Selecting with “c”

[Michael Garber]

Hey Loren – it’s a great feature when you are mousing around. But there’s no way that I currently know to select a connected clip or a secondary – or a connected audio clip – when the mouse is not hovering over it because there’s no way to give it priority over the primary storyline. Would love to know if someone has a trick up their sleeve, though.

Michael Garber
5th Wall – a post production company

[David Powell]

I’m finding that X wants you to keep your hands on the mouse at all times. I try and keep the mouse off of Timeline. If its in the gray, the shortcut will respond to timeline indicator. I’ve reprogrammed my whole keyboard so that the transport is on the left and all the shortcuts are so that I never have to leave the mouse. Since there is no way to patch to secondary clips, trimming from the keyboard is a joke (it kind’ve was in legacy as well). I’m finding it faster to keep one hand on the mouse and the other on the keyboard.

[Andy Neil]

[Michael Garber] “Would love to know if someone has a trick up their sleeve, though.”

These are my minor tricks when I start trimming in FCPX:

Use the Timeline Index. Open the index (CMD+SHIFT+2) and you’ll see an indicator between a list of clips wherever the playhead currently is. You can click to select individual clips just as if you’re using the C shortcut. You can also just use the arrow keys to jump to each successive clip in your timeline without needing the mouse.

Make sure you have clip skimming on. Ok. So there’s Skimming, and Clip Skimming. Clip Skimming (CMD+SHIFT+S I think) works like regular skimming, except that when the cursor is hovering over a specific clip whether it’s in the primary storyline or a connected clip, you get a mini-skimmer that shows only that clip in the viewer. The result works like this. If you skim above the highest connected clips in your timeline, you skim your project. If you hover over a clip in the primary when a connected clip is covering over it (like broll over aroll), then you see the primary clip, and not the broll covering it. I like this for how it allows you to see below covered clips without having to disable the clips above. But more important is it’s affect on IN/OUT points.

When clip skimming is turned on, you can mark IN/OUTs on any clip in your timeline just by hovering over it. When clip skimming is off, you can only mark IN/OUTs in the primary storyline unless you specifically select the range tool. So to make trims to connected clips, I’ll often hover over a clip, mark an IN and an OUT and then hit the shortcut (CMD+) [trim clip to IN/OUT].

Hope this helps.

Andy

https://www.timesavertutorials.com

[Michael Garber]

Andy,

Messed around with it. I can see when it would come in handy. Still, hoping this is an area where they can make the timeline more keyboard friendly. Oh, and I didn’t know about the trim clip command (opt-\). That’s a great tip :).

Michael Garber
5th Wall – a post production company

[Larry Asbell]

Yeah, when clip skimming is turned on, only the clip being hovered over is seen and its audio track is soloed. Also the in/out keys work on any clip even connected clips and secondaries. However you don’t have to turn Clip Skimming on and off with Option+Command+S unless you want it on all the time. For momentary use, just be in Range mode, Trim mode or Blade mode and functions of clip skimming are in effect.