RedShark News: Opinion: Which are the best NLEs right now?

[Oliver Peters]

[Bill Davis] “If you feel different, post away. But there IS a growing body of evidence that X editors are encouraged to not just keep the editorial skills that they came to the software with – but to improve them – basically leveraging what X can do inside the editorial environment itself – that they either couldn’t or just didn’t do before. “

That’s a pretty big leap. You are merely reacting to stories you see on FCP.co. They get placement because they are done on FCP X, not necessarily because of the edit itself. Granted the work is nice, but there are plenty of the same types of projects done on other NLE. They simply don’t get the press because it isn’t newsworthy within their own niche.

You are completely ignoring developments and innovations in other NLEs that X doesn’t and can’t do, but are standard within others.

– Oliver

Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com

[Jeremy Garchow]

I use Auditions for this (with dialogue/scripted driven pieces) and with the magnetic timeline it’s so easy to flip all the takes around without having to make another sequence. This is one area of fcpx that would be hard to let go of if I needed to move to another NLE. The piece I’m working on now has so many takes per scene, all a little different, and Auditions in combination with the magnetic timeline makes it so easy to look at different options, and then go back to the original option if needed, without having to go back to another version of the timeline. It is a very different way of working than I did with FCP 7 or Pr. The timeline, with so many decisions available at a key press, is very creative, and helps to not only review all my options, but make changes on the fly as the edit evolves. I really like it and is a huge timeline strength in X.

In non scripted pieces, I use snapshots. What I like about snapshots is that you don’t have to leave the current timeline, you simply hit the snapshot command and continue working. It’s much more fluid than the other way of finding the timeline in some bin, duping, then renaming and either opening that version and closing another, and some variation therein. Those simple, yet super mundane and repetivitive tasks, do get out of the way in X, which makes me feel like it’s more creative as I spend more time creating. But, like music, that is subjective. One person’s Rolling Stones is another person’s Chance the Rapper, if you know what I mean.

[Charlie Austin]

[Jeremy Garchow] “it’s so easy to flip all the takes around without having to make another sequence”

If I could select a pile of 5 or 6 alternate shots and choose “make audition” in the timeline I’d use this feature a lot more than I do. And, if “Replace and add to Audition” could work with the as-yet-unimplemented match frame replace (replace using the original clips’ duration) I would do a happy dance. 🙂

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~ My FCPX Babbling blog ~
~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Andrew Kimery]

[Jeremy Garchow] “I use Auditions for this (with dialogue/scripted driven pieces) and with the magnetic timeline it’s so easy to flip all the takes around without having to make another sequence.”

Auditions is one thing I’m looking forward to once I get time to mess around with X.

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Charlie Austin] “If I could select a pile of 5 or 6 alternate shots and choose “make audition” in the timeline I’d use this feature a lot more than I do.”

It would be nice, but I always match frame, add an “Audition” keyword, then find the 5 or 6 shots, make the Audition clip, and then replace that clip in the timeline with the Audition, then clear the Clips from the Audition keyword.

It sounds like more of a hassle than it is, but a decent way to make Audution clips from the timeline if doing it from the Browser is not feasible. It woikd be great to select them in the timeline and make an Audition, though. I find Auditions to be so useful, it’s worth a little pain to set them up.

[Charlie Austin]

[Jeremy Garchow] “but I always match frame, add an “Audition” keyword, then find the 5 or 6 shots, make the Audition clip, and then replace that clip in the timeline with the Audition, then clear the Clips from the Audition keyword. “

nice trick. 🙂 It would be nice to do it with one right click though, like making a compound clip. Hopefully they’ll add that when they dive into working on the timeline…

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~ My FCPX Babbling blog ~
~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Scott Witthaus]

[Jeremy Garchow] “It would be nice, but I always match frame, add an “Audition” keyword, then find the 5 or 6 shots, make the Audition clip, and then replace that clip in the timeline with the Audition, then clear the Clips from the Audition keyword”

You guys are GOOD! I would write all this down, but I still might not understand it all… Thank you!

Scott

Scott Witthaus
Senior Editor/Post Production Supervisor
1708 Inc./Editorial
Professor, VCU Brandcenter

[Walter Soyka]

[Richard Herd] “That is only half the Dinosaur analysis to (A) Set aside preconceptions, a veil of ignorance. There is also (B) “you just have to use the software to ‘get it,'” ostensive concept acquisition. The fanboy analysis is surely the contrapositive: a veil of opulence and meditation. ;)”

I love your semantic rigor, and your sense of humor. I minored in philosophy in college, and while I apply that study constantly, I don’t get to reference it very often.

But back to the off-topic at hand, I do actually think that both (A) and (B) are important for understanding FCP X.

Aside from the argumentum ad hominem I’ve already detailed, I believe the Luddite dinosaur argument also suffers from argumentum ad novitatem.

Walter Soyka
Designer & Mad Scientist at Keen Live [link]
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
@keenlive   |   RenderBreak [blog]   |   Profile [LinkedIn]

[Michael Gissing]

[Bill Davis] “The thing you’re missing is that audio is essentially single stream digital content. Which is to say that at the core, you have a consistent digital description of one type of waveforms. That stays consistent across all DAW approaches.

In video editing, the original clip is expected to be a layered composite. It will, by default, at least have video and audio muxed together. So file handling in an NLE (audio and video mixed clips) has a different fundamental structure compared to file handling in an audio only DAW.”

