Storage problem in 'Movies'

[Peter Franks]

I had 40GB left on the MBP 500GB drive this morning, and did one edit today on a video which was under 2GB in iMovie, and now it's showing I only have 4GB left on my SSD.

I've one film which was made up of 3 parts stuck together and it totals 1.48GB
But have just seen in Movies folder, 'Movie Library' says 38GB, Why is that using all that storage separate from the 1.48GB folder with movie in it?

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

First guess is that it is fattening the 2GB/1.48GB movie up into the ProRes format for editing. That can eat a LOT of storage space fast. When the editing is complete, you then render it as h.265 or h.264, proof the result and, if good, delete the original file to free up the space. The h.26X version will be much smaller.

Basically, video editing is a massive storage hog. Get yourself a BIG external drive- ideally a fast one- and do all video editing on that drive. I have an 8TB m.2 stick as a video editing drive and short movies being edited can easily eat up much of that 8TB depending on the edits. For bigger projects, I've traditionally used a 28TB RAID setup and it too can sometimes fill with a lot of edits for as little as 20-40 minute video projects.

To resolve your immediate issue, get some big storage, move the project to that storage and open and edit it in that much greater space.

 

[Peter Franks]

First guess is that it is fattening the 2GB/1.48GB movie up into the ProRes format for editing. That can eat a LOT of storage space fast. When the editing is complete, you then render it as h.265 or h.264, proof the result and, if good, delete the original file to free up the space. The h.26X version will be much smaller.

Basically, video editing is a massive storage hog. Get yourself a BIG external drive- ideally a fast one- and do all video editing on that drive. I have an 8TB m.2 stick as a video editing drive and short movies being edited can easily eat up much of that 8TB depending on the edits. For bigger projects, I've traditionally used a 28TB RAID setup and it too can sometimes fill with a lot of edits for as little as 20-40 minute video projects.

To resolve your immediate issue, get some big storage, move the project to that storage and open and edit it in that much greater space.

Thanks! So I can plug in a USB stick with 128 or so, and move that Movie Library to it or just dump the whole app on it and it will work from there?

I lowered the res to 540 and it still came out as 4GB for 1 hour. Assume YouTube lowers the res automatically anyway.
When using the older iMovie, the results were whited out and terrible, but end game was lesser gig

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

Movie files only. App stays where it is. It's the file that is hogging up huge space, not the app.

However, 128MB is much too small too... and standard USB will probably be much too slow. Unless this is a one-off video creation, you need to think BIG storage (I suggest TBs vs. GBs) and FAST storage (Thunderbolt if possible, else fastest USB4/USB3.2 enclosure option).

Too small storage won't fully resolve your problem. You'll probably find that the "bumping into full" issue is the same at only about 3.5 times the space you have now.

And slow storage will simply slow down how fast you can edit while waiting for R/W speed to catch up to whatever you are trying to do (usually manifesting as the spinning beach ball).

Hop on Amazon and seek out a FAST enclosure for maybe $100 or so and probably 4TB m.2 for about $200-$250 more to go into it. That should kill both birds with one stone for most small projects like the one you described.

If money is tight, go the big storage HDD route. While that will be slower than m.2 (and you'll have to wait through some beach balls), you can get a very large HDD for dirt cheap prices. Between the two, size will matter more than speed... but the latter can be frustrating when that beach ball is making you wait on the next edit.

 

[Peter Franks]

Movie files only. App stays where it is. It's the file that is hogging up huge space, not the app.

However, 128MB is much too small too... and standard USB will probably be much too slow. Unless this is a one-off video creation, you need to think BIG storage (I suggest TBs vs. GBs) and FAST storage (Thunderbolt if possible, else fastest USB4/USB3.2 enclosure option).

Too small storage won't fully resolve your problem. You'll probably find that the "bumping into full" issue is the same at only about 3.5 times the space you have now.

And slow storage will simply slow down how fast you can edit while waiting for R/W speed to catch up to whatever you are trying to do (usually manifesting as the spinning beach ball).

