auditioning within a compound clip workflow

[Jeff Kirkland]

If I follow ant you’re doing then I”d suggest you’ve missed the point of a compound clip, and of auditioning.

A compound clip is essentially a grouped virtual clip. In your case it’s an image with a title. As soon as you make that a compound clip FCPX treats it as a single clip. When you drag a new image over it in the timeline and add as a new audition you are replacing the virtual clip – both the image and title grouped together – with just the still, just as you’ve described.

Compound clips for the most part have a parent – child relationship. You can use that clip in many places but any changes you make to one instance will change all the others. So if you open a copy df that compound clip in the timeline & replace the image, you will make the same change in every other place you’ve used the clip. It’s a global change.

To prevent a global change, you need to break the relationship between the copy compound clip and its parent with the “reference new parent” command.

There’s plenty of good FCPX training out there that covers compound clips in depth, and the user manual does a good job of explaining how they work.

Or have I missed what you’re trying to do?

Jeff Kirkland | Video Producer | Southern Creative Media | Melbourne Australia
http://www.southerncreative.com.au | G+: https://gplus.to/jeffkirkland | Twitter: @jeffkirkland

[Bill Davis]

I agree.

To do what you actually want to do, just load the original background still into your Event and drop it on the Primary. Connect a title with Alpha background to it in a Secondary. Then import any alternate still you want to try out into your Event and drag it from there onto the original Still and select “replace from start.”

Bingo, new title composite.

If you don’t like the change you can undo. if you want to “audition” 10 stills feel free. If you like the original one best, it’s still in your Event Browser to replace wherever you are.

No need to make this any more complex than that.

Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com – video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.

[Craig Alan]

I know I can do what I want by breaking apart the compound clip. When I open an audition window or open the compound clip in its own project window, since the compound clip appears broken apart, I thought that I could apply edits to it as if it were broken apart. The FCP manual under MANAGE COMPOUND CLIPS seems to say that’s the case.

“The compound clip opens in a new Timeline view, with its contents ready for editing.”

If FCP was fully treating the compound clip as a single merged clip (like for example when you export a merged clip or an entire timeline as a self-contained QT file) then you would not see the clips in their own tracks with the connection points.

However, now that I know it is still treated as a single clip even in these expanded windows, I, as you pointed out, can just work the other way: break the compound apart and audition to my heart’s content. Not a big deal. I am using this particular project to learn the program better and therefore will “waste” time trying to understand how the different operations work rather than just finding the least resistant path that gets the job done.

Mac Pro, macbook pro, Imacs (i7); Camcorders: Panasonic AG-HPX170/AG-HPX250P, Canon HV30/40, Sony Z7U, VX2000, PD170; FCP 6 certified; write professionally for a variety of media; teach video production in L.A.

[Jeremy Garchow]

When you setup an Audition clip, it will hold any connected clips with the “parent” clip.

So, if you have a still with a connected title, that title is a part of that particular still. If you add a new still to the original still as an audition, you will “lose” the title until you bring back the original still.

There are a few ways around this.

-The most annoying is to add the title to every auditioned still. This way, every time you select the next clip in the Audition (Control-right arrow, or control-left arrow) the title will be there.

Another way is to use the tilde key. The tilde key keep connected clips in place while being able to modify the primary clip.

Select the Audition clip, and hold tilde, control-right arrow. Unfortunately, it seems that it’s a little buggy and only tilde, control-right arrow works. Left arrow reverts to default and gets rid of the connected clip.

At least, that’s the way it seems to work here.

Jeremy

[Craig Alan]

Thank you Jeremy. Of course, “the old tilde control right arrow trick” to paraphrase Maxwell Smart. That was what I was asking for. And even if it does not work that smooth and might get enhanced in the next update, it suggests that Apple was intending to allow these type of edits within compound clips. I mean compound clips are really just a non-destructive way of visually organizing two or more connected clips and/or any group of clips.

One follow up question: If I modify a clip in the timeline (say color correct and crop) where is this stored in the browser? Is the original modified but non-destructively? Do I need to save the changes somehow? Generally I’d like access to both the original and the modified versions whether or not they are still in the timeline.

Mac Pro, macbook pro, Imacs (i7); Camcorders: Panasonic AG-HPX170/AG-HPX250P, Canon HV30/40, Sony Z7U, VX2000, PD170; FCP 6 certified; write professionally for a variety of media; teach video production in L.A.

