Problem with file length in editing in FCPX

[Bill Davis]

[Bret Williams] “Turning off background rendering won’t keep the app from interrupting itself with waveforms, proxies & optimizing or thumbnails. You just have to wait.”

Arrrrrgh. No you do not. You can simply pause the background rendering processes here.

Every one of these, if they’re in process, can be paused or dismissed outright and re-started later.

So the idea that “you just have to wait” is simply incorrect.

We’re arguing semantics (and my poor phrasing choices) but the bottom line for the OP is that he wanted to GET TO WORK in a tight deadline environment. One strategy for that, is to DISABLE the up front processes, work with the low rez initial files to get the work done that you need to do editing and getting your program done – and only THEN let the machine do all the calculations. Is it the OPTIMUM way to work? Maybe, maybe not. Depends on the deadlines being faced and where you think the time exists in the workflow to allow the machine to eventually crunch all the numbers and build the show.

But regardless, X allows for a “deferred rendering and processing” workflow very nicely.

I will grant that if you’re working with non-native file types that X can’t immediately parse into on-screen clip representations (in other words, OTHER than ProRes or h-264 or similar Apple “in house” codecs – you may be shut out without transcoding. But millions of editors don’t face that. So it’s not always germane.

Whatever language you or I use to describe it.

Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com – video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.

[Bret Williams]

True. Below is the image of the background render setting it logically seems you were referring to here…

[Bill Davis] “Remember I said you “can” get to work instantly? It’s true, but it’s also true that unless you turn off “background rendering”, X is set up so that every time you move the mouse or type, the program STOPS the background processes. “

It’s not until much later in the post you even mention the background processes window. Which, yes, of course is where you could pause or stop the optimizing or proxy creation. Another solution might be to turn off both of those settings altogether by default before import (in the import prefs) and invoke it after the fact in the event on the appropriate media. But seems kinda like a weird thing to stop them. Either you need proxies/optimized media to edit or you don’t. If you can work without, then import the originals and begin editing. But I guess you could let the process start, open the window and force stop or pause it.

FWIW I’m not sure stopping those processes would improve performance. Isn’t the performance problem not that it’s churning on the transcodes while you edit, (it very seamlessly stops that the instant you move the mouse) but the fact that one ins’t using transcoded material when they need to? For example if you’re editing with originals instead of proxies when your system can’t handle the originals. If you want the performance, you do have to wait for them to encode.

Anyway, hopefully this little sidebar clears up any questions for the OP instead of muddying the waters!

[Bill Davis]

[Bret Williams] “Anyway, hopefully this little sidebar clears up any questions for the OP instead of muddying the waters!
“

Amen to that.

This entire thread is a great testament to the fact that while X appears to some like a “simple $299 NLE” it’s depths are pretty substantial. Witness the two of us deep in the weeds looking at the same workflows from two slightly different angles, and being able to usefully discuss the differences and similarities.

Score another one for the Apple design team. Simple, but deep. Not the easiest design goal to meet!

Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com – video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.

[Dave Jenkins]

Joel, I have been using FCP X for a couple of years now. FCP X has problems with long files 2 hours plus. I think the problem is it has to build the audio waveforms and on long files that can’t take 30 minutes to an hour before I can use those files. I’m using the latest MacPro and a T-BOLT 2 raid running at 700mb per second. How many audio channels does your video file have? I import ProRes 422 created using a Blackmagic Hyperdeck and FCP X has a fit with the 16 channels of audio even though only 2 channels have audio.

Dajen Productions, Santa Barbara, CA
Mac Pro 3.5MHz 6-Core Late 2013
FCP X

[Joel Porter]

Thanks everybody for the input, I will definitely be trying out some things here.

We have just 2 channels of audio. All 3 camera files have the same audio (for 6 tracks) but the extras are deleted and we just use 2.

It sounds as if there simply isn’t much to do except wait for processes to finish either before of after the editing, or turn into proxies.

Would it help to initially cut the file into 2 or 3 pieces each?

I will also look into getting RAID drives as well as it seems one lone SSD and laptop may just be too slow.