Details: iMovie.app For iPhone

Last week , the WWDC keynote introduced iPhone 4, and also a new video editing app called iMovie for the iPhone. If you own a Mac you are familiar with this app which creates movies complete with themes, transitions, titles, and other features that go beyond just trimming individual clips, an option found in the iPhone 3Gs. TidBits has obtained some details about iMovie for the iPhone.

See details after the jump…

  • iMovie for iPhone will require the iPhone 4, and not be available for the iPhone 3GS. Handling video and creating real-time transitions needs the power of the iPhone 4’s A4 processor.
  • Projects edited on the phone cannot “currently” be transferred to iMovie on the Mac for further editing; projects stay on the phone. (The edited movies can be exported or synced to iTunes, however.)
  • Video clips can be recorded directly within iMovie for iPhone or come from the Camera Roll (clips previously shot using the phone’s built-in camera). Based on how the Camera Roll works, I suspect it may also be possible to work with clips you’ve shot elsewhere by emailing them from your computer to the phone, then saving the attachment to the Camera Roll. The clips would need to be properly formatted as H.264 videos (and without having the software or an iPhone 4 to test, I don’t know which specifications that entails).
  • iMovie for iPhone is scheduled to ship June 24th to coincide with the launch of the iPhone 4.
  • The app is currently for the iPhone 4 only, and won’t run on the iPad. I suspect the app is tailored to the iPhone 4’s higher-density screen, and therefore wouldn’t work within the iPad’s pixel-doubled compatibility mode. (I’d be very surprised if an iMovie for iPad version doesn’t appear at some point, possibly with the release of iOS 4 for the iPad in a few months.)