[Since EBCDIC]

I'm making what'll turn out to be a full-length DVD (90 min, right?).

iMovie gets slower and slower at deletions and undos the more clips I have, and some of my weird effects have resulted in lots and lots of clips.

(1) Can I save what I've done into sub-projects, to be included later? What about things like trailers, etc.

(2) I can split a clip; can I combine two clips into one?

[scottiB]

Originally posted by Since EBCDIC:
(1) Can I save what I've done into sub-projects, to be included later? What about things like trailers, etc.

(2) I can split a clip; can I combine two clips into one?

iMovie3 does not have a "Save As" feature (which annoys me to no end), where you could save ongoing changes as separate documents/projects. One could duplicate the entire project (including clips), and work on them independently, but hard drive space could become an issue.

AFAIK, there's no way to combine clips within iMovie. iMovie limits the number of clips to 99, so there's a limited ceiling with large/long projects. You can though RESTORE a clip back to original it you've accidentally deleted a portion. Select on any portion of the split clip and choose Restore Clip (Advanced>>Restore Clip). This will, though bring in the original clip in its entirety by adding it, not replacing the original edits.

There is a workaround for combining clips using Quicktime Pro.

With QT Pro, you can copy and paste clips (.dv, .mov, etc.) into a new player window (or add to an existing one) creating a long QT file of 3, 13, or 33 clips and export it as one, longer DV file. I've had to do this with my father who's shot a complete 60 minute DV tape of 8-20 second clips.

1. Launch Quicktime, so a new, empty player window opens. You may have to select a new player (File>>New Player) if the goofy QT TV player opens first.
2. Navigate to your project's media folder (default is /user/Movies/Project Name/Media, I believe) and find your clips.
3. Drag the first clip to be combined on top of the Quicktime icon in the Dock or control-click on the clip and choose the "Open With..." QuickTime (which is default, unless you've changed it). This will open the clip in a new QT Player window. Don't simply double-click on the clip because it will launch iMovie.
4. In the DV Clip window, select all (command+A), copy, and paste it into the untitled player window. In the new window, immediately select none (command+B), so nothing's selected. Move the playhead to the clip's end--if it isn't already.
5. Drag a second clip from the iMovie project's media folder onto the QT icon. It will open in a second player window. Select all, copy, and paste it into the target player window (untitled1--or whatever). Immediately select none (command+B), so nothing's selected. Move the playhead to the clip's end (so you now have two clips in the target player window).
6. Repeat as necessary for the number of clips.
7. When finished, in QT, go to the export command (File>>Export). From the pulldown menu, choose "Movie to DV Stream." Name it something accordingly (clips 7-11 or somesuch) and click "Save" (it may take a few minutes for the file writing). Drag that file into the iMovie project's media folder.
8. Launch iMovie and a prompt will appear finding the new clip. Select the default "Add to clips pane". The new clip will appear, and you can slice and dice. Keep in mind that you've duplicated clips 7 through 11 as one long clip, so if you want, you can delete those clips while in the Finder (iMovie, on launch, will notice they're missing and prompt you to find them, but just press Cancel.)