It’s not about the gap. Can we edit with the magnetic timeline?

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Mark Morache] “Do I need to retrain my brain to think different? Or should I stop complaining about the limp and just get used to the crutches.”

Some of it. As far as what goes in the primary is a decision, and it’s not always visuals. I find the audio drives the piece, whether thats dialogue or a music driven piece. Depending on what you need, you can switch those around at any time, but you know all that.

I think a bit more control is needed. We need to be able to edit all four tracks (or whatever) of embedded audio at once. I don’t care if it hides itself back to one clip when I’m done adjusting, I like the clean timeline, but just let me have control, without divorcing the audio from the video.

Having compounds also controllable in a “dynamic clip” would be nice too, that way I could break apart the audio, compound the audio and video, and have what I need, including multiple, video tracks if that’s what I need, with different filters on each.

I do have a hunch we will see some interface upgrades with multicam, I mean how can you do a multicam switch without a sources and program monitor? Impossible. I hope they do it right. I really don’t mind the dynamics of the timeline, it just needs a bit more finesse. I think the foundation is there.

Keep sending suggestions to Apple, people.

Jeremy

[Mark Morache]

[Jeremy Garchow] “Depending on what you need, you can switch those around at any time”

Yes, but in FCP7 you didn’t need to. I still find the thing awkward, and that may be because there is ONE WAY to put things in the spine that makes everything else make sense, otherwise it still feels like I’m a slave to the paradigm, rather than having it work for me. And I like using I and O to set my points on the timeline. Tell me how I can use the keyboard to set the edit points on a secondary timeline? I can’t figure it out.

[Jeremy Garchow] “We need to be able to edit all four tracks (or whatever) of embedded audio at once”

I agree. I don’t like all of the audio being hidden. Choosing between detaching the audio and hiding it is a choice between two evils. FCX keeps me from having a track with only one or two clips in it, and that’s a good thing, but all of this double-clicking to see the hidden audio is wasting my time. Although I’ve said this before, I could live easier with it if expanding the audio showed me all four of my audio channels, in the context of the timeline. I hate nested clips in that you must edit them apart from the timeline, so you can’t see how your timing works with the other clips that aren’t part of the nest.

I think it would be very cool to be able to nest the audio, or any layered effect and open it up like an effect in Avid, with the small tracks visible in the context of the entire timeline. I’d use nested, or compound clips a whole lot more then.

[Jeremy Garchow] “I mean how can you do a multicam switch without a sources and program monitor? Impossible.”

Be careful of what you call impossible. You just might encourage them to try it. I believe that this whole magnetic timeline thing was the result of a double-dog-dare between software designers.

I still maintain that Apple will need to build in many more accomodations in order to make this trackless timeline work. Secondary storyline? In what bizarro universe would we even need to think like this?

———
FCX. She tempts me, abuses me, beats me up, makes me feel worthless, then in the end she comes around, helps me get my work done, gives me hope and I can’t stop thinking about her.

Mark Morache
Avid/Xpri/FCP7/FCX
Evening Magazine,Seattle, WA
https://fcpx.wordpress.com

[Gerald Baria]

As I see it the main thought behind the magnetic timeline is like how you mentally create a story in your mind. That there is a “backbone”, and actual point, a summary, an abstract, a direction that encompasses the whole piece. And from there breaks away all the little pieces of the story into the secondary storyline, etc. Like when you write a book, theres the main story, and the character bakcstories just branch out of it. And clip connections and compound clips are like how you do a story board, scenes are separated scene by scene. They are like mini-stories, that when brought together creates the entire movie.

I took a look at the demo video of that Audi on the FCPX site, and how the video was structured on FCPX on an iMac at an Apple Store in Shanghai (they don’t have one where I live), and what I noticed, during the part where there was commentary that they did not isolate the just the audio of the interview and place the video inserts at the primary and just synced it, they placed the entire video with audio interview on the primary storyline, and during the times that they need the race track video inserts, they just placed it as connected clips above it.

I think the magnetic timeline paradigm trains us to a more organized “mental process” of creating the story, a workflow for our mind. I see a lot of people here having the habit of dumping everything in the timeline and making choices from there, creating the story “as they move along”, and I think thats a very messy disorganized way to work.

Apple/Steve Jobs has always placed great thought into how every single product is brought out. How each component should make sense. Maybe this is their way of teaching people to not just have a minimalist clutter free hardware and software, but having a clutter free mind as well.

Quobetah
New=Better

[Lance Moody]

Hi Mark,

I agree with many of your comments.

While tackling a large first project on FCPX, I certainly felt the pain of not being able to do things as I wished, as I was used to doing them.

But as I worked I began to realize that things like choosing what is the primary storyline is really not that important a decision. I doesn’t matter that much…you can switch stuff in and out of the primary and I began to see that having everything magnetic really made sense.

Looking over that first timeline, I see lots of mistakes I made at first (like creating compound clips instead of secondaries) but then began to avoid as the workflow became more and more second nature while I continued to work.

Anyway, don’t know if this helps or contributes but I am looking forward to working more and more with X.

Lance

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Mark Morache] “And I like using I and O to set my points on the timeline. Tell me how I can use the keyboard to set the edit points on a secondary timeline? I can’t figure it out.”

Humor me for a second, I’m going to ask a dumb question. Besides the obvious, the three point edit that still works and not being able to set a global in and out, what capability are you missing? Just trying to get a sense.

I tell you what I miss about in and out, is that it seems pretty locked to the primary. You can use a range elsewhere, but I really think a target system would help, select an in and out on the timeline, target that clip, then whatever you want to do will happen to that targeted clip. It would help. More control.

