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FCP-X: Thinking Differently?
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If I have time, I will go back to the office. I don’t have any computing/media with me.
I have nothing to hide and welcome any and all criticism. I just wanted to see how bad it hurt to sit on some brass tacks.
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Best,
Andy -
[Andrew Richards] “1) Isn’t this a perfect use case for compound clips? You cluster your audio into a nest and it acts as a unit, but you can explode it to make fine adjustments at will.
2) You can either pin the audio to the first or second clip, at the head or tail (normal vs backtimed clip connections). Or you can make a compound clip out of the clips with transition and pin to that.
3-5) This where metadata shines. Your track assignments in a fixed track timeline are immutable. With roles assigned as metadata for each audio clip, you get to assign output based on role and not have to put any effort into maneuvering your clips into different tracks to meet an output requirement. At least that’s how Apple stated it would work in their FAQ. Further, you can quickly select and disable audio channels by searching the timeline using the same metadata.
6) Tag Temp VO accordingly and it can be located and disabled very easily. Aligning finished VO doesn’t require a free track (since there aren’t tracks), only that you can easily locate the temp VO chunk by chunk to lay in the finished VO.
7) Can’t generalize an answer for this one. I know one of the recent videos touched on overlapping audio though. I guess it depends on the situation.
“You are missing the big picture. It is not that you can’t do a bunch of these things individually. It is that you have to coordinate them all together. As you are building your piece you need to see the structure, not hide it away. The timeline is a map. I can go through and point out a number of things I disagree with you about in your list above–compound clips being more useful on a sfx cluster than a lasso and cut and paste, for instance–but the bottom line is that the magnetic timeline routinely destroys visual/spatial relationships that are very, very useful. I like metadata. I do many searches. I would like those searches to be easier and more powerful, but none of that is anywhere as useful to me as being able to see a visual schematic of the piece I’m working on.
And none of what you are suggesting is easier. When I import sfx to the timeline I put them on an sfx track. I’ve placed something where I want it, and I’ve defined it. I’ve given myself a visual representation. I don’t need to do anything else. All done.
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[Herb Sevush] “I am beginning to think that X is to FCP7 as Motion is to Shake. With Motion they were all a flutter with how it was going to be revolutionary with it’s use of “behaviors” which were going to take the drudgery out of compositing. Simplifying post for everyone. It was different, it was novel, it wasn’t too bad, and I use it to this day, although it ushered in no revolution and is a huge step back from Shake. And the stupidest thing about it are the dammed “behaviors” which any professional compositor could have told them was moronic. But then who would want professional feedback?”
Herb, this might be a good analogy, but I view it differently than you’ve suggested here. Many hoped Motion would be an updated, modernized Shake — but in reality, Motion was a whole new app with a totally different intended use and a totally different target audience than Shake.
Apple reinvented motion graphics with Motion. In the process, they arguably made it easy to get good results, but hard to get great results.
Walter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
Creative Cow Forum Host: Live & Stage Events -
[Andrew Richards] “The Dvorak analogy is perfectly apt …”
Andrew,
Wikipedia lists the DVORAK system as patented in 1936.
How long have you been using it?
How has it improved your composition results?
Franz.
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[Franz Bieberkopf] “How long have you been using it?
How has it improved your composition results?”
Do you think it is somehow intellectually dishonest or dissonant for me to defend the magnetic timeline, agree the Dvorak keyboard is a useful analogy, but type on a Qwerty?
If that isn’t the point you’re trying to make, what is?
Best,
Andy -
[Andrew Richards] “And I’d be much more willing to accept these statements if these advanced users supported them, which would help convince me their frustration was with a structural problem in FCPX’s timeline model …”
Andrew,
Actually, it is the software designers of FCP X that are making extra-ordinary claims – that the prevailing paradigms are old and in need of revision. And further, that this new software answers as of yet unasked questions.
Tracks and the prevailing conventional paradigms have proven their worth and flexibility. It is the designers and marketers of FCP X that are beholden to users to support their claims.
Or, to summarize …
[Chris Harlan] ” …the claim is constantly being made that X represents a revolution in editing, and is much, much faster. I think it is fair for people to ask for that to be substantiated.”
Franz.
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[Andrew Richards] “Do you think it is somehow intellectually dishonest or dissonant for me to defend the magnetic timeline, agree the Dvorak keyboard is a useful analogy, but type on a Qwerty?”
Andrew,
Let’s be clear then – why do you use QWERTY?
Franz.
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[Franz Bieberkopf] “Let’s be clear then – why do you use QWERTY?”
Clever.
OK, I admit I use Qwerty because it is the standard, familiar, and ingrained in my muscle memory.
Slow pitch right down the middle for you.
Best,
Andy -
[Andrew Richards] ” I still don’t see how they are exclusive of any of the good ol’ fashioned bin behavior. You can still create one with a keystroke like you could with a bin, still drag clips into it like a bin, still look at the contents in a list like the bins in legacy FCP.”
Andy, I’m with you. I see no difference between keyword collections and bins, except that keyword collections are more flexible. Long live metadata!
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