FCP X on XSAN, metaSAN, etc?

[Jeremy Garchow]

We have metaSAN with a couple of fibre (desktop) clients and some Ethernet clients (laptops/iMacs).

Fcpx works fine. With metaSAN, you have to be sort of careful as you can have multiple machines assigned to the same SAN Location as fcpx calls it (basically, the place where events and projects are stored, which can be anywhere, not just root level as with other drives). metaSAN doesn’t offer any protection if two users load the same location. Xsan does, I believe, offer more protection. Corruption occurs when two users have the same location open on a metaSAN volume.

We haven’t tested it too hard yet as fcp7 is still the moneymaker, but every computer (client) has its own SAN location. There’s also a repository of projects/events on the SAN. When someone needs to work on a particular project, they quit fcpx and drag the event/project folders to their unique SAN location and open If they are done, they move it back to the common folder (which isn’t a San location)

It works well. I wish Event Manager X could do this for us, but it doesn’t work that way.

I think Xsan offers some different permissions features, but I’m not sure. I think they simply lock out the different San locations to the different users.

MetaSAN offers some pretty unique advantages as well as your storage can be almost any format (HFS+, NTFS, whatever) and metaSAN simply doesnt care and serves the files to whatever OS computer. Basically it allows cross platform workflows with minimal fuss. For best results a dedicated server should be used to control all the metaSAN functions (metadata server).

Jeremy

[Gene Strocco]

Thanks Jeremy!

So, even though you have metaSAN, FCPX doesn’t allow multiple users to access the same Events folder (basically media)?

I can understand about a particular FCPX Project not being able to be opened simultaneously, but I’m surprised that two editors, working on 2 separate FCPX projects (moved locally), can’t reference the same media (events folder). Doesn’t that kill the whole idea of an XSAN / metaSAN?

I was hoping that once all media was ingested (for a particular client / project), two editors could be working on separate projects that might use the same media, without having to move the media to different SAN storage devices, or even locally.

Also, can you tell me what kind of hardware configuration you’re using? ActiveSan? CalDigit Super Share? Others?

Thanks!

Gene.

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Gene Strocco] “So, even though you have metaSAN, FCPX doesn’t allow multiple users to access the same Events folder (basically media)? “

Just like with fcp legacy where you can’t have two people working on the same open project, you can’t do that with an fcpx Event. Think if two people were trying to keyword all the footage in one event, who’s keywords stay, who’s go? If changing the name or metadata of a clip, who’s stays? Each editor had to have their own event and project. You don’t have to copy media in to the event, you can work by alias which means that there’s one hard copy of the media that each editor references, but they all need their own events and projects. That’s where the repository comes in as a place to store the most up to date. Fcpx allows merging of events as well.

[Gene Strocco]

Thanks Jeremy.

I’m still trying to wrap my head around the whole projects/events concept after coming from FCP 7 and the Scratch Directory.

Can you give me some insight on how you manage your workflow? Do you have a separate system for ingest/digitize/transfer? I would assume whatever station does that (whether from tape (which we don’t do), or camera cards), is the station that creates the initial Events folder on the SAN.

Do your individual editors then create their own localized Events folder, just referencing and not copying the SAN Events folder? When they’re done editing, do they then merge their Events folder onto the SAN events folder? Copy their Projects onto the SAN for collaborative access?

We’re trying to setup a workflow where the main media doesn’t have to be copied onto external firewire drives if at all possible, and so that multiple editors can access (or reference) the same SAN media simultaneously while working on different edits.

And lastly, can you maybe let me know how you setup and organize your Events folders based on clients and projects? I see we can create folders under each Events folders, but not visa-versa. So if you had a client with multiple projects, and possibly even a main project with multiple sub-projects, is it possible to organize all media associated with a particular client to better organize our SAN media?

Sorry for the long post and extensive questions. I greatly appreciate your insight!

Thanks,

Gene.

[Jeremy Garchow]

i have answers for you, but it will take a while to write up.

Give me some time and I can put something together tonight.

Have you used FCPx at all yet?

Jeremy

[Gene Strocco]

Jeremy,

Not extensively, no. But I have been doing a lot of tutorials and can see the inherent power that it offers.