[Mark Morache] “Although I’ve said this before, I could live easier with it if expanding the audio showed me all four of my audio channels, in the context of the timeline. I hate nested clips in that you must edit them apart from the timeline, so you can’t see how your timing works with the other clips that aren’t part of the nest.

I think it would be very cool to be able to nest the audio, or any layered effect and open it up like an effect in Avid, with the small tracks visible in the context of the entire timeline. I’d use nested, or compound clips a whole lot more then.”

Yep.

[Mark Morache] “Be careful of what you call impossible. You just might encourage them to try it. I believe that this whole magnetic timeline thing was the result of a double-dog-dare between software designers.”

Heh heh.

[Mark Morache] “Secondary storyline? In what bizarro universe would we even need to think like this?”

Like it or not, there’s a method. Secondary storylines give you control of defining a horizontal relationship without a track. In a trackless world, you need them, just like gaps. It allows you to stick clips together that might have a chance of coming apart, but need the relationship (like a transition). It allows you to layer things as you need them with the surrounding clips too without destroying the horizontal relationship.

[Carsten Orlt]

[Mark Morache] ” I believe that this whole magnetic timeline thing was the result of a double-dog-dare between software designers.”

Couldn’t disagree more! I congratulate whoever was responsible at Apple to have the guts to risk everything for what they believe in. And they sure thought very hard about this. Why do you think it took so long to release a software that has quite a few things missing?

Having tracks is something editors have to struggle with everyday because all tracks have to do everything at once. FCP legacy was already better than Avid because it already made the doing it all at once the default. But you are facing difficulties again when you wanted to only change one clips in/out on one track. What about the other tracks? I could give you plenty examples why FCPx is the logical evolution what FCP legacy already started. Plus you have to constantly assign track panels to make sure what you put in goes where you want it.
All NLE’s before FCPx are basically software forms of a 2 VTR edit suite. That’s why you have tracks, why you have 2 monitors for source and recorder and so forth. Surely its time to move on (specially because tape is history) (it will be by the time FCP7 stops working)

When you start with the premise to get rid of tracks you will end up with this new timeline system. Now of course this will change how things are done. But if the one overriding premise is: no tracks, than you can’t put things back that effectively re-instate tracks.

So yes you can improve the workflow by adding shortcuts to do things quicker than when doing them manually one after the other (normal evolution of every software ever created) (converting connected to storyline when adding dissolve is best example) but you can’t change the basic idea behind it because that would mean you’re back to tracks.

So simple decision for everybody. If you want tracks: go somewhere else. If you do not like tracks (or do not need them) hang around.
I’m sure hanging around!

my 2 cents

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Lance Moody] “Anyway, don’t know if this helps or contributes but I am looking forward to working more and more with X.”

Prepare to run to a bomb shelter. It can get rough around here with comments like this, although it’s not as seedy as it used to be.

[David Lawrence]

[Carsten Orlt] “Having tracks is something editors have to struggle with everyday because all tracks have to do everything at once. “

I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve never struggled with tracks. Understanding tracks is part of my job.

[Carsten Orlt] “FCP legacy was already better than Avid because it already made the doing it all at once the default. But you are facing difficulties again when you wanted to only change one clips in/out on one track. What about the other tracks?”

Again, I’ve never had any difficulty. It’s easy once you learn. Knowing how to do this is part of my job.

[Carsten Orlt] “So yes you can improve the workflow by adding shortcuts to do things quicker than when doing them manually one after the other (normal evolution of every software ever created) (converting connected to storyline when adding dissolve is best example) but you can’t change the basic idea behind it because that would mean you’re back to tracks.”

I basically agree. So let me ask you the same question I asked Jeremy in another thread. If you honestly believe the trackless magnetic paradigm is the future and better than what we’ve worked with for the past 20+ years, how long do you think it will take to become an industry standard? Will DAW venders begin using a trackless approach to match Apple’s? Will Logic X be trackless?

_______________________
David Lawrence
art~media~design~research
propaganda.com
publicmattersgroup.com
facebook.com/dlawrence
twitter.com/dhl

[Neil Goodman]

Can we edit with it? Sure. i have, i did, it worked, and if i HAD to i could do it again, but until every other viable NLE switches to a locked ripple, than i have the choice to work with the other ones, most of which are industry staples and arent going anywhere, maybe forever. Most editors i meet are so stuck in the ways. Is that good, maybe not butif the current traditions work today, theyll work tommorow too. Sure, they all need imporvements but ive never heard anyone complain about a standard 2 Window Source and Record/Tracked Timeline NLE.

If you love grow to love the magnetic timeline, more power to you, Master it and do what you do, ill stick with what i know works best for me.

Neil Goodman: Editor of New Media Production – NBC/Universal

[Herb Sevush]

“As I see it the main thought behind the magnetic timeline is like how you mentally create a story in your mind. That there is a “backbone”, and actual point, a summary, an abstract, a direction that encompasses the whole piece. And from there breaks away all the little pieces of the story into the secondary storyline, etc. Like when you write a book, theres the main story, and the character bakcstories just branch out of it. And clip connections and compound clips are like how you do a story board, scenes are separated scene by scene. They are like mini-stories, that when brought together creates the entire movie.”

And there is nothing that you described that hasn’t been done, over and over again, without complaint, by an army of editors for the last 20 years using tracks. The only difference being that with tracks the organizational structure is both more flexible and easier to visualize.

Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions