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Editing scenario
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[Jules bowman] “Clip collision, as described above, is something that makes sense and something I tout of when the whole thing was released, but instead they took a good idea and made it into something that isn’t usable for many many editors, or something that many many editors don’t want to use because of its limitations and the need for workarounds. The fact there are all these discussions about primary this, secondary that, connected the other when none of these issues ev existed for the…. Woah, magnetic timeline…. Makes a pretty good case for it being folly.
I bet you there could have been tracks and clip collision that made things move around like a magnetic timeline (though do magnets move like that?) so you’d have had a useful tool for the very few times you did have that clip collision issue, you’d be able to lob clips at the timeline and other clips would make way for them, which would be great, but you’d have tracks and all the advantages that come with them.
“Fixed track options would have certainly helped the software gain wider acceptance and I do understand why some people aren’t comfortable with trackless.
I still wouldn’t be surprised if tracks or something similar make an appearance in FCPX in the future though.
Steve Connor
“Sometimes it’s fun to poke an angry bear with a stickl”
Adrenalin Television -
Indeed, it is a possibility. As I said, I think trackless was folly. And if they came I would be curious then to have a look. But thing is, by then will I care? I’ve started wrapping my head around PP CS6. Sure it is missing little things i’m used to in FCP7 but they do listen to feature requests so in time I imagine those will come back and on the whole it is great. it has little things FCP didn’t have. Even without the right graphics card it runs nicely. The layout options of the windows is blinding and i’m loving those across my two monitors, etc. etc.
For me there isn’t a need to know all editing software as I’m self contained, so one is fine and to be honest my love affair with apple has died. I’m personally pondering whether to shift to PC when my work station needs upgrading, and the answer is probably yes because I do believe Apple see the buck in consumer stuff and I simply cannot and will not trust them again. This whole debacle is costing me time and money, both of which are mine to use as I see best and thus being forced by apple to waste both is a tad annoying.
Personally, I think, and will always think, apple cocked up. They believe their own hype and they don’t really appear to listen to the negative voices because, y’know, they’re huge dude and X million units of YZ and A shifted by the third quarter validates everything they do.
I truly believe as time passes FC will slip further and further down the pecking order for top end editing and as such it’s reputation within the mid and lower ranges of editing will be diminished. I bought FCP in the first place because of the adoption by top end editing. For that same reason I chose not to start with PP. I do truly believe the next 3 years will see those two swap places.
So again, by the time they sort things out, will I care? Sadly, I think not.
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I have a dental video with a VERY picky client that constantly wants changes. Also not sure what she wants.
It’s a decent size practice with a good size staff.
They have multiple staff members that can do the same job so she wants to mix in different people to show diversity.
It’s a family practice so the family members feel they all have equal say and they all don’t agree on what shots should be used where, but one member is more vocal and dominate than the rest.
Here’s how I have approached the project. Since I already have done a video for them that they just want updated, I put the original video in the primary. Then I stack new shots of new employees on top of that. I also connect new VO under.
Since I’m not sure which employees they want to use for which tasks,(and they don’t sit in the whole time) I stack up multiple choices in the timeline. Then when they come in, and start to argue over shots I simply hit the “v” key and toggle through their choices.
I could expand the audio tracks and just leave them that way in the timeline if I wanted them that way.
I like them better collapsed for stacking.
Even when they settle on a shot I don’t cut out the other shot. No need to. I just leave it dark because they may come back and want it changed again. At that point I would just hit the V key and I’m good to go.
This has worked out great for me.
I used to get kind of frustrated with a bunch a changes, but with X…….and 64 bit speed, editing is more fun for me : )
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[tony west] “Since I’m not sure which employees they want to use for which tasks,(and they don’t sit in the whole time) I stack up multiple choices in the timeline. Then when they come in, and start to argue over shots I simply hit the “v” key and toggle through their choices.”
As a mater of interest, why are you using this method over “Auditions”?
Michael Sanders
London Based DP/Editor -
[Alex Hawkins] “Please help me out here. What is it about X that is really so much better than PPro or Avid that makes you want to edit in it? Seriously? Just reading your OP makes me wonder. The fact that you’re editing this piece in 7 speaks volumes.”
Some of the things I like about X are the organization methods, skimming and SOME of the UI design. I also like the growing ecosystem of filters and would like to take advantage of them.
The reason I am cutting this in 7 is that it’s an ongoing legacy project that has to integrate with FC Server check-out/check-in.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
[Jeremy Garchow] “Is there a way you can post a pic of your timeline, Oliver?”
No, but in reality that wouldn’t help much. It’s a standard looking FCP 7 timeline. A/V clips on V1/A1-2. B-roll on V1 or V2. Graphics on V2. Music/SFX on V3-4/5-6/7-8. The complication is in the fact that any element can be changed and that has ramifications on everything else. Swap out a song and now everything cut to that song has to be re-edited to the new beats. It also causes everything behind to ripple accordingly.
The timeline is simple. It’s in the ease of making changes where the tactical issues come up.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
[Michael Sanders] “As a mater of interest, why are you using this method over “Auditions”?”
It’s a good question, because auditions works fine for this very purpose.
I have not really counted, but it seems like auditions is more key strokes than the way I do it.
When I stack graphics it’s fast to toggle back in forth this way.
