Moving and Locating Media in Projects

[Alan Okey]

[Mina Demian] “what is the proper procedure within FCP so I don’t break projects and render them useless? “

Use Media Manager to create a new copy of the project, duplicating existing media and saving to the desired location. Read the FCP manual section on Media Manager for details.

[Mina Demian]

Hi Alan

Thanks for your reply. I’ll look into that. What’s the alternative metho d in Final Cut Express, which is where I did the original project? (I later moved it to FCP)

Also… any ideas on the first error: “” is missing?

[Alan Okey]

I’m not familiar with Final Cut Express, but if you need to reconnect offline media, you have two choices:

1. When first opening a project with offline media, when the “media offline” dialog box comes up and “” is highlighted, click the Search button and see if your system can locate the missing media automatically. If not, try clicking Locate and navigate to the directory where you moved your media. See if any files in that directory are highlighted. If you can’t find the file, skip it and go on to the next file. Once you have finished, check the browser to see if any clips are still offline. You can then right-click (or control-click) on the offline clip and choose “reconnect” to search for the file manually.

If you have moved all of your media for a given project to the same directory, once you successfully connect to the first offline media file, all subsequent files in that same directory will automatically be linked to the project as well. Once all offline media has been reconnected to the project, immediately save the project so that you won’t have to reconnect the media again the next time you open it.

It is essential to develop good habits with regard to media management in Final Cut Pro. Some tips:

1. Give new projects a name and save them before capturing any media. This ensures that when you begin capturing media, it will be saved to a folder inside the Capture Scratch folder with the same name as the project, instead of “Untitled Project.”

2. Be diligent about naming clips and reels (tapes) during the logging and capturing process. Try not to use “capture now” unless it’s absolutely necessary.

3. Once you start editing, if you rename any clips in the browser, make sure to also change the file name to match. This is accomplished by highlighting the clip in the browser, right-clicking (or control-clicking) and choosing “rename file to match clip.”

Being tidy with media management from the start will go a long way toward making your projects easier to manage.