ran into the problem I described in my original
post.


>

> If all you want is to undo a few actions then use Undo.

Undo is unavailable if you have quit iMovie, then later restarted it.

[JF Mezei]

On 13-02-24 09:55, Matthew Lybanon wrote:

> That is just the problem. There is no "Save As" (or Save�) in iMovie.

> The user has NO control over saving his work in iMovie.

And I thought this was just a Lion thing. But iMovie 09 which predates
Lion/Mountain Lion is also devoid of a save as.

You can export the movie, but not the project.

And if you quit and wish to make backup copies, you need to know exactly
what you need to backup because there may be multiple files involved
(each clip, the project file and what not).

(Consolitate in the File menu might help there *IF* it creates a single
file can can be duplicated as a backup copy. But I am not sure this is
hat consolidate actually does).

This is one issue with movie editing because clips are generally large
files and you don't want to have a gazillion copies of them.

[John Varela]

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 15:00:36 UTC, Matthew Lybanon
<lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:

> In article <51W5y0sPNk52-pn2-KWTz97Scidvd@localhost>,
> "John Varela" <newl...@verizon.net> wrote:> >
> > > On Fri, 22 Feb 2013 18:25:22 UTC, Matthew Lybanon
> > > <lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> > >
> > > > I'm not sure whether this is a system-specific or application-specific
> > > > question, which is why I am posting to both newsgroups.
> > > >
> > > > The Mac OS usually makes it easy to revert to an earlier version of a
> > > > saved file. For example, in Pages the File Menu has a "Revert To"
> > > > choice.
> > > >
> > > > However, some programs are different. In iMovie there is not even a
> > > > Save in the File menu; iMovie takes care of saving your work for you.
> > > > And also, there is no Revert To in the File Menu list (or anywhere
> > > > else,
> > > > as far as I can tell). Presumably iMovie saves the current state of
> > > > things whenever it "needs to." If I start up iMovie I get exactly what

> > > > I saw when I last quit it (there is no Open� either). But in some

> > On Sat, 23 Feb 2013 17:06:41 UTC, Matthew Lybanon
> > <lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:

> > > As far as I can tell, the only way I can "cause" iMovie to save the file
> > > is to close it. But suppose I would like to get to a version of my
> > > project before I added the last ten items.
> >
> > I thought you wanted to save an interim version.
> >
> > For example, I made a movie of our vacation last fall, but wanted a
> > separate video of the portion that we spent with a tour group. So I
> > did the tour group first, saved it under a separate name, and then
> > continued with the complete movie including visits to relatives and
> > so forth. Later, I wanted to extract the tour of Canyon de Chelly to
> > send to someone else, so duplicated the whole movie, then removed
> > everything but that one episode. (All that in iMovie HD, not
> > iMovie.)
>
> I understand that iMovie HD is more capable than later versions of
> iMovie. There was so much public outcry when iMovie was "dumbed down"
> that Apple made it possible to run both versions on the same Mac.
>
> But I'm trying to help some high school students with a brand new Mac
> (and no iMovie HD) who ran into the problem I described in my original
> post.

I'm having trouble understanding the problem here. I have made many
hours of video using iMovie HD and can't recall ever having had a
reason to use Save As to preserve a version while working on a
project. The closest I've ever come to that is the example I
described above.

Is this something to do with unique ways that high school students
have of screwing up?

> > If all you want is to undo a few actions then use Undo.
>
> Undo is unavailable if you have quit iMovie, then later restarted it.

Would Time Machine be of any help with your problem? With Time
Machine you can always drop back to a version from no more than an
hour ago.

--
John Varela

[Matthew Lybanon]

In article <51W5y0sPNk52-pn2-jMzwGVdd0v9d@localhost>,

"John Varela" <newl...@verizon.net> wrote:

> On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 15:00:36 UTC, Matthew Lybanon
> <lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> > In article <51W5y0sPNk52-pn2-KWTz97Scidvd@localhost>,
> > "John Varela" <newl...@verizon.net> wrote:> >
> > > > On Fri, 22 Feb 2013 18:25:22 UTC, Matthew Lybanon
> > > > <lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:

...

> > If all you want is to undo a few actions then use Undo.
>
> Undo is unavailable if you have quit iMovie, then later restarted
> it.

...

> > > For example, I made a movie of our vacation last fall, but wanted a
> > > separate video of the portion that we spent with a tour group. So I
> > > did the tour group first, saved it under a separate name, and then
> > > continued with the complete movie including visits to relatives and
> > > so forth. Later, I wanted to extract the tour of Canyon de Chelly to
> > > send to someone else, so duplicated the whole movie, then removed
> > > everything but that one episode. (All that in iMovie HD, not
> > > iMovie.)
> >
> > I understand that iMovie HD is more capable than later versions of
> > iMovie. There was so much public outcry when iMovie was "dumbed down"
> > that Apple made it possible to run both versions on the same Mac.
> >
> > But I'm trying to help some high school students with a brand new Mac
> > (and no iMovie HD) who ran into the problem I described in my original
> > post.
>
> I'm having trouble understanding the problem here. I have made many
> hours of video using iMovie HD and can't recall ever having had a
> reason to use Save As to preserve a version while working on a
> project. The closest I've ever come to that is the example I
> described above.