[Bill Davis]

[Craig Alan] “One follow up question: If I modify a clip in the timeline (say color correct and crop) where is this stored in the browser? Is the original modified but non-destructively? Do I need to save the changes somehow? Generally I’d like access to both the original and the modified versions whether or not they are still in the timeline.
“

To understand this, you need to start thinking about the metadata flow in FCP-X. (Remember ALL editing in X is based on manipulating metadata. ALL of it.) Metadata comes in with clips on import. You typcially ADD metadata in the Event Browser. Some of all of which then joins the original and flows into the Project. Metadata flow is “one way” EXCEPT when you create a compound clip of some type (e.g. synchronized clip) – which expresses the new state of the clip back up to the Event Browser. Tha’ts why when you make a Compound Clip in your timeline, you get a copy in your Event Browser.

If you understand this, then it becomes apparent that WHERE you apply metadata changes determines whether the new metadata is “inherited” downstream.

Essentially, if you apply metadata in the Event Browser – it flows into all the subsequent Projects where you use those clips. But if you apply metadata changes IN your projects, it won’t flow back upstream into the Event Browser.

So WHERE you make changes is important. The earlier in the data flow you do something (trim by setting an in and out point and giving that “trimmed clip state” a keyword to re-call it, for example) the more useful that decision is because you can re-use it across subsequent projects.

It’s a fundamental truth in X that the more you learn to do useful things in the Event Browser, the more powerful X can become for you since you can make decisions once – and re-use them over and over again.

Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com – video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.

[Craig Alan]

Understood.

And I do consider the browser in X to be very powerful and a giant step forward.

I do go through my original clips in the browser and add keywords and make some rough cuts.

However I also make changes in the timeline. As the project sequence starts to evolve changes are needed.

Is there a way to save these changes in the browser. I understand this is not the default behavior.

Are the changes made in the browser to a clip non-destructive? Can I always open it in the inspector and return it to its original state?

Mac Pro, macbook pro, Imacs (i7); Camcorders: Panasonic AG-HPX170/AG-HPX250P, Canon HV30/40, Sony Z7U, VX2000, PD170; FCP 6 certified; write professionally for a variety of media; teach video production in L.A.

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Craig Alan] “Is there a way to save these changes in the browser. I understand this is not the default behavior. “

Not like you can with other NLEs where you can drag things from the timeline to the browser.

What do you need to do specifically?

[Craig Alan] “Are the changes made in the browser to a clip non-destructive? Can I always open it in the inspector and return it to its original state?”

Yes. Just reset the parameter or turn or off by hitting the little blue box that is present on most effects.

[Jeff Kirkland]

The exception would be opening the browser clip in it’s own timeline and doing something crazy like deleting the audio track rather than just switching it off. I’d expect you would need to re-import the clip to fix that.

Jeff Kirkland | Video Producer | Southern Creative Media | Melbourne Australia
http://www.southerncreative.com.au | G+: https://gplus.to/jeffkirkland | Twitter: @jeffkirkland

[Mark Morache]

I frequently use auditions of compound clips to produce alternate edits. I would take a section of my timeline and compound it, then duplicate the compound as an audition then make changes inside the new compound. This way I could create two versions of my timeline without duplicating the entire thing.

Say I had a 45 second montage in the middle of a timeline, and tried two completely different types of music, that necessitated completely adjusting the rhythm and even shot selection. Two versions that can be switched with a key-stroke.

When FCPX changed the way that compound clips are handled, adding them to the event browser, this workflow changed. You can still do it, but after you compound, and duplicate and add to audition, you now need to select your new audition and “reference new parent clip” to break the duplicate from the original compound clip. Now you can create your alternate timeline section.

If I’m just switching out one shot, I don’t compound it.

But here’s a question… when you create an audition to a clip with other clips attached, the new audition doesn’t have anything connected to it. Do you then go back and copy and paste everything that was connected to the original? Or is there an easy way to create an audition and keep everything connected when you switch the auditions?

———
Don’t live your life in a secondary storyline.

Mark Morache
FCPX/FCP7/Xpri/Avid
Evening Magazine,Seattle, WA
https://fcpx.wordpress.com