Yesterday I started making my first video using iMovie for iPhone 4.  I was giddy.  I couldn’t believe I was making a project on my cell phone with the same non-linear ease I used to only expect from a top-of-the-line desktop machine (I’ve been using Final Cut Pro since the day it came out over a decade ago).   There were some limitations, of course, but nothing I couldn’t work around.   I made a video for my girlfriend, timing pictures and video of her nephews and niece to one of her new favorite songs. I showed it to her on the phone’s high quality screen.  She loved it.  She wanted to share it with her sister 3000 miles away.   And that’s when I had a problem.  A big problem.  Every time I tried to export the video, the app crashed.

A simple Google search turned up this support document on Apple’s website.

Apparently iMovie currently has a problem with still images:  use more than a dozen or so in a project and you could start to have issues exporting.  I had close to 40 photos in my project.   Playing around with the suggested settings didn’t help.  Apple’s final suggestion:  Use less photos.

In other words:  When all else fails, start over again with lesser ambitions.

That’s not an attitude I’m using to hearing from Apple.

Anyways, I’m not going to do that. I’ll continue to show off the video on the phone while I wait for a bug fix (it’s clearly a bug — the App has no problem processing all those photos on the fly during editing or playback — just when compiling for export).  When that will come, no clue.  Apple seems a little busy at the moment.  But at least while I wait I can listen to some podcasts…