If you are experiencing issues editing AVCHD MTS files on Mac EI Capitan through iMovie or FCP X, you may have interest in this post. It displays a workaround to transcode AVCHD MTS clips to QuickTime movie format for editing on EI Capitan with invisible quality loss.
What to do to make MTS files editable on EI Capitan through iMovie?
“Hi there, I need your Help! I’m new to Macintosh. Recently, I’ve purchased a MacBook Pro with OS X EI Capitan v10.11 installed. I have copied a bundle of MTS files shot on a Panasonic camera achieved on my former Windows PC, which I would like to edit in iMovie. Unfortunately, I can’t see my movies on iMovie. I can’t edit anything I had. Do you know what to do to make these MTS files editable in iMovie on EI Capitan? I would really appreciate any help. Thanks.”
Both Apple iMovie and FCP X don’t work with individual MTS clips. They only read from an entire AVCHD folder. If you didn’t keep the AVCHD folder structure intact, you will need to convert MTS files to a format that is compatible with your editing app first. This requires a third party MTS Converter for EI Capitan. Read on to learn a quick guide on how to convert AVCHD MTS files to AIC/ProRes for editing on EI Capitan through iMovie/FCP X.
Here’s what you need
HD Converter for Mac
A quick guide on how to encode AVCHD MTS files to a Mac friendly format for editing on EI Capitan through iMovie/FCP X
Follow these steps:
Step 1: Open up HD Converter for Mac as a MTS Converter for Mac EI Capitan. When its main interface comes up, click ‘Add File’ to load your source media.
Step 2: Select output format for iMovie/FCP X
1) Select AIC .mov as output format for iMovie
To convert MTS files for iMovie, from ‘Profile’ list, choose ‘Apple InterMediate Codec (AIC)(*.mov)’ as output format under ‘iMovie and Final Cut Express’ column.
Important: If you’ve loaded a number of video clips to do batch conversion, please do remember ticking off ‘Apply to All’ option before you start.
2) Select ProRes .mov as output format for FCP X
From the ‘Profile’ list, move to ‘Final Cut Pro’ catalogue, and select ‘Apple ProRes 422 (*.mov)’ as target format. Apple ProRes is the best suited editing codec for FCP X and its former version FCP 6 and FCP 7. When loading them into FCP X/6/7, you needn’t wait for a long time for rendering.
Step 3: Custom video and audio settings (optional)
If necessary, you can click ‘Settings’ button and go to ‘Profiles Settings’ panel to modify video and audio settings like video encoder, resolution, video bit rate, frame rate, aspect ratio, audio encoder, sample rate, audio bit rate, and audio channels. 3D settings are also available.
Step 4: Begin AVCHD MTS clips to MOV Conversion on Mac
When ready, click ‘Convert’ to start format conversion. Once the conversion process is complete, you can click ‘Open Folder’ button to get the generated AIC/ProRes MOV files for editing in iMovie/FCP X with optimum performance.
Tips:
If you don’t want to wait for the entire conversion process, you can tick off ‘Showdown computer when conversion completed’ and go away to do other things.
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