Hop on Amazon and seek out a FAST enclosure for maybe $100 or so and probably 4TB m.2 for about $200-$250 more to go into it. That should kill both birds with one stone for most small projects like the one you described.

If money is tight, go the big storage HDD route. While that will be slower than m.2 (and you'll have to wait through some beach balls), you can get a very large HDD for dirt cheap prices. Between the two, size will matter more than speed... but the latter can be frustrating when that beach ball is making you wait on the next edit.

Thanks! And can they be left on the storage device, as in I can edit from there, How does it connect them to the app, if you know what I mean?

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

I haven't used iMovie in a long time. I use FCPX. But it should be just like storing a document on an external. In the File menu, select "open" or similar and then choose the movie file/library you want to edit. The difference is that it will now be on the external drive instead of the internal. I fired up iMovie and am confident that you use the options in this menu for this...

See this article about iMovie "library" moving to external drive, opening it (there) and using it as you do now.

As to "left on the storage device", if you mean short-term while you develop a final video file, yes. If you mean long-term, I'd change my thinking about that, as you'll need that fast storage for future video projects. If you fill it up with a bunch of iMovie libraries you keep, you crash into this problem again.

If the goal is to forever keep the iMovie library, get yourself a big fat HDD too and move the library to the HDD after you edit, perfect, render. This will move the library files off the fast SSD storage so you have maximum room for future projects. Then, later if you want to work on a library file again, you could bring it back onto the SSD from HDD storage when ready to edit again.

I would NOT be thinking of just leaving them there for the long-term. Long term storage should be HDD. Short-term, fast storage for video editing should be SSD.

 

[Peter Franks]

I haven't used iMovie in a long time. I use FCPX. But it should be just like storing a document on an external. In the File menu, select "open" or similar and then choose the movie file/library you want to edit. The difference is that it will now be on the external drive instead of the internal. I fired up iMovie and am confident that you use the options in this menu for this...

View attachment 2367014

See this article about iMovie "library" moving to external drive, opening it (there) and using it as you do now.

As to "left on the storage device", if you mean short-term while you develop a final video file, yes. If you mean long-term, I'd change my thinking about that, as you'll need that fast storage for future video projects. If you fill it up with a bunch of iMovie libraries you keep, you crash into this problem again.

If the goal is to forever keep the iMovie library, get yourself a big fat HDD too and move the library to the HDD after you edit, perfect, render. This will move the library files off the fast SSD storage so you have maximum room for future projects. Then, later if you want to work on a library file again, you could bring it back onto the SSD from HDD storage when ready to edit again.

I would NOT be thinking of just leaving them there for the long-term. Long term storage should be HDD. Short-term, fast storage for video editing should be SSD.

Brilliant, and very helpful, thank you!!
I've deleted all, or so I thought, but it's left so much crap in the Movies folder, Projects, Library, Events just from one film

 

[HDFan]

I had 40GB left on the MBP 500GB

Standard recommendation is to keep ~30% of that 500 GB free.

 

[Peter Franks]

Standard recommendation is to keep ~30% of that 500 GB free.

That's like 150GB? That'll never happen. I looked at 1TB Samsung drive to replace this but then realised I'd need 2 for back up. Since removing just the one project, I got back 40GB. I couldn't work out why the pop up telling me I had 4GB left was happening, until I checked how much iMovie used.

 

[HDFan]

That's like 150GB? That'll never happen.

You are asking for trouble.

"The operating system needs around 20% of the SSD space to be free for it to function properly."

What to Do if Your SSD Is Full

If you find yourself with a “Disk Full” error message or experience poor performance due to insufficient space on your SSD, you’re not the only one! Here are some practical tips and solutions to assist you in making space on an SSD.

www.kingston.com

 

[Peter Franks]

You are asking for trouble.

"The operating system needs around 20% of the SSD space to be free for it to function properly."

What to Do if Your SSD Is Full

If you find yourself with a “Disk Full” error message or experience poor performance due to insufficient space on your SSD, you’re not the only one! Here are some practical tips and solutions to assist you in making space on an SSD.

www.kingston.com

Never realised it should be that much!