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My Roller Coaster FCPX Experience
I’ve been editing on Final Cut Pro since version 2. I recently decided to try out FCPX now that it has had a few updates and has the Multicam feature. I am at a point where I want to make a decision as to which NLE I will be using for the next year or two or longer.
Two weeks ago I shot a two day long panel discussion on 3 cameras in AVCHD. I was excited to import without transcoding to ProRes and the Mulitcam feature seemed pretty slick. I was very impressed that while the Multicam Clip was playing, I could drag in JPEG images, add cross dissolves, and move clips around without having to stop playback.
Then it happened. I had spent a full day editing a 2 hour segment of the discussion and was nearly complete, and then the project file became corrupt. No big deal, I will just go to my autosave vau…..wait…There is no autosave vault!!! Okay…they’ve got a backup file I’ll just open that. Nope. That became corrupt as well.
I called Apple, and the guy walked me through about ten possible fixes. And by the time he got to the last one he said “I sure hope this works”. It didn’t. So I had to completely re-edit that 2 hour segment on a Sunday in order to stay on schedule.
So today, I’m recovering from what just happened…I went ahead and imported some footage. Once I finished importing the footage and was about to create a new Multicam clip and I noticed that I get the spinning beach ball. So I have to force quit (no big deal, I’ve seen that in FCP before) but when I restart I get the beach ball again. I call up Apple and after going through several troubleshooting steps, it turns out the EVENT has become corrupt and I can no longer open that Event.
So in a matter of three days I have had both a “Project” and an “Event” become corrupt. I have a deadline that needs to be met tomorrow. I would like to say that I’d give FCPX another chance, but I truthfully do not have the time nor the money to spend on things like this.
In the 10 years I’ve worked on FCP, I’ve never had two incidents like this happen in such a short period of time. I’ve had some disasters, but I’ve never had a project become corrupt. I’ve never had to completely re-edit a project because of FCP.
I previously did not use FCPX because of what others said about it. Now I’m not going to use it because of what I’ve experienced myself. So…if you need me I’ll be learning Media Composer 6.0.
Mike
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7 Replies
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What version of FCPX were you using?
Jason Jenkins
Flowmotion Media
Video production… with style!Check out my Mormon.org profile.
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Thanks for posting your experience – I literally feel sick to my stomach now.
Still on FCP legacy – testing CS5.5 – loving what I’m hearing about CS6.
Anyway, let us know how you fare with MC6.
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Why learn mc6 when you can switch to CS6 with your eyes closed.
Fcp keyboard layout
Fcp xml support -
I was using 10.0.3 until 10.0.4 was released. I then updated to 10.0.4. The crashing and corruption issues actually happened a few days after updating to 10.0.4.
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Mike
I’m really sorry to hear about your problems, sadly I dont have any answers I’m afraid.
I just want to say in case Apple are listening that this is exactly what I’ve been hammering on about since 10.0.1 – that the lack of autosave is a disaster waiting to happen!
Its a crazy workaround but what I do is have Chronosync running in the background every couple couple of hours and regularly drag the project over to a USB stick that permanatly lives in my computer (this automatically makes a copy).
Good luck.
Michael Sanders
London Based DP/Editor -
Go to Premiere. I learned FCP X, edited with it, I actually LIKED editing with it, but finally had to cut my losses and switch to Premiere: the buggy performance aside, I just need manual control.
I can’t have Apple trying to do stuff for me. I hate it when, somehow, my tricking FCP X using disk images doesn’t work.
When I hit command-S, I know something has happened. I know autosave files are created. If (when) FCP X is not saving my work, I don’t know it.
I’m a professional editor, which means I’m a paranoid control freak. FCP X is not for me.
With Premiere and the Creative Suite, you can do what you could (and still can) do with the old Final Cut Studio: anything you want.
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Not being able to save manually I’m finding the biggest turn-off in FCPX.
I’ve always regarded pressing ‘Command-S’ as part of ‘completing’ the edit – unless you want to play around for a bit and then you want to have the option of ‘revert to saved’…
Gary Cole
Regent Records UK Ltd
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