Automatic Duck

[Shane Ross]

I remember contacting Wes a LONG time ago, when a project came into the company I was at that was cut on FCP 3…and they wanted to move it to Avid Meridian. The producers all complained that FCP was worthless trash because it just didn’t port the project over. I asked, “did you plan for this? Did you start on FCP 3 thinking that you could just bring it over to Avid…and not test it?” They admitted to not testing.

But, I had heard of Automatic Duck, and emailed Wes asking if he could do a small test for me on one act. And he did. And I took this information to the producers and editor on the project. And yes, they did buy the Duck and did convert the project…again miffed that the effects didn’t transition (sheesh). I took a couple days to recreate the effects and get the show all in order and everyone was happy.

The Duck has saved many a project…and made many a motion graphics editor happy that they got the full clips, instead of a single exported file when doing AE Comp work.

Shane
Little Frog Post
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def

[Noah Kadner]

Yep great to see Wes and AD back in the FCPX and elsewhere world.

Noah

FCPWORKS – FCPX Workflow
FCP eXchange – FCPX Workshops

[David Mathis]

Thanks for sharing this Oliver. Always look forward to your posts!

The magnetic timeline, it’s magnetic-o-matic!

[Oliver Peters]

[David Mathis] “Always look forward to your posts!”

Thanks. I think I posted this before, but here’s my review of it. My post pretty much is the same as Wes’ presentation.

https://digitalfilms.wordpress.com/2015/09/10/automatic-duck-redux/

– Oliver

Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com

[Jeff Markgraf]

Great to see this. Long time coming.

Obvious (?) question: Could this be the “bridge” between X and Avid? XML from FCP to AE. Then export an Avid AAF, copying media, etc? I’m not clear from the presentation. (And I’m not ready to spend $300 to experiment…yet.)

Any thoughts? Anyone used this yet?

[Oliver Peters]

[Jeff Markgraf] “Could this be the “bridge” between X and Avid?”

Such a bridge already exists via Resolve. Plus using an Adobe AAF to get into Avid MC is pretty much useless.

– Oliver

Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com

[Jeff Markgraf]

[Oliver Peters] ” bridge already exists via Resolve.”

Well, yes, except it doesn’t work. It should, but it doesn’t. And that’s not even dealing with audio, which works even less.

[Oliver Peters]

[Jeff Markgraf] “It should, but it doesn’t.”

I completely agree. But then no method works well at this stage. FCPXML is pretty wacky and importing and linking in Avid is not a strong point.

But, why do you want to go FCPX to Media Composer?

Oliver

Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com

[Jeff Markgraf]

Well, I do not really want to go from X to Avid at all. But some of the companies I work with can’t stand the idea of not having a project end up on their Avid system. “What if we have to make changes in a month and you’re not available?” and other such hand wringing. Rather than putting FCP on one of their systems… So a proper translation program would make my life easier.

[Oliver Peters]

“So a proper translation program would make my life easier”

I see the need although the market is probably small. Naturally such a translation would likely only be the Project/sequence and not the whole Library/project. For now, the best shot is probably Xto7 and then from FCP7 use the older Automatic Duck translation to export an AAF for MC. Or the Boris Transfer tool.

Oliver

Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com