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A Question for Working Professional Editors Using FCPX.
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[Oliver Peters] “That requires that the application always sees all the projects and all the media. There is no way to hide, disable or re-access de-activated projects from within the application. “
This is abjectly wrong. Creating folders in the Project library is trivial (there’s a button for it) Make as many as you like. Name them anything you like (completely obscuring their internal contents at the finder level. Store your projects in them. Those projects are then “invisible” to clients watching over your shoulder with a click.
If you’re talking about hiding them on an unattended machine, that’s easy too.
My favorite is to simply store client A’s work on it’s own $140 firewire 800 drive. Unplug the drive and all the projects on it become completely inaccessible. Not even a hint of them in the interface. And that includes all the attached event content too. Plug it in, and they all auto-mount and are again available.
You can also use Hodgetts Event Manager X or just move a project out of the Event Library via the finder.
Thats multiple perfectly usable ways to do what you’re saying X can’t do.
[Oliver Peters] “Same problem. You access all of the media for all clients, all sessions, etc. Just like Aperture, iMovie, iTunes and iPhoto.”
See above. That you don’t understand how to manage volumes via external drives through X does not mean that the program “can’t do it.”
[Oliver Peters] “There’s no reason to cop an attitude. “
I don’t mean to do that at all. I do a lot of the things you’re saying X “can’t do” on a regular basis.
It hasn’t been particularly difficult to establish a workflow that does the job for me.
Drives are cheap. Attached to X via even Firewire 800 – they’re responsive and useful.
I know a lot of people who are still trying to work like Legacy where everything had to reside in a on-machine Capture Scratch for Legacy to find it – and I think that approach is still informing their approach to X.
X is totally fine with any entire project including all it’s events, living on a connected drive.
I agree that if you’re in a “facility” environment, then the central storage mode is less useful in X than in other software.
But X is an excellent personal editing environment that allows a seat holder to manage files to hide or reveal projects and events very easily. It does NOT force the editor to reveal their work to those they wish to keep it hidden from. It allows you to work “modularly” with inexpensive off-the-shelf hardware.
And is particularly useful for tracking multiple projects and keeping them available and publishable in real-time access environments with astonishingly little requirement for complex or expensive network infa-strucrure.
Yes it’s currently best for individual and small group video creators. But the foundational structures are there to let it grow into much, much more.
And for the freelancer, it can be transformative.
Arrive with your laptop, your personal drive, and all you need is a desk, chair and the network password and you you have your own suite capable of contributing to multiple projects right out of your briefcase.
If the editors true value is seen as what’s in his or her head, rather than the hardware they operate – X is a beast of seriously excellent possibilities. It’s affordable, capable, agile and actually FUN to use IMO.
My 2 cents.
“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Connor
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Tony,
Couldn’t agree with you more.
I’ve been here for nearly a year trying to say the same thing.
If you expect X to be “like 7 but a bit different” you’re in for a whole lot of struggle and even anger.
Only when you actually stop trying to make it work like you’re conditioned to expecting – and start to understand how it actually functions, can you start to see the value of the new suite of ideas.
Then things really start to cook.
Welcome aboard.
“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Connor
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You mean FRY….! To give you an idea, I just started a project about 15min ago, 4x 1hr HDV tapes which need to be skimmed/trimmed, some shots need 50% slow-mo, fade in/outs and music added. I’m just about done :-))))) GOD BLESS THIS MAGNETIC TIMELINE (Most of the time that is LOL..)
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[Oliver Peters] “While you guys all seem to be jazzed about the project browser structure, it strikes me as completely inadequate. “Management” is relegated to working manually in the Finder or using a third party product (Event Manager). I’m sorry, but that’s simply a workaround. In the inevitable Coke vs. Pepsi example, if I don’t want competing clients accidentally exposed to a competitor’s timeline or event content, I have to remove it from the visible folders that X looks at.”
Let me preface, Oliver, by saying you know your sh*t. I enjoy your insight, and respect your opinions. Your seem to be giving all of this an honest shot. No shame in that.
What most people don’t have is a SAN.
We are lucky enough to have one. “SAN Locations” in FCPX work sort of like Event Manger X, but you control them right in the app. Of course they aren’t perfect, but if you want NDAs between your “FedEx and UPS” clients, SAN locations take care of this right within FCPX, really easily and efficiently. As a matter of fact, if a client is over your shoulder, you can easily mount a SAN Location without them even knowing, as the name can be as abstract as you want (it’s done by folders, at any level, not just root level). If you remove the SAN Location before quitting, FCPX opens as a blank slate.
If not, using the Finder to manage fcs3 project files is not an uncommon practice for you, even today. I know nothing of your organizational practice, but I feel confident that you manage your current NLE projects through the Finder. I know I do. I manage a lot through the Finder.
[Oliver Peters] “Second issue is RAM. Yes, you can place multiple projects into folders, but any open projects have to be buffered into RAM in order to enable skimming. If you have a lot of visible projects in the browser and these contain a lot of effects and Motion titles, it can take quite a long time for FCP X to initially open.”
In my opinion, .0.4 has some performance fixes (it would be silly to call them “gains”). And yes there are some improvements that should be made, but I’m sure you wouldn’t load all of fcp7 projects at once, it would take longer than FCPX especially depending on your project complexity, right? This is easily manageable through the Finder, and sure, it might take an extra click/drag up front.
Reliability is still up for grabs. It remains kinda weird. Backup early and often.