Sorry for the long quote as I didn’t want to be accused of paraphrasing your description. In a typical DAW timeline for a documentary I will have mono dialog, mono & stereo effects, stereo music files and then possibly a collection of multichannel wavs which might be surround effects, or multi dialog tracks when many radio mics are being used (a bit like multicam). So in exactly the same way as an NLE, I need a system that can both lock a multi channel file or break it apart and then relock it again.

I don’t see a video with multi audio file as anything different as it is simply another multi channel file where one channel happens to be an image. In a multi channel dialog file typical on a big drama scene each channel is totally unique and may be broken up and edited differently yet need to remain in sync (or not).

Further, a scene has a large number of totally unrelated files that have a sync relationship to the picture. When I reversion a mix from say a feature version to a TV cutdown I have to edit up to ninety eight tracks of disparate but sync related elements plus automation including multiple mix buses and a final mix bus. That is editing totally beyond anything as complex as you are ever likely to deal with in X.

The fact that I can have fluid grouping/ sync relationships and no fear of destructive overwriting whilst maintaining track and clip based signal processing means I need a tool that is much more advanced than X is with its mag timeline and roles which do not come close to dealing with the complexity of even a simple documentary on a DAW.

To dismiss DAW editing to the idea that I am dealing with a single digital stream with one type of waveform is to show an ignorance of what goes into a typical tracklay & mix and the need to create a variety of versions from a master sequence. It is that complexity that has meant that a way to manage such sync relationships, track relationships, to manage routing, signal processing and dynamic automation that has meant DAWs had to solve the very problems that X is attempting to deal with a long time ago.

So that is why I hate audio editing and mixing in DAWs. Vegas, because it was a DAW that added video editing was a better attempt. I should also point out that I sometimes have to edit video as well in Fairlight. It might surprise you to know I can do a video & audio edit directly in the Fairlight timeline, even if the video stream is 3D. It even does dissolves and fades. It also stacks video clips non destructively on a single track and produces and EDL and AAF of the cut. But it is a simple video tool with a hugely powerful and complex audio section. NLEs are essentially the opposite. Powerful picture tools with ordinary audio capability but with exactly the same need to deal with group and syn relationships.

So before you think that X has come up with the best way to manage sync and group relationships between related and totally unrelated media invite yourself into an audio post facility and marvel at the complexity and the tool set that a DAW needs to deal with typically 6,000-8000 separate audio elements in a simple but typical one hour show, particularly watch them reversion or deal with directors re-cutting after a mix.

So whilst I applaud X for having a go at solving the same problems that were fixed a long time ago by DAWs like Fairlight, please don’t think X is on top of the solution or that there isn’t a better way that might just need tracks to be truly powerful.

[Charlie Austin]

[Michael Gissing] ” I need a tool that is much more advanced than X is with its mag timeline and roles which do not come close to dealing with the complexity of even a simple documentary on a DAW.
“

Chiming in just for the heck of it. You’re absolutely correct in your assessment of DAW vs. NLE. They’re two entirely different beasts. While it’s certainly possible to do a complex mix in an NLE, to me it’s just the wrong tool, even with a bolted on mixer a la Premiere, FCP 7 etc. And X doesn’t have one at all.

That said, There are some really nice things about working with multichannel sources in the X timeline. By expanding the components of a clip, you can work with, as your example, multichannel dialog wav files. Cut out bits, enable/disable and effect various channels. And they close right up reducing visual clutter when you don’t need to see them. Like a DAW, audio is always editable in subframe/sample increments without changing “modes”. Setting connection points is very easy, and it keeps your audio only clips in sync. Using Comps (audio only or including the picture) can lock sync between dozens of clips as tight as a drum.

And Roles can certainly organize your audio into as many “tracks” as you’d like, you just need to create/assign them. A Master Role (Bus Group?) of Dialogue could contain subroles DIA A, B, C, etc. An ADR Role could have subroles for different characters etc. Effects could contain Mono FX, Stereo FX, Hard FX, LF FX, Ambience, Room Tone, Surround FX (which you could break down further in their components) etc. A Foley Role could contain various Foley subroles, Walla, Footsteps, whatever… Just like tracks, you can have as many as you need. All searchable/selectable/mute/solo-able etc from the timeline index.

So, in a way, Roles = Bus Groups, and Sub Roles = Tracks.

What Roles can’t do now, is work like Busses do. Even though Master Roles kind of are like Bus Groups, there’s no mixer with which to utilize that function. If there was, it’d pretty much work as we’re used to I’d think. A Role(s) could be assigned to a Master, or a send etc. Or if Master Roles had sends to… something… that would be cool. FCP X just (simple! lol) needs a mixer. I’m not sure Apple wants to do that, but who knows.

Using fcpxml, Roles already come into Logic (and other DAW’s via X2Pro) as nicely named tracks. If Apple can further integrate fcpxml with Logic, maybe Master Roles would be converted to Track Stacks (which are very cool) Or maybe in the X timeline Roles could collapse like Comps but open back up like components. You could then effect/mix the Master Role, as well as effecting/manipulating the individual clips contained by the Role. You can already do this by comping a Role, but it’s a kludge, you can’t open it up in context (i.e. in the timeline containing the comp) without breaking it apart which means you lose any mixing/Effects you’ve done. Again, you sort of can, but not really.

I guess what I’m saying, in a long winded way, is that Roles could conceivably do everything that tracks/busses/sends can do. The way they’re designed would allow this now. The problem –as seen in my signature which was copied verbatim from within the bowels of the FCP X app package when I was poking around– is that:

“The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”

It’ll be interesting to see what, if anything, they come up with…

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~ My FCPX Babbling blog ~
~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~