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Restore iMovie Project

Hi folks,


I'm using Mojave 10.14.5 with a late 2013 iMac.


I recently spent quite a while creating an iMove project and was pleased to note that it saved my work automatically. However, on one edit I made a huge error and that error was also saved, presumably overwriting my earlier version.


Is there a way I can restore or revert to the version of my project that doesn't contain the error? Or do I have to start the whole thing over again? Yes the faux par was that bad.


If there is no way to get back to my earlier, wreck-free, version is there a way to disable the auto-save feature and rely only on manual saves?


Many thanks

iMac 27", macOS 10.14

Posted on Jul 8, 2019 4:35 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jul 8, 2019 8:25 AM

Hi,


Yes, working with a duplicate project is good for preserving previous edits while experimenting with new ones.


Open your project and do an Edit/Undo to undo the previous edit. You can do it repeatedly until you undo the disastrous edit. You would need to redo all the edits that you undid to get to the bad one. Hopefully the bad edit was the last one that you did.


If that doesn't work, you might try opening iMovie from the backups folder from a previous backup of your library that occurred just before your edit. To get to the Backups folder, follow this file path from the Finder menu:


Go/Home/Library/Containers/com.apple.iMovieApp/Data/Library/Caches/iMovieBackups


When you get there you will see a list of previous backups of your iMovie library. Click on one dated just before you made your edit. iMovie will open in that library. Go to the Projects browser screen (where your projects are displayed as icons) and open the project you were working on. The project version that you see will be the one that was backed up before you made your bad edit.


-- Rich




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8 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jul 8, 2019 8:25 AM in response to hogscape

Hi,


Yes, working with a duplicate project is good for preserving previous edits while experimenting with new ones.


Open your project and do an Edit/Undo to undo the previous edit. You can do it repeatedly until you undo the disastrous edit. You would need to redo all the edits that you undid to get to the bad one. Hopefully the bad edit was the last one that you did.


If that doesn't work, you might try opening iMovie from the backups folder from a previous backup of your library that occurred just before your edit. To get to the Backups folder, follow this file path from the Finder menu:


Go/Home/Library/Containers/com.apple.iMovieApp/Data/Library/Caches/iMovieBackups


When you get there you will see a list of previous backups of your iMovie library. Click on one dated just before you made your edit. iMovie will open in that library. Go to the Projects browser screen (where your projects are displayed as icons) and open the project you were working on. The project version that you see will be the one that was backed up before you made your bad edit.


-- Rich




Restore iMovie Project

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