[Oliver Peters] “Add to this the broadcast monitoring issue where you have to exit FCP X and change format settings in the Pref Pane when changing between projects with different format settings.
Sorry, these items are not up to par, yet. Doesn’t mean you can’t work within these constraints, but it’s not as good as FCP 7 (or PPro or Avid).”
Yes, broadcast output format is rather inconvenient. PPro 5.5 is as well. Avid also has it’s hang ups. Fcp7 is the winner here.
Jeremy
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Bill is there a way of maybe organising a video conference gathering and maybe once or twice a moth have a professional get together throwing workflow’s or workarounds at each other?
When can post video podcasts here :-)))
just a suggestion I guess 😉
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[Bill Davis] “Creating folders in the Project library is trivial (there’s a button for it) Make as many as you like. Name them anything you like (completely obscuring their internal contents at the finder level.”
Yes, I know. I use that all the time.
[Bill Davis] “My favorite is to simply store client A’s work on it’s own $140 firewire 800 drive. Unplug the drive and all the projects on it become completely inaccessible. “
Don’t you view that as a major step backwards? Also not very practical in the world where the preferred Apple config is an iMac and a Promise array on Thunderbolt.
[Bill Davis] “You can also use Hodgetts Event Manager X or just move a project out of the Event Library via the finder. “
Yes, I know. Essentially, what I’m asking for is that same functionality actually built into the application.
[Bill Davis] “That you don’t understand how to manage volumes via external drives through X does not mean that the program “can’t do it.””
I think you are make a pretty big leap there. I’m quite aware – and also use – most of the same techniques as you. I simply view them as workarounds.
[Bill Davis] “But X is an excellent personal editing environment that allows a seat holder to manage files to hide or reveal projects and events very easily”
And that’s exactly the crux of the problem. It’s a “personal” editing environment.
[Bill Davis] “I don’t mean to do that at all. I do a lot of the things you’re saying X “can’t do” on a regular basis. “
No harm. We are actually saying it does the same things. I simply feel it needs to do more. These seem to be adequate for your needs. I tend to view these are temporary (I hope) workarounds. Moving things around in the Finder level manually is the same as Avid editors moving media into separate MXF folders and relabeling the numbers. Both are viable methods of organization, but neither is ideal, once you get past a single user who knows exactly what he did, how he did it and where he put things.
[Bill Davis] “And for the freelancer, it can be transformative.
Arrive with your laptop, your personal drive, and all you need is a desk”I completely understand that. I’ve done my share of convention support gigs, too. However, most of my freelance gigs are at shops with existing facilities, where I’m one of several users. That environment is where X still needs development.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
[Jeremy Garchow] “What most people don’t have is a SAN.
We are lucky enough to have one. “SAN Locations” in FCPX work sort of like Event Manger X, but you control them right in the app. Of course they aren’t perfect, but if you want NDAs between your “FedEx and UPS” clients, SAN locations take care of this right within FCPX, really easily and efficiently. As a matter of fact, if a client is over your shoulder, you can easily mount a SAN Location without them even knowing, as the name can be as abstract as you want (it’s done by folders, at any level, not just root level). If you remove the SAN Location before quitting, FCPX opens as a blank slate. “And that’s part of what I’m wrestling with. I function as the ad hoc post consultant for a prod co where I edit freelance a lot. They have a 4-seat FCP 7/FibreJet SAN installation. It’s volume-based, but the volumes are partitioned by room: Edit 1, 2, 3, 4. Plus they have FC Server, which has its own partition. As with most such installations, each room has read/write permission to its volume and read-only to the others.
Ignoring FC Server in this discussion – a whole different problem – I’m looking at the best way to make the system work with X in a way that is viable for multiple editors and clients. Creating SAN partitions by client requires some administrator level interaction on a regular basis, which is something I’d like to avoid.
[Jeremy Garchow] “Reliability is still up for grabs. It remains kinda weird. Backup early and often.”
My biggest concern. Much more of an issue for me than any missing features.
[Jeremy Garchow] “Yes, broadcast output format is rather inconvenient. PPro 5.5 is as well. Avid also has it’s hang ups. Fcp7 is the winner here. “
Hmm… MC 6 with a Kona or Decklink is pretty darn seamless. Switch projects with different formats and the cards automatically follow. No view settings to correct like in FCP 7. I like the versatility with FCP 7, but AV sync and latency has always been an issue, so I really welcome the tight integration Avid has done with these folks. I hope Adobe’s Mercury Transmit in CS6 will work as well. That being said, X works reasonably well with the latest drivers and update and really, really well with AJA’s units.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
I’ve used the duplicate project command and worked alternatives in on the duplicate. then just switch between them. I find this to be pretty close to using alternative sequences in FCP 7. you still need to switch between them. yes, in FCP 7 you could actually put them on the same timeline, but I find that having two options on the same timeline is kind of sloppy organizationally anyway (though this can be done in FCP X too). So I guess I see using alternate sequences in FCP 7 is similar to using alternate “projects” in FCP X.
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[Oliver Peters] “You access all of the media for all clients, all sessions, etc. Just like Aperture, iMovie, iTunes and iPhoto.”
Aperture, iMovie, iTunes and iPhoto can use multiple independent libraries.
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“Aperture, iMovie, iTunes and iPhoto can use multiple independent libraries.”
Correct. And if X adopted this it would be a nice addition.
Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com
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