-
It’s All Connected — Clip Relationships and The Magnetic Timeline Paradigm
-
[Walter Soyka] “See Cooper Kingston’s Edit Button:”
Thank you for that, hadn’t seen it before. I’m ordering mine now.
Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
—————————
nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf -
[Franz Bieberkopf] “In other words, if you don’t conceive of your edit as A/B, how do you conceive of it? How does X help you with this (in ways that tracked models don’t)?”
Some of what I would do falls in to Aroll/Broll, some doesn’t.
Interview pieces are usually Aroll/Broll, spots usually aren’t.
I like what FPCX does as the relationships are “written down” as I mentioned much earlier in this thread. In the earlier stages of the edit, I am able to very quickly and easy swap things around when building the story. Any sweeping changes that are made are very fast and I can “heal” the timeline much faster than I can in FCP7 due to the “everything allowed” approach of FCPX (no clip overwrites unless I specifically tell it to overwrite). Everything is available, nothing is lost. I don’t mind that and it is rather unique to FCPX.
Usually when adding cutaways (or broll) that footage tends to stick with that part of the story, so having little “groups” of clips that pertain to a comment or thread of the story is actually very helpful. I can even further define those groups in a secondary which allows even more options. Where the connected clip convention currently does lack is precision and control which I touched on earlier (moving a primary clip without moving its connected clip for example). So for the earlier stages, the speed is absolutely fantastic, but when things start to get precise, FCPX has less control so sometimes it takes more time. The same is true for FCP7 when you have a lot of layers.
For Non Broll editing (like spots), I find editing in the primary extremely fast and fluid. Keyboard shortcuts are logical and easy and pretty well though out. This is why I have been trying to ask you why you think FCPX is geared for a/b editing when “a” editing is so easy and quick and “b” tends to take a lot more shuffling of clips in and out of the primary simply due to the lack of given keyboard shortcuts and young stage of FCPX programming.
Jeremy
-
[Walter Soyka] “If the point of a connected clip is to cover a cut, then it is not properly related to any specific frame of either the outgoing or incoming clips on the underlying layer. It is related to the cut itself, and if the cut moves, the cutaway should move with it.”
Yeah, but when I am cutting an interview dialogue, there might 8 cuts that I need to cover due to me taking out pauses/ums/ahs/making a complete sentence. Which one do I attach it to? Why not attach it to where I want the broll to start, which is usually on a specific frame that may or may not be a cut?
[Walter Soyka] “This may be a corner case, but I’m just trying to point out that the FCPX clip connection model doesn’t catch all relationship cases.”
But it has easy methods to do so. It has vertical AND horizontal methods of creating relationships. As well as magnets.
-
[Jeremy Garchow] “I am able to very quickly and easy swap things around when building the story.”
By “building the story” do you mean working in the primary storyline, or is it more than that?
[Jeremy Garchow] “Everything is available, nothing is lost.”
I am not sure what you mean by this. Perhaps a negative example might illustrate.
[Jeremy Garchow] “For Non Broll editing (like spots), I find editing in the primary extremely fast and fluid.”
From what you’ve described, I understand that you work with an A/B approach to your editing: a primary, structuring track with cutaways or secondary material used to hide edits or support the primary. So either I’ve misunderstood something or you’ve not explained it well enough.
Franz.
-
[Walter Soyka] “I suppose it’s worth noting that Avid has had adjustment layers for years (you can add effects to filler and it works as an adjustment layer), and FCPX has a clever hack for adjustment layers via a blank title template.”
Good point. My main gripe with filler on the Avid used to be that it’s like gaps in FCPX. You have to use it to fill empty space. But Avid editors always talked about its utility and now I understand why.
_______________________
David Lawrence
art~media~design~research
propaganda.com
publicmattersgroup.com
facebook.com/dlawrence
twitter.com/dhl -
[Franz Bieberkopf] “By “building the story” do you mean working in the primary storyline, or is it more than that?”
Yes, when cutting the dialogue (with interview pieces, I cut a story first, then add broll) I use the primary as there’s no reason to use anything else and the magnetism, position tool, fast keyboard editing and everything works in my favor.
