iPhone video storage - 1 large video vs. multiple smaller clips

Question

iPhone video storage - 1 large video vs. multiple smaller clips

Hi, can anyone explain the scenario I have come across.

All my photos/videos are managed on my MacBook, I then sync albums to my iPhone, in my case I sync all the albums & that equates to 43gb of storage on the phone.

I thought I would try and break up a few large video files, so on the Mac I imported them into iMovie and split the video into smaller clips whilst at the same time discarding some of the less useful footage, the sum of the smaller clips is now shorter in duration than the single large clip.

Following that I re-imported the individual clips into photos on the Mac, at the same time I removed the single large video from the album & deleted it using control, right-click & delete video.

when I re-synched my iPhone the storage taken by the photos app has increased from 43gb to 51gb - how is this possible ?

thanks in advance, Mark.

iPhone 12 Pro, iOS 15

Posted on Jan 25, 2022 1:21 PM

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Answer 1

Jan 26, 2022 6:41 AM in response to appletastic45

I think I found the answer, when I export the trimmed clip from iMovie I have a few options & I left the defaults which were 720p resolution & quality set as high, when I looked at the rendered clip it shows the 16 min clip as 1.53gb 1280 x 720 (25fps).

If I change the export settings to 540p & medium quality then I can get the size of the same clip down to 620mb which is half the size - the issue is I do not know what future issues I might bump into by opting for this lower res option in order to save space, i.e. the 540p clip looks ok on my iPhone or Mac screen but if I played it on a big TV screen would I notice anything?

basically I have chopped a big video into smaller clips but unwittingly taken up more space with the sum of the smaller clips than with the single file - looks like I may need to do it all again.

Mark.

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Answer 2

Jan 30, 2022 11:42 AM in response to TonyCollinet

I understand what you are saying but I'm not sure in this context that would be true, if a have a 15 minute movie that is 500mb in size imported from a mini DV camcorder (via QuickTime) & in iMovie I split that into 3 smaller clips using the highest quality/res export settings, each of those files is then 400mb, surely all we are doing is increasing the size of the file, it cannot possibly improve the quality/resolution of the original movie ?

Mark.

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Answer 3

Jan 30, 2022 2:00 PM in response to appletastic45

Hi

You are correct that the larger file size cannot improve on the original but ...

You asked about setting the resolution to 540p - lower than the original. this will significantly degrade quality. You need to find a way of keeping the resolution but reducing the bit rate (changing the compresssion) closer to the original. Better still, find an app that will cut the file without re-encoding.

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Answer 4

Jan 26, 2022 9:13 AM in response to appletastic45

I would not export as lower res unless you are also able to archive the higher quality file. Yes on a big TV you will easily see the difference.

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iPhone video storage - 1 large video vs. multiple smaller clips

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