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It’s All Connected — Clip Relationships and The Magnetic Timeline Paradigm
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It’s an interesting topic David.
but I can’t help but wonder how you approached editing before NLE’s came out.
It’s not like people were not cutting great things before on their CMX tc monitors.
All we looked at were a bunch of numbers on the screen and you got it done.
Sunset Blv. NOT cut on AVID. I still prefer to watch it over much of this stuff that’s out now : )
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lucasfilm edit droid stories with a pint?
my bar tab lawrence.
https://vimeo.com/user1590967/videos http://www.ogallchoir.net promo producer/editor.grading/motion graphics
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[Franz Bieberkopf] “Though he claims the opposite, Walter (below) has provided a good definition of the special kind of groupings that are parent / child connections.”
Sorry for any confusion. That’s my struggle with semantics. I think that FCPX’s parent/child connections are clearly different than “groups” as defined by usage in Premiere Pro, not the global sense of the word.
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 -
[Walter Soyka] “… not the global sense of the word.”
Walter,
In the global sense of the word, parent/child groups are pretty hard to define.
Franz.
Edit – on reflection, my humour may have been too dry there; suffice to say I am still trying to understand my relationship with my parents.
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[David Lawrence] “I’d argue that in it’s current implementation, timeline reflow is neither consistent, nor predictable.”
Where do you think it falls apart? What behavior is inconsistent?
[David Lawrence] “The fact that they’re selected as a single object can easily be addressed in the UI. For example, in Adobe Illustrator (and After Effects) There are two selection arrows. The black arrow always selects groups, but the white arrow lets you select individual points or objects. A similar dual selection UI for Premiere’s object groups would give you the benefits of both peer object flexibility and one-way hierarchical inheritance. “
This would let you work inside a group, but this gives you a different kind of inheritance than FCPX.
Since Premiere’s groups are based on an open timeline, direct object selection within the group would make changes relative to external time. The group’s container is effectively a null. In FCPX, the group’s container is itself a clip.
[David Lawrence] “In FCP7, this is essentially a synchronized replace edit. You are matching specific frames between the source and footage being cut in. The FCP7 manual describes how do do this (scroll about midway thru the document and look at “To replace an entire clip in the Timeline with a clip synchronized to a point in the sequence.” By default, FCPX makes the connection (sync) point the first frame of the cut and codifies it as the the relationship between the primary and the connected clip. It also allows the connection point to be moved as necessary. From the standpoint of editor intention, I see no difference between this and grouping a sync edit between clips in a traditional timeline.”
The critical difference as I see it is that in FCP7, a synchronized replace edit is an instantaneous operation. The connection only exists in the editor’s mind at the moment it is made. FCP7 itself cannot store or use that implied connection for anything other than the replace edit. With FCPX, connections are persistent (but mutable), and impact more than the one operation.
[David Lawrence] “FCPX only codifies a single specific type of relationship — a relationship drive by an engineering data model, rather than specific editor intention. When editor intentions and the data model happen to line up, the magnetic timeline works.”
I agree here. I have argued before that FCPX assumes (or maybe imposes?) a certain approach to editing. I think that the data model was designed to implement nonlinear A/B editorial.
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 -
I’m really not the ideal FCPX proponent. It’s not my tool of choice, and for my work, I’m far more comfortable with a traditional open timeline. Premiere is a great fit for my workflow, and I am sincerely sympathetic to the sorts of arguments that David, Aindreas, and Franz are making.
My explanations of the FCPX data model and timeline are really more academic. I think I do understand the FCPX approach, but I’m hoping for some more practical, real-world insights from those who actually use this thing every day.
[Aindreas Gallagher] “IT’S a timeline people. Its a scenario in which my thoughts about all of the elements are liable to change. “
But this precisely my point. Though we’ve thought in tracks and timelines/EDLs for decades, a timeline is not the only way to look at editorial.
In FCPX, there is no timeline. There are storylines, and they do encourage you to change your thoughts about the elements — but in a totally different fashion than traditional timelines.
[Franz Bieberkopf] “The purpose of an NLE is to arrange video and audio in time. Broadly, we call this activity “editing”. Storytelling is one application or approach to editing. It does not encompass all that editing is. Further, A/B editing is one approach to the problem of editing. It does not encompass all that editing is.”
FCPX meets the definition of a tool that arranges video and audio in time. It’s just a different approach.
A compositor is a tool to combine visual elements from separate sources into a single image. Some are layered and some are nodal. They accomplish the same task, but with different data models and different toolsets, and they require different approaches to compositing from the user. Some tasks are more straightforward in a layer-based compositor, and some are more straightforward with a nodal compositor. There is room in the market for After Effects and for Nuke.
So what if FCPX isn’t the perfect general-case NLE? We are very focused here on the situations where FCPX is a poorer solution than Legend. Might not there be cases where it’s a better solution?
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 -
[Franz Bieberkopf] “In the global sense of the word, parent/child groups are pretty hard to define… Edit – on reflection, my humour may have been too dry there; suffice to say I am still trying to understand my relationship with my parents.”
You may need to adjust your connection point (he says with a smile).
I did get the humor the first time around, and I had a good chuckle over it. I’d love to hear what a psychologist would have to say after reading through this forum.
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 -
[Richard Herd] “I cut a shiton of dialogue,”
You must be in an NTSC country, otherwise you’d cut a metric shiton of dialogue.
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[Walter Soyka] “We are very focused here on the situations where FCPX is a poorer solution than Legend. Might not there be cases where it’s a better solution?”
Walter,
From what I’ve read, it seems X is probably quite good and maybe the best A/B model NLE there is.
I don’t read this thread as “FCPX vs. Legend” so much as “new paradigm necessity” vs. status quo; the status quo is quite varied of course, but the claim is that “everything has changed”.
I’m interested in X and the implications, but I also find it interesting, for instance, that the ongoing proponents of X here in the forum have chimed in with comment thats seem to eschew theoretical considerations, and the implications that design models have on editing. It seems to be some of those that are apparently married to traditional models that are most interested in understanding how models impact on editing practice, and most open to exploring those implications.
Franz.
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