I also like that I can add clips to the timeline quickly and not have to worry about selecting an audio track right away or track patching or anything of the sort. It is very easy to add a clip, get the edit situated, and select audio tracks later. I can even do this as a group. If I select 45 clips at once, I can adjust which audio channel I want to use in the timeline in the inspector of all 45 clips at once. I like this a lot and is actually something nice about audio editing in FCPX. I can do this in tracks in FCP7 as well, but it’s somehow easier in FCPX and I don’t have to disable audio tracks. This is a pain if you extend to 4 or more audio tracks as you have to “layer” the audio. For instance, if I have 3 clips that are overlapping this means I have six total audio channels to manage (2 per clip). 3 of those channels I am not using at the moment so I can either delete the one channel I’m not using (or not add it to the timeline in the first place), disable the one channel I’m not using and have three audio tracks on the timeline that are doing nothing but taking up space, or disable that one track on each and every clip every time I add a clip to the timeline. It can be rather tedious.
With FCPX I can always bring the audio back in FCPX as well by selecting it in the inspector, and there’s no wasted tracks, my timeline looks exactly the same, there’s no reason to make more room or rearrange.
The reasons for this are that when editing, I usually use the audio channel that sounds best to me, but when I export an OMF to an audio engineer, I give them all the relevant channels so they have to the most material to work with. For example, after processing the lav might be better than the boom even though the boom sounds better without processing, or the audio engineer might use a combination of the two.
[Franz Bieberkopf] “[Jeremy Garchow] “Everything is available, nothing is lost.”
I am not sure what you mean by this. Perhaps a negative example might illustrate.”
Sure. With clip collisions in FCP7, I might have to move a clip to another track, or trim a clip out of the way, or delete a transition, or move a transition in order to make room for a new clip, even if I don’t want to. Here’s an example, check out the end of the post with the FCP7 screen grabs:
https://forums.creativecow.net/readpost/335/41361
With FCPX, nothing is lost (unless I want to overwrite with the position tool in the primary). Everything is available, the software simply adjusts and keeps all of my options in front of me. Some see this as a hinderance, I see it as an advantage. The software is simply making room for everyone to come aboard and I don’t mind it. FCP7 constantly reminds me that I am an idiot and there’s a transition that is perhaps, 5 seconds away from the CTI and it is preventing me from doing an operation. I can’t overwrite certain edits with transitions if I want to due to clip collisions. If I drag multiple layers, I sometimes run in to road blocks as I missed a clip that was seven audio tracks down, so I have to stop, move the clip to a different track, reselect my selection just right and continue the move. FCPX is a valiant attempt to make those types of editing processes more efficient. I’ve heard people say the interface is dumbed down, I of course think it has smartened up. FCP7 does some really dumb things when it comes to collisions.
There is a downside as multichannel audio editing is currently very awkward in FCPX. I am very anxious to see what Apple is going to do here with thier announced tools (linked). I really like the “Expand Audio” options/commands in FCPX. I think if every channel was shown in the expand audio, it would go a long way to making multichannel audio editing more efficient and complete.
Jeremy
-
All,
Any plans on turning this thread into a movie? It might be easier for me to follow. Maybe something along the lines of “My Dinner With Andre”?
Brilliant stuff here,
Dave -
Great post Jeremy, thank you. I can really understand what you like about working in FCPX. Makes sense. After 10.0.6 is released and I upgrade to a new system, I’ll try FCPX again in the ways you describe.
_______________________
David Lawrence
art~media~design~research
propaganda.com
publicmattersgroup.com
facebook.com/dlawrence
twitter.com/dhl -
[Walter Soyka] “Right now, FCPX makes secondary time relative to the absolute time of the primary — a literal frame in the media within the clip container on the timeline. I’m suggesting that sometimes it’s more useful to make secondary time relative to the relative time of the primary — the absolute time of the container itself, not the absolute time of the media it contains.”
It occurs to me that a compound clip might enable this behavior.
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 -
That’s a dubious claim. I of course did not make a dubious claim. I compared 7 to X. You compared me to you, which brings up an entirely different digression:
America’s Best Editor. or Hell’s Video Editor.
What we need is a reality show that pits editors in high stakes competition. Imagine how exciting it would be for the audience to watch video editors Right Clicking and Keyboarding nifty edits. We could have this forum as the gossip sections of the show.
On point…though, I’m a SHIFT-L kind of guy in Legend. The beauty of Js and Ls in X over Legend is how it deals with “flow” (as is named above). Also the precision editor is a marvel to behold when doing L-s and J-s. 7 v X I’m right, but I’ve used both “softwares.” I believe you haven’t actually delivered anything using X, and you are more in favor of hypotheticals. Delivering a simple test project is all you gotta do.
Kudos to the little “if you know what you’re doing comment”; it’s a beauty of a sniping zinger suited for reality tv.
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up