Simple Guide to import Panasonic DMC-ZS30/TZ40 to Mac FCP/iMovie/FCE editing on Mac (Yosemite)

Do you want to solve the Panasonic DMC-ZS30/TZ40 and iMovie/Final Cut Pro/Final Cut Express compatibility problem on Mac OS X 10.10/10.8/10.7/10.6/10.5? This short article will tell you the most simple way.

The Panasonic Lumix TZ40, or ZS30 as it’s known in North America, is the company’s hugely popular travel zoom camera. Panasonic ZS30(TZ40) continues to offer the choice of two encoding formats, AVCHD(1080p, 1080i or 720p) or MP4. The former AVCHD format is for the best quality results or playback on HDTVs, but not for extensive editing or uploading. There’re some issues while importing video from Panasonic Lumix ZS30/TZ40 to FCP, iMovie, FCE on Mac.



If you just wanna view Lumix AVCHD from ZS30/TZ40 on Mac, you can upgrade operating system to Mountain Lion and you could preview the AVCHD videos in QuickTime Player. While, if you plan to do further editing in iMovie, Final Cut Pro, things become a bit complex. If you shot 1080 60i or 50i(depending on region) AVCHD footage, you are able to import and edit on FCP/FCE/iMovie in most cases, but when comes to 1080 60p or 50p AVCHD, those Mac tools Final Cut Pro, Final Cut Express, especially iMovie will reject to ingest these recordings. Alternately you can transcode Panasonic Lumix ZS30(TZ40) AVCHD video to Mac compatible format to ensure smooth editing.

How to get Lumix ZS30(TZ40)AVCHD files Mac-friendly

Download and install Brorsoft MTS/M2TS Converter for Mac, which is the best AVCHD to Mac Converter, helping you to achieve AVCHD converting on Mac. This program is good at encoding camera shootings in AVCHD .mts/.m2ts formats to video editing software compatible file types, i.e. AIC for iMoive, ProRes for FCP, MPEG-2 for Premiere Pro, and DNxHD for Avid Media Composer… Now let’s start the Lumix AVCHD to Mac conversion using the Mac AVCHD Converter.

1. Launch the program and import your MTS, M2TS video by clicking “Add” button.



2. Click the Format bar and select a proper video format according your needs. For playback on Mac, QuickTime Movie Format is the best choice; For iMovie, you can select the output format AIC .mov from iMovie and Final Cut Express profile list; For FCP, Final Cut Pro >> Apple ProRes 422 is optimal.



Tip: Click the “Settings” button, you are able to enter the “Profile Settings” panel to adjust video and audio parameters for source files, including video size, bit rate, frame rate and more.

3. Start the AVCHD MTS to Mac conversion via hitting the Convert button.

After the conversion, you can get the resulted video by clicking the Open button in the main interface. Now, you can play/edit Panasonic Lumix ZS30/TZ40 video on Mac OS X freely.

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