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Some FCP X Qs
Some questions and some observations from an FCP X job yesterday. A few of these are subjective and I haven’t had a chance to thoroughly test them, but I’m curious if others have seen these issues or have some answers.
1. Any way to set rendering to uncompressed? Or to export via Share as uncompressed?
2. Any thoughts on why render files are lost?
3. I placed DV (480) clips into a 486 timeline. Spatial Conform Fit or Fill softens, so I set it to None. In FCP 7 as I recall, it would add a shift for proper vertical resolution. FCP X doesn’t, so I manually shifted the image. Any rhyme or reason to the X/Y numbering? It says PX (pixels) but this clearly isn’t true. From completely off screen top to bottom, the Y range is from -100 to +100, so a 1px shift is really something like 10 pixels. I used .2 and that seemed to look about right.
4. Tight audio edits within a VO track (48K AIFF) seem to induce pops. Not actually clicks or pops, but just not a seamless-sounding edit. I still had to add 2-frame crossfades to make it sound clean. The same edit in STP would have sounded fine without crossfades.
5. Audio mixing, especially when you apply compression, sounds a bit harsh to me. The same values in STP would have resulted in a better sounded mix. Bear in mind this is just an impression at this point. Further testing is needed.
6. ProRes exports passed through Squeeze or Compressor to generate H264 review files seem to be darker than the same process when files are exported from FCP7. Again, I need to do more testing, but I wonder if the Colorsync profile is messing things up.
7. Any way to enter In and Out points by timecode in an event clip?
Thoughts?
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
18 Replies
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1. Yes, in project properties Cmd-J. Yes, in export media. Change current settings.
7. Click in the Dashboard or press Control-P.
All the best,
Tom
Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Coming in 2011 “Complete Training for FCPX” from Class on Demand
“Final Cut Pro X for iMovie and Final Cut Express Users” from Focal Press -
“Yes, in project properties Cmd-J. Yes, in export media. Change current settings”
Thanks. Yes, I see, but the render option is only 10-bit. No 8-bit option. Oh well. On export, though, I only see ProRes, H264 or IMX. No uncompressed options.
“Click in the Dashboard or press Control-P.”
Aah, got it. Wish you didn’t have to do Ctrl-P for each entry, though.
Thanks,
OliverOliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
1. You’re right. I thought there was an uncompressed out.
2. Or click in the Dashboard and type the number.
All the best,
Tom
Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Coming in 2011 “Complete Training for FCPX” from Class on Demand
“Final Cut Pro X for iMovie and Final Cut Express Users” from Focal Press -
[Oliver Peters] “4. Tight audio edits within a VO track (48K AIFF) seem to induce pops. Not actually clicks or pops, but just not a seamless-sounding edit. I still had to add 2-frame crossfades to make it sound clean. The same edit in STP would have sounded fine without crossfades.
5. Audio mixing, especially when you apply compression, sounds a bit harsh to me. The same values in STP would have resulted in a better sounded mix. Bear in mind this is just an impression at this point. Further testing is needed.”
I’ve noticed the same thing. Harsher sounding mixes and pops at cut points — especially with dialogue cutting. Quite a few people have said FCPX is superior to FCP7/STP for audio. That has not been my experience so far.
BTW, I’m curious — you said you were using 2-frame crossfades to smooth the pops. How did you get that to work? When I try to make a 2-frame crossfade, FCPX won’t let me. It changes it to 3-frames. Not the same thing.
_______________________
David Lawrence
art~media~design~research
propaganda.com
publicmattersgroup.com
facebook.com/dlawrence
twitter.com/dhl -
[Oliver Peters] “Aah, got it. Wish you didn’t have to do Ctrl-P for each entry, though.”
I’ve remapped control-p to the keypad enter key. Much faster and less awkward.
When do your render files go missing?
Yes, the pixel value thing is nothing short of odd.
Great point about dv, does motion have a publishable shift fields filter? I’m away from an FCPX machine.
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The “drag handles” on the audio tracks go to 1 frame.
“My Name is Steve and I’m an FCPX user”
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[Steve Connor] “The “drag handles” on the audio tracks go to 1 frame.”
Yes but that’s not what I’m talking about. It’s a huge PITA to stack, overlap, adjust, etc.
I just want a 2-frame cross-dissolve between clips. Is it possible?
_______________________
David Lawrence
art~media~design~research
propaganda.com
publicmattersgroup.com
facebook.com/dlawrence
twitter.com/dhl -
“BTW, I’m curious — you said you were using 2-frame crossfades to smooth the pops. How did you get that to work? When I try to make a 2-frame crossfade, FCPX won’t let me. It changes it to 3-frames. Not the same thing.”
Shoot! You’re right. I typed in a duration of 2 and didn’t actually check. Now I see that you can’t make the crossfade (dissolve) shorter than 3 frames. That’s what the result is even if you typed 2.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
“When do your render files go missing?”
When I exit the app and later relaunch to come back to it. Things that were renders aren’t.
“does motion have a publishable shift fields filter?”
Don’t know. Haven’t checked.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
I was incorrect about video levels. ProRes exports from both FCP 7 and FCP X result in darker H264 encodes via Squeeze. Note the the top two sections of the attached file. The darkest chips are crushed. The usual Apple gamma crap. The uncompressed section (bottom third) is clean and not crushed. Also look carefully and note the thin horizontal lines in the ProRes sources. Yuk!
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com
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