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Dupe detection plug-in?
Wishful thinking, but maybe someone has already made my wish come true?
Is there a 3rd party plug-in that improves on FCP’s built-in dupe detection?
I’m working on a feature docu with hundreds of archival elements, avoiding dupes can be a nightmare. The most useful tool so far is to label used clips, but this is a manual step I sometimes forget and it doesn’t help when portions of a clip are used.
Over 90% of the sources don’t have true timecode, so the prospects of manually defining 800 reel names (to get FCP’s dupe working) are slim.
What I’m greatly missing:
* Choose a clip in the browser and list where it’s used in the project, and be able to go there.
* Dupe detection with consideration of clip names. These are the best unique identifiers in this file-based day and age.
* detect / list dupes across several selected sequences. (I don’t want footage from reel 2 repeat in reel 5) -
8 Replies
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Using the find function can point out where your clips are if you search by name.
Reel number is a good way, actually. Assigning them might take a while, but worth it.
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If you want things to work right, you gotta go through the steps to make them work right. As Jeremy says, adding a reel name is the best way. It might take a while, but then things will work. You need to help FCP help you. It needs information before it can display dupe frames.
Across sequences? No. I don’t know one NLE that does that.
Shane
GETTING ORGANIZED WITH FINAL CUT PRO DVD…don’t miss it.
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def -
On the sequence thing … I think you could put all the sequences together into one sequence for the purpose of dupe detection.
Matt. -
Thanks everyone for the responses, I did realize after posting that searching the timeline is another effective tool.
Shane, you sound like an Avid user 😉 You gave a relevant and complete answer for the available solutions, but it’s the software’s fault, not the user’s. FCP is missing a useful feature (dupe detect by clip name), and I suppose 7 hasn’t changed anything (I’m using 6).
There’s no way manually typing unique reel names for every clip is a good workflow, and FCP doesn’t expect you to work that way. It’s grown to support file-based workflows well, but they neglected to update dupe detection to better support them. I should file a feature request…
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As someone who ends up at the online & grade end, please don’t forget how useful reels names are to sorting out replacement of low res archive clips. File names are not enough.
With timecode and reel names a simple EDL will provide a perfect dupe list as a B roll.
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[Drew Lahat] “Shane, you sound like an Avid user ;-)”
Guilty. I use both FCP and Avid, and love both FCP and Avid.
[Drew Lahat] ” FCP is missing a useful feature (dupe detect by clip name)”
Name one editing software package that does this. If not, then EVERYONE is missing it. EXACT clip name? Or partial? Because I will have several clips with similar names…the same name, but then additional information. Like B-ROLL_CASTLE-EXT, B-ROLL_CASTLE-INT, and so on. If you go by name only, then all sorts of colors will light up. Plus, what if I have a 2 min clip called INT_CASTLE…I use 5 seconds from the head of the clip, and then 10 seconds from the tail…But the app sees only the name, not the timecode or reel number. It will highlight “HEY, YOU USED THIS CLIP!” Well, yeah, but not the same part. So that would be pointless.
[Drew Lahat] “There’s no way manually typing unique reel names for every clip is a good workflow”
Not a good workflow? Are you serious? No professional editor would want to work WITHOUT unique reel names for each tape or tapeless card backup. It takes mere seconds to add this when you capture, or import, so why not do it? Not a good workflow? So if your media goes offline, say you delete it, or a drive fails, and you need to recapture or reimport it. How on earth will you be able to recapture the footage if you didn’t have unique names for each tape? How would you know what clip came from what tape, when all of your timecodes start at 00:00:00:00, or 01:00:00:00?
Having been in the position of having to online footage captured at low resolution, where people didn’t bother to give unique reel names, or having to recapture footage where ALL the reels had the same name, I can tell you that it is not only a good workflow, it is ESSENTIAL and VITAL to EVERY workflow.
[Drew Lahat] ” and FCP doesn’t expect you to work that way.”
No, YOU do. FCP TOTALLY expects this. Note that when you finish capturing one tape, and insert another, that FCP prompts you “You inserted a new tape…please note this and change the reel number.” Watch what happens when you take media offline, then highlight your clips and hit BATCH CAPTURE…FCP then prompts you to insert a tape, and gives the REEL NUMBER. If you don’t have unique ones…you will be SOL. OF COURSE FCP expects unique reel numbers.
[Drew Lahat] “grown to support file-based workflows “
And if you didn’t notice, the name of the folder you backed this footage up to shows up in the REEL column in FCP when you import it. That’s right. THis is why when you back up the tapeless media (SxS, P2, SD cards…please tell me you do this.) you give each backup folder a unique name. So that when you need to reimport the footage (Batch Capture)…it asks where this folder/reel is…and will look in that folder for the footage. If all your folders have the same name…good luck!
If this is your attitude towards editing, good luck surviving as a professional editor.
[Drew Lahat] “but they neglected to update dupe detection to better support them.”
Dupe detection works perfectly fine, when you do things right. YOu can’t expect to do things wrong and have things work the way you want. Life doesn’t work that way. Follow the rules and things work right.
Shane
GETTING ORGANIZED WITH FINAL CUT PRO DVD…don’t miss it.
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def -
Your post made me smile… sorry I made you write so much, because you’re preaching to the choir. My comments were not about tapes or cards, I had mainly stills on my mind (and in my browser).
I’ve been a professional editor for several years now, thank you. I’ve onlined and supervised TV shows that required a real offline-online workflow. Tapes and cards without timecode are a nightmare. I was scared when I had to cut an HDV feature 4 years ago w/o timecode (the JVC HD100 just came out, no one supported it properly) and I’m disappointed that the same problem surfaced again with DSLR clips.
Anyway, the current project I’m working on has dozens if not hundreds of stills. It also has plenty of stock footage from a plethora of sources, and they’re not in any manner accommodating each other with continuous TC.
Reel names were not meant to be unique identifiers of individual clips, but of containers. When you’re given a hundred glass jars with 1 tag in each, the simple & sensible way is to handle them by what the tag says; not by creating a parallel, non-automated catalog of jars. Do you think a workflow where you have to manually type in timecode for every clip is a good one? No, it’s a broken workflow.
I’d like an exact name match, *in addition* to reel & TC. Better yet, with an option to turn it on or off. Looks like it’ll work fine with the situation you described. Anyway,
p.s. While batch Capture was the only way in when I started, I find myself using it less and less these days. If my media is lost I bring up the backup drive and reconnect to it.
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[Shane Ross] “YOu can’t expect to do things wrong and have things work the way you want. Life doesn’t work that way. Follow the rules and things work right. “
From your mouth to my dog’s ears.
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