How to Add music to the beginning of my video using iMovie on the Mac book pro
By Jim Jackson, 13 March, 2019
Forum
macOS and Mac Apps
Hello, I've created a video, I've also created a music theme to use with my video. I can't figure out how to add the music to the video at the beginning so that the music will start and finish before the video begins.
Forgive the non-specific nature of these instructions, I'm going by memory, so I may skip some specifics and hope you can figure them out. If you need more detail, I'll follow up with more when I have the chance to open iMovie up and double check things.
One option other than the one suggested above would be to add a blank title at the start of your movie. So make sure your playhead is at the start of the timeline, then open up the titles picker and choose a blank, black-background title. Insert this before the playhead selection (I believe the keyboard command is Q). Then be sure to delete the filler title text so that nothing shows up in the title, and set the title length for however long you want the music to play before the video starts. Then you should be able to start your music at the beginning of the video, and get the desired effect.
Note about editing title text—this has always been a bit finicky for me. If I remember right, when Voiceover focus is over the title editor (which will say something like "Add Title Text Here"), I then actually have to physically click the trackpad in order to start interacting with the text, at which point I can delete it all or type a new title. There may be a better way of doing this, but this is what has worked for me. Best to get sighted assistance to confirm that your title was actually deleted, because I've had trouble with that in the past.
the method described by JW above does work but can be a bit tricky. My method is usually more clear cut as the operations are the same basic commands that you must know to produce and export content from IMovie.
You essentially make two projects which are your opening theme project and your actually movie project. In your theme you add your music, pictures, and video clips along with any text you might want. this will be what people will see in every video just like before any TV show. Once your all done and have the theme just the way you want it you share it as a file and save it somewhere that you can find it later. nNow you close that project and archive it on a separate storage device if you want and move on to your actual project. Once your done with the main content you take your MPEG-4Movie file which was exported to be your theme and add it to the location on the timeline that you think fits best. I have a guide to accessible IMovie production that you can find on this site by searching for it.
Comments
Theme
Export your theme as a project with music and all as a movie. Then drop that exported movie into your projects timeline.
How to add music to a video with iMovie on the Mac Book Pro
Thanks for your responxe Eli! Can you provide step by step instructions on how to accomplish this task? Again, thanks
Another Option
Forgive the non-specific nature of these instructions, I'm going by memory, so I may skip some specifics and hope you can figure them out. If you need more detail, I'll follow up with more when I have the chance to open iMovie up and double check things.
One option other than the one suggested above would be to add a blank title at the start of your movie. So make sure your playhead is at the start of the timeline, then open up the titles picker and choose a blank, black-background title. Insert this before the playhead selection (I believe the keyboard command is Q). Then be sure to delete the filler title text so that nothing shows up in the title, and set the title length for however long you want the music to play before the video starts. Then you should be able to start your music at the beginning of the video, and get the desired effect.
Note about editing title text—this has always been a bit finicky for me. If I remember right, when Voiceover focus is over the title editor (which will say something like "Add Title Text Here"), I then actually have to physically click the trackpad in order to start interacting with the text, at which point I can delete it all or type a new title. There may be a better way of doing this, but this is what has worked for me. Best to get sighted assistance to confirm that your title was actually deleted, because I've had trouble with that in the past.
Exporting Theme
the method described by JW above does work but can be a bit tricky. My method is usually more clear cut as the operations are the same basic commands that you must know to produce and export content from IMovie.
You essentially make two projects which are your opening theme project and your actually movie project. In your theme you add your music, pictures, and video clips along with any text you might want. this will be what people will see in every video just like before any TV show. Once your all done and have the theme just the way you want it you share it as a file and save it somewhere that you can find it later. nNow you close that project and archive it on a separate storage device if you want and move on to your actual project. Once your done with the main content you take your MPEG-4Movie file which was exported to be your theme and add it to the location on the timeline that you think fits best. I have a guide to accessible IMovie production that you can find on this site by searching for it.