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Help with moving keyframes.
I have an audio track. Very punchy (beat driven).
I am editing to this audio track.Every now and then, I pull the song back and pull my nats up full.
Just as often, I will pull the nats back and bring my music full.
I do all of my music fades manually with keyframes.Now then, if I need to remove a section from the middle of my edit and therefore adjust the edit of my music… I have an issue.
Let’s say that the top row is my video and the bottom is my audio.
Here’s how it looks when the mix is first completed:vvvvv VVVVV vvvv VVV vvvvvvv VVVVV
aaaaa AAAA aaaa AAA aaaaaaa AAAAA
(*lower case and caps indicate a harmonious event of some kind between audio and video… in this case, changes in volume)Now then, I want to cut out a shot of my video. The result is this:
VVVVV vvvv VVV vvvvvvv VVVVV
aaaaa AAAA aaaa AAA aaaaaaa AAAAA
(*since the video lost a shot and the music track was NOT edited, my keyframes are now out of harmonious union with the video track above).The audio keyframes (inside or “overlaying” the audio track) are right where they used to be… as expected.
What I DO NOT want to do is MOVE THE WHOLE AUDIO TRACK LEFT. I like where it rests. I do NOT want to move the TRACK left so that my keyframes come into harmony again. What I DO WANT TO DO is physically LEAVE THE TRACK where it is but MOVE THE KEYFRAMES so that the fades happen at DIFFERENT PLACES in the audio track (in this case sooner).Now then, I can move one keyframe at a time just like the next guy. But since all of the keyframes are already PERFECTLY ALIGNED with the now repositioned video, and since there is a crapload of them to move, it makes MUCH MORE SENSE to just be able to move a GROUP OF KEYFRAMES INSIDE OF A STATIONARY AUDIO TRACK. Effectively, this means that the fades will happen at a different place in the song… but that the song itself will remain where it was.
HOW CAN I DO THIS?
I cannot seem to find a way to move (slide) a group of keyframes to the left or right all at once. HELP! -
3 Replies
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The first suggestion I would make, albeit for future reference, is to lock picture before you put a lot of time into audio mixing. You may even want to export all of your audio into Soundtrack Pro to use a program better suited for audio mixing.
You’re obviously past that stage now, so here are some other options…1) It seems to me that if you’re dealing nat sound, and you remove a clip, you’d want its nat sound gone as well, which would just involve deleting the audio, and re-syncing the rest. If it’s just the music bed you’re trying to get back in sync (at least the keyframes), you could just use the slip tool (keyboard -s), and slip your music to the left to compensate for the duration of the clip you removed. This should move the keyframes as well, but while your start and end points in your timeline would be the same, the point in the music at which it comes in and goes out will be different.
2) I just made this up, and i sounds sketchy in my head, so you’ve been warned. Copy the audio (1 piece at a time if you’re dealing with multiple things in the timeline), and paste it on an empty track at the same point in time. Make sure your target tracks are selected correctly, and that auto-select is turned off for all tracks with lower numbers (A1,A2, etc.) Use the roll tool, or razor blade, to remove an amount of time equal to the duration of the video clip you removed from the front of the audio. Now copy the audio. Ctl-click the original version of the audio you just copied and modified, and select remove attributes, then check the levels box. Now ctl-click again, and paste attributes. Click the levels box again, and make sure the “Scale Attribute Times” box is NOT checked. Now you should have the same keyframes moved forward in time the same amount as the duration of the clip you removed.
If someone gives you an easier way, go with that… just my thoughts
Zak
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pain in the proverbial but you could find the first frame of your keyframes you want to move, use the blade tool to place a cut into the audio track at the point, select the clip to the right of the cut and press cmd-c to copy, right click the cut point and choose “join through edit” to remove the blade cut, now move to the new frame in the audio/video where you want to start those copied keyframes, again use the blade tool to place a cut a that point, select the clip to the right of the cut and press opt-v to paste attributes, uncheck “Scale Attribute Times” and all other attributes, check Audio>Levels and press OK
… that’ll do it but whoo boy, depending on the complexities of your needs it could be a whole lot easier to look into sending to Soundtrack Pro
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bit late as a answer but i think useful enough to warrant sharing (should anyone not already know) …
was just browsing through Larry Jordan’s latest newsletter and noticed a comment on slipping keyframes. this was with respect to applying a vdeo filter to a specific portion of video by use of the range selection tool … clever me, i already knew about filters and range selection, but Larry’s info was describing how one would use the slip tool in the viewer to slip the selected range, and therefore also the associated keyframes. normally, my practice would be to slip video filter keyframes using the click and drag method within in the clip keyframe area in the timeline … however i knew that this trick only applies to video filter keyframes not to audio level keyframes.
anyway, the article reminded me of this thread and prompted me to have a look with respect to slipping audio levels keyframes… and sure enough it works, albeit without benefit of GUI feedback.
lets assume that you have applied a series of audio level keyframes to a clip and now wish to slip them a little, heres how:
load the audio clip from the timeline into the viewer
select the slip tool
then simply click and drag on any keyframe (or anywhere on the level line itself) within the waveform area of the viewer to slip the clip’s keyframes (the cursor will change to the slip tool as you hover over the right area)… release the mouse button and you’ll see that the keyframes have indeed slipped appropriately, whereas the clip’s in, out and placement, has remained unchanged. unfortunately however, theres none of the feedback that we’ve come to expect from rest of the FCP interface during this process… no phantom marks showing where the keyframes are moving to, no counter to show how many frames left and right the keyframes are being moved.
it seems to be another one of those not quite finished undocumented features.
hope its useful info
Andy
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