It’s ONE key V V V V back and forth
One of the things I like most about apple products is there are often many ways to do the same thing.
Let’s say I have 3 employees stacked up.
They pick employee #2
Employees 1 and 3 are still sitting there in the timeline and I can just grab one of them and drag it further down in the timeline to replace another shot.
I like having them sitting there. It just seems faster to me.
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[tony west] “It’s a good question, because auditions works fine for this very purpose.
I have not really counted, but it seems like auditions is more key strokes than the way I do it.
When I stack graphics it’s fast to toggle back in forth this way.
It’s ONE key V V V V back and forth
One of the things I like most about apple products is there are often many ways to do the same thing.
Let’s say I have 3 employees stacked up.
They pick employee #2
Employees 1 and 3 are still sitting there in the timeline and I can just grab one of them and drag it further down in the timeline to replace another shot.
I like having them sitting there. It just seems faster to me.”
This is one of the things I have being doing in FCP Legacy for years – CtrlB (or whatever else you want to map) toggles the visibility in Legacy (and Ctrl S toggles Solo) just as V toggles the visibility in X. It’s interesting that you prefer the “old way” of doing it rather than using Auditions 😉
Simon Ubsdell
http://www.tokyo-uk.com -
Your question would justify a long answer, but as I’m in the middle of a big project so I do not have the time right now.
The short version is that for me it clicked with X is when I noticed that X basically uses something that 7 (and before) was using all the time: In 7 every clip (audio or video is basically connected too, e.g. you have music running over a couple of clips. when you start to trim edits somewhere in the middle of the music piece the start point of the music stays but every track that has a clip after your change will move with our trim. Same in X. All audio or video after the point that you trim shifts. So if you want to open an edit but keep the music in place, in 7 you use the track forward and select everything forward, deselect the one music track (or tracks) and move. In X you just insert a gab clip on the primary and extend this clip. everything including all connected elements move with it. No need for track forward. Than you can either use override or insert to change the edit on the primary forward and once done delete the gab and everything snaps together again.
In a scenario where you want to keep the relationship of a couple of connected clips but want to change the primary, you just go create a temporary secondary story line starting with a connected clip before the point you want to change and include the connected clips you want to lock the relationship. After your done your changes you can keep the secondary or undo it to connect the clips back to their current primary position.
If you need to do edits in connected clips, e.g. music as mentioned before you create a secondary to edit the music. Once done you can edit the primary to fit.So I would edit the main soundbites from your talents on the primary, put cut aways in connected and have music and sound effects in connected as well.
Because this is in a rush this explanation is a bit half baked (and full of bad grammar and spelling mistakes), so apologies for non-logical bits. The essence is to think of the connection points. The idea of taking away the tracks I think! started by thinking about the problem that if you have 2 items on the same track and change the edit so they collide, now they move out of the way and the connection point stays intact while you can edit what you want, not needing to move clips to different tracks. Disadvantage is that you can’t keep your track system visually organised. But if you think it through this is the trade off for being able to trim always regardless of clip collisions.
Best
Carsten -
In truth Steve – you are a pro, to some degree I am too – either one of us, if push comes to shove, could produce workable strategies to deal with the most egregious shortcomings of the software.
but all you are doing is presenting the software with scenarios that weren’t envisioned in it’s design – FCPX is intended to guide novices into somewhat more complex workflows. hence it’s *safe for four and up* auto collision avoidance, auto b-roll clip linking, friendly routes into your itunes music collection, friendly routes into your iphoto snaps, friendly dated events structure you’re familiar with from iphoto.
You can get it to perform in the scenarios outlined in the original post, because we generally know how to get things done, but some of the solutions you read here sound crazy – does this sound anything like a sane NLE?
If you need to keep the relative position of connected clips, but change the primary storyline, then you move the clips out of the primary…then replace the gaps that are left over, or add as new connected until your “committed”, and then move those clips in to the primary
chances are I would want them to travel with the bite anyway. If not, well, then I would temporarily compound the connected clips and slide them off the clip I was moving. Make the change and then slide the compound back and break it up..
A useful feature I found is toggle storyline mode (g). After connecting your first clip, the next clip you drag from the browser to the timeline, if you hold G and place the clip next to your previous connected clip it will create a secondary story line for you
I can move the connection points of my music bed and secondary stories (Broll) to the same gap clip in the primary, and that way they stay synced and don’t move around on me when I trim, ripple, roll the sound bites in the primary.
to be frank Steve – some of that sounds pretty mad. What is going on there? are we being serious? does that actually sound like the workflow of a robust non-linear editing system? read it uninitiated and it reads like crazed gibberish nearly. FCPX was built for highly simplistic idealised workflows.
I’ve said it before – I don’t actually view FCPX as an NLE – its a DAM, its an expression of effects rigging in motion, and its a hand holding environment to allow novices – coming specifically from imovie – to advance into somewhat more complex workflows based on the highly specific, and frankly weird workflows of iMovie.
FCPX can be described as any number of things, but, to my mind at least, it bears no resemblance to a functioning, professional non-linear editing system.
It’s just far too weird, and too limited by its crass simplification of the underlying track structure.
https://vimeo.com/user1590967/videos
http://www.ogallchoir.net
promo producer/editor.grading/motion graphics
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