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FCPX Suggestions
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Great list as always Oliver.
I’ll add the same one I’ve been asking for since the first day FCP X was released.
1) Allow key-framing in the cold corrector.
2) Under bug fix, allow me to razor blade a clip without losing the audio waveforms. I shouldn’t have to zoom in or zoom out the timeline to restore them…
Mitch Ives
Insight Productions Corp.“Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.” – Winston Churchill
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[Mitch Ives] “1) Allow key-framing in the cold corrector.”
Although it doesn’t fix the issue, you might want to play around with this little color correction plug-in I compiled:
https://digitalfilms.wordpress.com/2015/07/04/building-fcp-x-effects-update/
The Motion template download link is at the bottom of the post.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
Hi Oliver,
my list, that I send to Apple sometimes, sometimes updated after a new FCPX update:
– Remove Attributes button
– A kind of batch export
– If you export for instance, 3 timelines in the background, you only see the first file by name.
The one below, awaiting, just say: ‘Master File’. Why can’t you say the name of the project or timeline? So you can get a quick idea of what you are already exporting and if you forgot anything.
If it’s the same timeline you are exporting multiple times, with changes, let’s have it say the name of the sequence with the date and exact time of the export?– If you click Expand All in the menu for expanding video and audio, that it expands every clip in the timeline, INCLUDING the ones you put in the timeline AFTER you pushed the Expand All option. It reduces the amound of clicking. If you want to edit with an expanded view of audio seperately, you click expand all, and edit the way you want. If you put new clips in the timeline, you don’t have to press again and again in the menu. The same goes for Components. Could be nice to just have it as a viewing mode.
– More RAW controls from REDCINE in the R3D Hud, including (big one) the eyedropper tool to very quickly and automatically set white balance.
– Have a simple white balance tool in your standard color tools, like the one from RED. Let it be a tool you can switch on or off.
– A timecode HUD with much more timecode options. Seeing in one view the timecodes of everything in the timeline (like the old timecode overlay in FCP7), optional of course. Being able to COPY and PASTE a timecode from a clip instead of manually having to feed it always, like you could in FCP 7. You could just copy the timecode from the viewer of canvas.
– A well made timecode reader/generator effect, not only a generator. (have both). Like the old one: read timecode, generate one, custom, … Now, we have to work trough compound clips with timecode generators above, which seems unnecessary. To be able to read source timecode.
– More options from Color. Tracker. Sharpening, denoising,… Maybe have a seperate Color Room? (same with Audio?)
– If you click to have Proxy Media Playback, put a warning side if media hasn’t been converted to Proxy yet, but don’t have it be offline completely. It sometimes doesn’t make sense to transcode EVERYTHING in your timeline to Proxy Media. Only being able to transcode a portion of it, and just see a small subtle warning sign in the rest without hindering your ability to work with it, would be much better!
– ‘Break Apart Compound Clip’ back in the contextual right-mouse click menu.
– At Audio Enchancements, at the background Noise Removal option, have a small button to set the noise print, as you could with Soundtrack Pro. I don’t know if the technology now in FCP X is the same as in Soundtrack Pro, but I’m getting much worse results (frankly, I never get good ones, and thus never use it) when using the remove background noise option in FCP X. Maybe having the option to manually set the noise print, will get better results back?
– Roles based mixer, with color coding etc.
– Being able to give Color Corrections names, instead of just the automated numbers.
– Have a quick way of putting audio back to a clip after detaching it. (and if they are out of sync, maybe have a dialogue box or something to choose if you want to keep it out of sync, or put it back to it’s default?) And/or better/easier solutions for working with a recording where for instance, all audio is 4 frames out of sync.
– Have the Background Render option be REALLY background. So for instance, when you are working, it keeps rendering, but like with one core or something. So it’s low taxing on the system, but you can really keep working.
– Please make it possible to have your transform, and crop tools in the inspector change in stacking order together with effects. Being able for instance, to put a crop ABOVE or BELOW a 3rd party effect for instance. Now there are many work-around necessary (compounding) to do this. (and some things are just impossible)
– The background Dashboard hud dissapears when going into another application. Not that handy.
– This feature could maybe be a work-around for the dashboard dissapearing, although it would be nice to have both: In the Share Monitor program, have a look at what you are exporting in every program (FCPX, Motion 5, Compressor 4). They all share the same engine. Having the Share Monitor open and being able to see what you are exporting in FCP X next to your regular Compressor Batch would be great. Having a seperate tab or something like that.
– When making a new compound clip, being able to immediately say which keyword it needs to have. Now, if you need to make a lot of them, and you are making compound clips from clips in a keyword-collection (which we do, to have a timecode generator on them, because we miss having a timecode hud), you always get thrown back into your Event, instead of staying within that keyword collection, and then you have to manually search the compound clip and assign a keyword to the compound clip again.
