I have zero skills with video. I am hoping for some help on using this thing. The use will mainly start as home movies to capture moments in our life, like vacations.

But maybe it turns into some Youtube channels (BBQ and Cocktails is my idea).

I'm looking for advice on simple, cheap, editing software. Mainly I'll just want to cut out the bloopers and nonsense. I'm definitely not looking for any technical quality editing advice that is for more skilled people.

I don't even know how to get vids from my phone app (Go Pro Quick) to my iMac. I don't see the app for the computer. My iMac is old, like mid 2011 old.

Any advice for simple fast cheap apps or whatever is appreciated.

Imovie will do what you are looking to do. It should already be on your Mac.

quote:

Originally posted by vandrv:
Imovie will do what you are looking to do. It should already be on your Mac.

For some reason it's not on my Mac anymore and I can't download it. My iMac is too old and can't be updated to the newer OS that's required for iMovie

Just use the GoPro Quick App on your phone to do your basic edits.

Then, take the memory card out of the camera and manually save the videos to your Mac for safekeeping.

quote:

Originally posted by Aeteocles:
Just use the GoPro Quick App on your phone to do your basic edits.

Then, take the memory card out of the camera and manually save the videos to your Mac for safekeeping.

Luckily my iMac does have a spot to put in the media card with the adapter. So I figured out getting the vids onto the iMac. I would rather be able to do it with USB. Getting the micro sd card out of the Go Pro is a pain.

Apart from that I want to edit on the computer. The phone is a bit small to edit stuff but I'll give it a try.

ETA: I just made a video and tried to edit in Quik but it seems the app is better for putting clips together than editing sections out of a long video. So it's fine for putting a vacation vid together but maybe won't work for making YouTube content.

 
For editing videos, the native Mac QuickTime Player will work, if you cannot get iMovie. You can trim a video, and combine clips, too. To trim, hit Command-T. In the resulting frames box at the bottom, drag the left/and or right sliders to just the frames you want and click the Trim button on the right.
 
Handbrake is a good video transcoding app. It will take .mov files (typically what a phone takes) and turn them into .mp4, for example. But it also has the capability to handle just about any video format.
 
Handbrake is a free, open source app for macOS and Windows.
 
 
ETA, since you prefer USB over the SD card slot, there are a plethora of USB to SD card adapters available. Just make sure the one you choose supports your type of SD card.

First, I've done a bit of video editing using iMovie and Adobe Premiere Pro, but not a lot. I've been shooting video - including hours and hours of underwater video - since the mid-90s. Whenever possible, I tried to avoid editing after as it just took so much time.

Please do not take this the wrong way, but understand that video editing can seem easy, but it takes a tremendous amount of time.

You mentioned a GoPro. Those units are great for first-person action stuff, but they are not a good choice for regular family and event videos. Your smartphone will be a much better choice for basic shots like you described unless they are in/near the water or on the ski slopes.

You should be able to open the App Store on your iMac and update or download iMovie from there. I would stick with iMovie for now as an editor. I'm not sure what will happen with your 10-year-old iMac when it comes to the App store, but you still should be able to get iMovie.

I took would try editing with the GoPro Quick App on the phone as it should meet your requirements for now.

I'm guessing you have an iPhone since you mentioned the iMac. There is a iMovie app for the iPhone too.

Can’t get iMovie on my Mac and doing edits on the phone is not easy for my old eyes and big hands. Anyhow I’m just looking for a way to cut bits or sections out of videos I take. Seems like it would be simple. But the apps I have seem to only make clips that then need to be strung together. I’ll figure something out.

The GoPro will be good for the vacation vids we want to take. Water, zip lining, Atv rides etc.