As I pointed out, the high school students DO NOT HAVE iMovie HD. They
have iMovie 11, which does not allow them to Save, Save As, etc. iMovie
takes care of saving its file on its own. I'm trying to find a way to
get to an earlier version of what it saves, if possible.


...

[gtr]

On 2013-02-25 16:11:59 +0000, Matthew Lybanon said:

> As I pointed out, the high school students DO NOT HAVE iMovie HD. They
> have iMovie 11, which does not allow them to Save, Save As, etc. iMovie
> takes care of saving its file on its own. I'm trying to find a way to
> get to an earlier version of what it saves, if possible.

I don't think you can do it. I use iMovie quite a bit, and have never
found any possible option in this regard, other than exiting the
program copying some files to a backup folder of some kind and then
continuing. Once you want to "revert" you'll have to exit, copy the
old files back in, either replacing them or making new backups of the
current state of things and then continuing.

For me it was easier just to *NEVER* make a mistake that I couldn't
undo my way out of. Clearly anything tricky, complex or any vast
changes that were effected, I make very sure indeed that things work
appropriately before exiting the program.

Neverthless I've found screw-ups later on and just had to fix thier
current state, whatever it may happen to be. For something more robust
in this regard I would suggest Final Cut instead. Or you can lump
it--which is what I do.

Another thing I do, to get more authoritative answers and aid in
general is refer to this crew:

http://www.apple.com/support/imovie/

One can usually get answers there.

[gtr]

On 2013-02-25 18:01:11 +0000, gtr said:

> Another thing I do, to get more authoritative answers and aid in
> general is refer to this crew:
>
> http://www.apple.com/support/imovie/
>
> One can usually get answers there.

Apologies: This is where I snoop:


https://discussions.apple.com/community/ilife/imovie

[nospam]

In article
<lybanon-CF2DCE...@70-3-168-216.pools.spcsdns.net>, Matthew

Lybanon <lyb...@earthlink.net> wrote:

> As I pointed out, the high school students DO NOT HAVE iMovie HD.

download it here:
<http://support.apple.com/kb/DL319?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US>

[David Empson]

That's just one of the updaters for iMovie HD 6. It won't work unless
you have iMovie HD 6.0.2 installed, and it says so right on the page.

Apple pulled the page which allowed a download of the full version of
iMovie HD for users of iMovie 7 (iLife '08), probably around the time
iMovie 8 (iLife '09) was released.

The full installer is about 161 MB.

--
David Empson
dem...@actrix.gen.nz

[nospam]

In article <1kyw59b.wcjh9v1hs2xmeN%dem...@actrix.gen.nz>, David Empson

<dem...@actrix.gen.nz> wrote:

> > > As I pointed out, the high school students DO NOT HAVE iMovie HD.
> >
> > download it here:
> > <http://support.apple.com/kb/DL319?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US>
>
> That's just one of the updaters for iMovie HD 6. It won't work unless
> you have iMovie HD 6.0.2 installed, and it says so right on the page.

you're right. i downloaded it from apple a couple of years ago but
apparently it's gone now.

dig a little further and you'll find it out there. it's a much better
app.

[John Varela]

On Mon, 25 Feb 2013 16:11:59 UTC, Matthew Lybanon

I DIDN'T SAY THEY DID. What I did say was that I don't understand
why it's so important to preserve a version while continuing to work
on a project, when you can undo back to the start of the session or
revert to a Time Machine version. I am an experienced user of iMovie
HD and have never had to use Save As in the way you describe so it
would matter not to me that Save As is gone in iMovie.

> have iMovie 11, which does not allow them to Save, Save As, etc. iMovie
> takes care of saving its file on its own. I'm trying to find a way to
> get to an earlier version of what it saves, if possible.

And in what way does that make the suggestion of using Time Machine
invalid?

--
John Varela

[JF Mezei]

On 13-02-25 16:01, John Varela wrote:

> I DIDN'T SAY THEY DID. What I did say was that I don't understand
> why it's so important to preserve a version while continuing to work
> on a project, when you can undo back to the start of the session or
> revert to a Time Machine version.

When you are less experienced, there is a lot of trial and error.
Sometimes, this is expressed in hours of owrk which you tehn wish to
discard and revert to a last stage where YOU decided the work was good.

This is why YOU want to be able to decide when to save what is
essentially a checkpoint that you can revert to when/if you are unhappy
with work you have done since and wish to start over again for that work.

Similarly, you could have a core video which you then wish to split into
2 developments (say one for blue ray, the other for some youtube video).

There are many many scenarios where one can have legitimate need to
"save as". However, iMovie is aimed at home users who just want to edit
their vacation movies, or teenagers who just shot some embarassing
footage of a friend during a party and want to edit it before they post
it on youtube.

[John Varela]

I need to clarify that I'm not challenging some users' need to save
versions. I'm just curious what is so different about others' way of
working that they need a feature that I never use.

--
John Varela