Polish up your footage
Overcome problems created in shooting by using iMovie’s post-production fixes
Most video ca meras attempt to accurately record a subject’s colors and tones, but due to various factors (such as highcontrast scenes or using incorrect in-camera color balance settings) your footage may need tweaking in post-production to look its best. Fortunately iMovie is geared up to help you solve common production-related problems quickly and easily.
The Color Balance icon above the Viewer (a circle whose halves are different shades) enables you to warm up a cold-looking color cast, or cool down a warm one, to get a range of natural-looking colors.
You can remove color casts automatically or use the eyedropper to manually sample an area that should be a neutral white to get a more accurate color balance.
You can even get one clip to match the colors in another using the handy Match Color tool. This is an effective way to get timeline clips looking consistent.
iMovie’s Color Correction tools (the next icon to the right above the Viewer) enable you to boost the saturation of drab colors to make them more attractive. They also enable you to brighten up underexposed clips and boost their contrast to help overcome in-camera problems with exposure. The Clip Filters enable you to creatively grade your clips colors and tones, as well as add special effects such as vintage film artefacts.
Eliminate ca mera shake
If you shoot handheld, your footage may suffer from distracting camera shake. Above the Viewer is a powerful Stabilization tool that analyzes the selected clip for dominant motion and then irons out the worst of the wobbles to create an easier-to-watch, Steadicam-style effect. You can also add movement within statically framed shots (and photos) using the Ken Burns tools, which are found by clicking the Cropping icon above the Viewer.
Once your movie has great color, healthy tones and clearer sound, you can polish up your production by adding extra assets, such as animated maps from the Backgrounds browser. These can be customized to illustrate a journey’s start and end point, which is a great way to introduce a vacation video, for example.