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Oops! Inherited legacy FCP projects, no idea what version…
DIscovered the unpleasant ( and scarcely believable) truth that the FCP app i can buy (“X”) does NOT SUPPORT ANY LEGACY PROJECTS. I can’t open dozens of old projects for editing. And I need to edit one TODAY. The previous manager of this stuff did not bother to export any XML, all i have is media and these cursed FCP files. It’s shocking that Apple dropped legacy project support. Can you imagine not being able to open an XLS or DOC file from 2 years ago?? I can open CorelDraw files made over a decade ago in the latest version. But I digress!
Obviously, I have to obtain an “old” version of FCP somehow. But if this is any indication – I probably need to establish WHICH version i need. Can 7 open 6 files? What about older versions? My inherited collection of projects came with zero documentation. 🙁
I took a peek inside the project file looking for metadata, can’t see anything obvious. The first characters of the FCP file I am supposed to be revising right now are ¢KeyG – does this ring a bell with anyone?? I also have a small folder of projects marked “old FCP format” – and those also start with ¢KeyG…
Any secret way to tell the version of these files? Any hints on where I can best buy a copy of this obsolete but necessary product?
TIA
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5 Replies
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What you haven’t tell yet is which FC version you are using.
rafael -
I thought there was a third party program that could cross-convert old projects to work with X. Or did I dream it?
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[Mark Suszko] “I thought there was a third party program that could cross-convert old projects to work with X. Or did I dream it?”
You are not wrong Mark.
You can go FCP Classic to FCPX, with “7toX” or FCPX to FCP Classic, with “Xto7”, but you need FCP.6/7 and FCPX.In the case of Michael, he needs to be able to open first his old FCP project with FCP 6 or 7, and export an XML that “7toX” will translate.
rafael -
The project files and media are all sitting on an IMac running MacOSX (Mtn Lion) but they could have originally been created on a Macbook running MacOSX Lion. (or earlier – it’s got Lion on it now. The thing is, neither of these machines currently have FC installed, otherwise I’d be happily exporting project XML files. No records have surfaced yet of this company ever having bought FC. (Not surprising, they apparently are highly allergic to documentation here). No disks, manuals, or dongles are present.
I spent six hours last night doing a kludgy workaround ‘faking’ edits to this project by creating overlays in Premier. I suspect that the changes would have only taken an hour, if I had been able to edit the original project. (Actually i cannot say for sure, having never used Final Cut…)
I’ve seen some copies of FC 6 & 7 on eBay but they are extremely pricy. So I want to make sure I buy the version that is compatible with these project files. Apple website seems to have DELETED all the docs for these (not so ancient) legacy products – Thanks, Apple!
BTW, do all of the older versions of FC use a dongle?
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So… there is no way of discovering “which” version these project files were made with?
There is a HUGE difference in price between available copies of FCP6 (studio 2) and FCP7 (studio3) – but I would hate to buy version 6 and then find out that the files are still unopenable, due to having been made in V7 :-((
Does anyone happen to know when V7 came out? These project files go back a few years…
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