– In an Event, in your viewing options, you can choose to display: “no rating or keyword selections”. I like that option, but it would be extra nice if you have an extra viewing option with separate: “no rating” “no keyword”, next to the excisting option of both.
– Being able to have a Proxy with Alpha channel (have the software detect that automatically? Make Prores 4444 in those cases?)
– In the transform Tools, have full Rotation controls. So for instance, only with the Y axis for instance.
– The last view of your viewing modes of your clips in the timeline is very small, which makes it very handy if you are working with many layers and don’t need to see thumbnails. It would be great to have fade handles for audio in that viewing mode. And maybe also have an expanded audio components view in that mode, but I would consider that less important.
– Having Snapping also work with for instance, doing retiming (with Hold Frames) on multiple secondary storylines above each other.
– If you have for instance 4 layers of video, with each of them having 4 clips next to each other… Once you make a couple of clips in a layer of video into a secondary storyline there is a minimal height difference. This becomes annoying when working with multiple layers of video, and you want to check and go from one of them to the other. (for instance, by putting transitions between them).
– At this point it seems impossible if you use Match EQ, to apply the match with the same clip, but just an other audio component. If I have one clip with 2 tracks of audio components, and I want to match channel 1 with channel 2, I cannot do so. I need to copy the clip, and make sure it’s physically another clip on the timeline. This seems a lot of unnecessary steps and gets in the way of what the whole Audio Component feature is about.
– Being able to drop a complete folder in Compressor. And make Smart Folders or Quees. Compressor has Job Actions now, but it would be great if you could tell it to use every movie that arrives in a folder (including things you are currently rendering out in FCPX, but you are leaving the computer overnight), to compress that to a couple of things. I know you SORT OF can get that now by sharing in FCPX to multiple things, but it would be a nice feature for Compressor to have too.
– A way to ‘lock’ edits/Projects, with a simple lock-icon like in system preferences. Snapshot seems to be a way, I’m just wondering if a lock icon is not more universal and easily understandable.
– it would be great if you could select all your markers in the timeline index, and make them into another kind of marker, with one command, or one click. Like making all your markers chapter markers, or making all your markers to do items, etc. …
– Having a way of seperately consolidating only your Proxy Media to another folder like you want.
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Nice list.
[Mathieu Ghekiere] “- Being able to have a Proxy with Alpha channel (have the software detect that automatically? Make Prores 4444 in those cases?)”
Maybe Apple needs to create an additional codec in the family. ProRes Proxy+alpha. Basically a very highly compressed PR4444.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
Yeah, I’ve thought about that too. On the other hand, I would *think* that in a project you probably mostly don’t have a LOT of stuff with an alpha channel (mostly some small graphical stuff) and it wouldn’t be a problem for *most* projects to have the software make Prores 4444 for those clips.
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I’m surprised nobody mentioned scrolling timeline. Or did I miss it?
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[Oliver Peters] “Although it doesn’t fix the issue, you might want to play around with this little color correction plug-in I compiled:
https://digitalfilms.wordpress.com/2015/07/04/building-fcp-x-effects-update...”
Thanks Oliver…
Has anybody at Apple ever explained why we could keyframe color correction in FCP 7 but not FCP X?
Mitch Ives
Insight Productions Corp.“Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.” – Winston Churchill
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Targeting roles while editing much as one would target video or audio to a track. In some cases, it’s easier for me to do it while editing rather than in advance or having to change it once in the timeline.
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Huh? I import GoPro timelaps image sequences all the time into X and it’s easy and fast. The only time I have trouble is when I used to try to import timelapse stuff from my DSLR. Before my new laptop with the R9 GPU that would slow X to a crawl. I eventually learned that since X ties to work with native resolution when possible, thousands of 22.5 megapixel frames were just too much for my old hardware to process. I’d just toss them into Graphics Converter and make them something reasonable like 3840 wide proportional – and it solved the problems. I considered that user error – my trying to stuff unreasonable arrays of pixels through the pipes. (Tho I’m tempted to try it with my me hardware and see if the SSD and new GPU have made it possible.)
But regular image sequences are a snap. 3000 images as single frame storylines takes Just a few seconds to build as noted above – Sort in browser – select all or some – New Project – tap Q – Command A – Control D – Type 1 – hit return and playback. Takes about a lazy 10 sec.Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com – video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.
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“But regular image sequences are a snap. 3000 images as single frame storylines takes Just a few seconds to build as noted above – Sort in browser – select all or some – New Project – tap Q – Command A – Control D – Type 1 – hit return and playback. Takes about a lazy 10 sec.”
Will all due respect, that’s NOT importing an image sequence.
Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com
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