Having been a long time FCP 7 user, I was looking at other systems (Premiere, AVID, etc), but after returning to FCPx and seeing more of what it has to offer, I’m convinced that this may very well usher in a new era of editing. The other systems are still based in ‘legacy’ editing methods, and I’m not sure if they’ll ever offer anything new like FCPx.

That being said, I could be completely wrong!

However, if I do move with FCPx, I want to fully understand and setup the best workflow as possible, hoping that with future releases, FCPx will grow into a more ‘pro’ friendly app that accommodates everything needed for full-scale agency/post-production house capabilities.

Thanks so much!

Gene.

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Gene Strocco] “‘m still trying to wrap my head around the whole projects/events concept after coming from FCP 7 and the Scratch Directory.
“

It’s different than FCP7 for sure. You should probably read up from the manual, or another book, but I’ll give you a cursory overview.

Basically, an Event holds all of the project organization, and it can also hold media. If the media you are using is already a .mov, then you can have a link to the media instead of bringing it in (duplicating it) to the Event.

So, If you have .mov media, that can live anywhere on your SAN, then when importing to the Event, you can choose to NOT bring a hard copy in to the Event, and the Event will have very small reference files that point to the original hard media.

Every user must have a “SAN Location” as FCPX calls it. Only one user at a time may have this SAN Location open. As I explained earlier, metaSAN currently does not block multiple users from opening the SAN location, so I have devised a scheme to keep things easy and non corrupt.

We basically manually check in and check out Events/Projects. Each user gets a unique SAN Location (which amounts to a folder on the SAN). Then when someone wants to edit a Project/Event, you simply go to the main Project/Event folder (which is NOT a SAN location to users) and drag the Event and Project folder to the appropriate user’s San Location folders (it’s a quick copy as no media needs to transfer, you are just basically moving folders to new folders on the same drive).

This means that only one person can work on any particular Project or Event. Once they are done, they move the Event/Project back in to the main repository for later editing.

If two or more people need to work on a project or Event at the same time, you simply have to dupe the Event/Project and each person has their own individual copy which can then reconcile later if need be.

It’s not extremely efficient or automatic, but it is safe and it’s how we worked in FCP as well. No one shared the exact same project, but we did swap pieces and parts of projects all the time via XML or what have you. At some point, you have to reconcile what you need out of each one in to some sort of master project. This can be done with FCPX as well.

Hope that helps a little bit. Let me know if you have anymore questions. My gut feeling is that this is going to get even easier with future revisions of FCPX, but don’t quote me on that. It’s just a hunch.

You can do what you want to do, but you have to make sure the FCPX is good enough for your needs. We don’t employ it full time quite yet.

Jeremy

[Gene Strocco]

Jeremy,

Thank you so much for your insight and detailed answers. This is really helping me wrap my head around how to setup a SAN type system for FCP X (and whether I should go with FCP X or not).

I just have one more question that relates to Events/Projects organization: what is the best way to organize this in terms of clients & projects? We deal with multiple clients, each that have several video projects (and even sub-video projects). Should we pre-organize our .mov in folder systems, and then reference these though FCP X to allow the Events manager to organize based on folder names, dates, etc?

Thoughts?

Thanks again for all your help and time. I realize you must be busy doing other things!

Best,

Gene.

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Gene Strocco] “I just have one more question that relates to Events/Projects organization: what is the best way to organize this in terms of clients & projects?”

It’s kind of subjective. The biggest difference between X and 7 in this regard is that the timelines are separate from the organization.

You can setup on an Event to have all of a particular client’s media, or you can set it up so that it’s just that one particular client project (but not Project). Projects are timelines and you will have to store them in conjunction with the Events.

[Gene Strocco] “We deal with multiple clients, each that have several video projects (and even sub-video projects).”

That share the same media or is it separate media?

[Gene Strocco] “Should we pre-organize our .mov in folder systems, and then reference these though FCP X to allow the Events manager to organize based on folder names, dates, etc?”

Depends on the answer to the above.

Jeremy

[Gene Strocco]

Thanks Jeremy!

We’ll start playing around on our end and learn as we go.

But your comments and responses have been incredibly helpful!

Much appreciated,

Gene.