Trying to open, modify, and save files in Quicktime with AppleScript - applescript

Question

I am unsuccessfully trying to use AppleScript to automate the process of making small edits to a bunch of files. More specifically, I want a script that will:
Open a specific file in QuickTime
Split it into segments of a specified length
Save each segment as an individual file in the same format and with the same quality as the original.
Close the document
Most importantly, I want the script to essentially work unassisted/unmanned.
Here's some more info on what I'm trying to do: http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20100305070247890.
Another user on StackOverflow asked a similar question a while back, but the suggestion does not work.
From the few online discussions I've been able to find, it appears that Apple took away some of the functionality of QuickTime after version 7. I'm currently using 10.3+
Here's another discussion that describes almost exactly what I'm trying to do. As "kryten2" points out, export no longer seems to work in the new version of QuickTime. And, just like "VideoBeagle", I get permissions errors when I try to call the save method.
The code posted by VideoBeagle on that page does not work for me. Here's a modified version:
tell application "QuickTime Player"
open basefile --argument passed to script when executed
set the clipboard to "outputfile"
delay (0.25)
tell document 1
trim from 0 to 60
tell application "System Events"
tell process "QuickTime Player"
keystroke "s" using command down
keystroke "v" using command down
delay 1
keystroke return
delay 3
#click menu item "Save..." of menu "File" of menu bar 1
end tell
end tell
close saving no
end tell
end tell
The code above DOES open the file in QuickTime and trims the file to the correct length, but then it creates an unsaved copy of the file in a new window, closes the original, but does not save the new document. When I experiment with the delay and remove the "trim" function, it will show the Save dialog but won't actually save a file.
Has anyone successfully managed to use AppleScript and QuickTime to save files? ...recently?
Thank you so much!

Answer 1

The best should be to use export function of QuickTime Player 7 if you have the QuickTime Pro authorization (not free, but very cheap). to do so, you also need to download this old QT version from Apple site. it is still available, but Apple promotes the QuickTime Player 7 with basically only read functions.
Still if you want to stick to QuickTime Player (after version 7), there are known issues in scripting while saving. The workaround is to simulate part of GUI as you already start doing.
The script bellow asks for movie file to be processed, defines the new path and name for the modified video, trim from second 2 to second 6 and then use the GUI interface to save and close. I made many comments to make sure you can understand and update for your own needs :
-- select file to be processed
set myVideo to choose file with prompt "Select video to be processed"
-- set new path and file name
set newPath to ((path to desktop folder from user domain) as string) & "Test_Folder"
set PPath to POSIX path of newPath
set newName to "cutVideo.mov"
tell application "QuickTime Player"
activate
open myVideo
set myDoc to front document
trim myDoc from 2 to 6 -- keep only video from second 2 to 6
end tell
tell application "System Events"
tell process "QuickTime Player"
keystroke "s" using {command down}
delay 0.8
keystroke "G" using {command down} -- go to
delay 0.8
keystroke PPath -- folder path with / and not :
delay 0.8
keystroke return
delay 0.8
keystroke newName -- fill file name
delay 0.8
keystroke return -- ok save dialog
delay 0.8
keystroke "w" using {command down} -- close window
end tell
end tell