Mountain Lion/FCPX not reading AVCHD “PRIVATE” folder correctly

[Oscar Piña]

Hello. I’d like to upgrade to Mountain Lion in order to improve the AVCHD files encoding process (FCPX-Compressor). And found this Thread.
Instead of using importing files, I actually ingest the NXCAM AVCHD media importing from camera and it runs perfectly.

Note: I have not updated my OS Lion to Mountain Lion.

Try this and let me know

Good Luck

Oscar

[James Ewart]

Just did a test Mountain Lion 10.8.2.

AVCHD from Panasonic TM900

Imports no problem direct from card.

[Trevor Ward]

Is there a resolution to this? I’ve working with a brand new workflow to me: New OS (mountain lion), new editor (FCPX) and new camera (AF100). I have a card full of footage that final cut pro x can’t seem to read. I will have about 7 cards by the time this is over. Am I really supposed to change all those folder names and use some converter software before I’m able to use the footage? Is’nt there some sort of Log & Transfer function like there was in Final Cut 7?

-Trevor Ward
Red Eye Film Co.
http://www.redeyefilmco.com
Orlando, FL

[James Ewart]

Well yes…optimise or transcode Media.

The Apple recommended workflow is to do this and create both optimised and proxy files I understand. I’m not sure of the advantage of working with native codecs…I dare say Brett will enlighten me but I always work inPro Res and don’t seem to get any of the issues described.

[Trevor Ward]

But what does that mean? Does that mean that I have to:

Step 1. do the whole renaming thing for each folder until I reach the mts files.
Step 2. use compressor, mpeg streamclip or some other application to do a transcode
Step 3. import those newly transcoded clips

Has Final Cut X done away with Log&Transfer?

-Trevor Ward
Red Eye Film Co.
http://www.redeyefilmco.com
Orlando, FL

[James Ewart]

Unless I’m getting the wrong end of the stick here it’s very simple…when you see the import window open make sure you have checked “Create optimised Media” and also in my view good to have “create proxy media” checked too for faster workflow later. Or after you have imported you can do the same thing in the Event Browser. Select the clips and then go FILE – TRANSCODE MEDIA.

I think it expects you do do the logging after you have imported but because of the background rendering this does not hold you up as you can log as soon as it appears in the Event Browser.

I think in FCP7 (or what everyone seems to all “Legacy” rather mystifyingly) most people transferred everything anyway most of the time so they have done away with logging prior to capture/transfer/import.

You can always trash clips you don’t want.

The downside of Optimising is storage space but for me everything runs a lot smoother if I bother…I now many don’t.

[Trevor Ward]

Ok, for anyone on this thread and those who in the future look for an ANSWER to the problem.

Upon creating a new project, or opening FCPX for the first time, you have two choices for footage. Choice one is import clips. The other is import from Camera. If you select import clips, you will have the file structure as mentioned in earlier posts. Selecting the top level of the card (or folder, depending on your workflow) will return an error message stating there is unsupported media or something of that nature.

If you select, Import from Camera (or input media from connected device. It’s the icon that looks like a video camera, interestingly enough, a Panasonic AF100). The program might default to your facetime camera. But in the lower left of the screen, there is an option to Open Archive. Selecting this will then allow you to navigate through finder to your top level folder with your card data. Once you do this, you will see the “card” or “folder” in the upper left under CAMERAS. Selecting it will then show you all the clips on your card.

You can then import all or select which clips to import. Boom. Done.

I didn’t see logging abilities there. But as pointed out by James I think, you can log after the clips have been imported (and while they are background transcoding).

For the record, I don’t like that when it creates Optimized media or Proxy media, I don’t have the option of telling it what I consider proxy and what I consider Optimized. For example, in FCP 7, I used to transcode into ProRes LT for low budget projects that were going to the web and where not getting serious color grading. Is there a Preference that I can change to make that happen?

-Trevor Ward
Red Eye Film Co.
http://www.redeyefilmco.com
Orlando, FL

[James Ewart]

I just select IMPORT – MEDIA and all the options are there in the left hand bar including my card from the camera (AVCHD). Initially had some issues with the camera option and then realised that is probably for when footage is recorded to an internal camera hard drive as opposed to a car which is just a storage device.

I think selecting camera might be the red herring for people…better to transfer from a camera to a storage device and select files that way no??

[Garrett Evans]

I’ve read and read and read but never really found a solution for what would work for me…until this morning.

So, for those of us using Mountain Lion and FCP7 (I know, I’ll update when I’m ready), in order to have the folder structure of AVCHD footage appear in the Log & Transfer window, all I did was COPY the SDHC card on my desktop, and PASTE it into my raw library folder for that project. Doing that provided the folder structure needed to L&T in FCP7 on Mountain Lion.

My inference tells me ML sees the card as a structure and not a package…but then I’m just an old dog looking to work smarter not harder…done TV is good TV.

MacPro OSX 10.6.8 2×2.26 QCIX 10GB 1066MHz DDR3 FCP7.0.3/FCS3
FCSvr1.5 Xsan2.2 DotHill 24TB QlogicSANbox 8GB ATTO 8GB

[James Strawn]

I had to right click and ‘show package contents’ to get to each directory level where I isued to be able to just access it all as you would any other folder structure. Annoying, but the workaround is pretty easy.