The Position Tool Does Not Disable Ripple Mode – Here’s Why

[Jeremy Garchow]

[David Lawrence] “o you mean you’re still on the fence regarding whether the position tool disables ripple mode on the timeline? That’s the argument people have been making since June. I think I’ve shown definitive proof this is not true.”

I think your perspective is very limited. Do this with a video clip, and you will see. There is no ripple. And as Andy mentioned, you hold option, and there is no ripple when grabbing a gap.

[David Lawrence] “Yes, overwrite. This is not the same as disabling ripple. That’s my point. If there were a toggle switch on the timeline to disable ripple, we wouldn’t need a position tool. That’s why I consider it a workaround.”

I’m confused here.

The position tool positions the clip where you want it in time and overwrites what’s there. If you don’t want to overwrite, why don’t you just move the clip where you want it with the selection tool keeping everything else in time around it?

Jeremy

[Andy Neil]

[David Lawrence] “In FCP7 there are no gaps. The timeline is a wide open space. The only thing to think about is where you want to place your media clips in that space, which has a direct one-to-one mapping to time. It doesn’t get any simpler or more intuitive.”

How do you get your clips into an FCP7 timeline when you want gaps between sections? Most editors place the playhead a point down the timeline and then overwrite or insert a clip at that point. You can do the exact same thing, the exact same way in FCPX. You do NOT have to create a gap, or lay the clips next to each other and then move them apart. Just move the playhead or the skimmer further down the timeline and insert your clip. The gap will be created automatically. The result is exactly the same as FCP7.

If you’re one of those editors who likes to drag and drop from the browser, then use the position tool, and drag and drop wherever you like. FCPX again makes the gap for you.

[David Lawrence] “The beauty of FCP is that you can select this space and delete or close it if you choose to. This is smart, intuitive, and helpful.”

Again, FCPX works exactly the same. Just select the gap and delete it. Smart and intuitive, no? I don’t really see how dealing with empty space is so much faster and easier than dealing with gap clips.

I feel like you’re making the gap feature harder than it needs to be.

Andy

https://www.timesavertutorials.com

[David Cherniack]

[Andy Neil] “You’re starting to look like Premiere.”

Yep, this is a long standing bone that many pick with PPro. I’m sure the Adobe folks are aware of it by now.

David
AllinOneFilms.com

[Neil Goodman]

as far as the selection tools, that doesnt really change the interface, it only adds the toolbar, to the already existing interface, and the tools are totally ignorable. They didnt remove an entire Source window and make the interface completely uncustomaizable.

Neil Goodman: Editor of New Media Production – NBC/Universal

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Neil Goodman] “as far as the selection tools, that doesnt really change the interface, it only adds the toolbar, to the already existing interface, and the tools are totally ignorable. They didnt remove an entire Source window and make the interface completely uncustomaizable.”

All true.

[Jim Giberti]

“Give me the keywords, the metadata, the ability to edit native h264 files, the skimmer, the motion effects, the logic effects in the timeline, the color tools, the timeline index, the ability to filter bins by typing in a search field, and all the other cool things about FCX, but for God’s sake, give me back my tracks.”

This would have been a good email from Steve Jobs to the FCPX development team after the first presentation.

[David Lawrence]

[Jeremy Garchow] “I think your perspective is very limited. Do this with a video clip, and you will see. There is no ripple. And as Andy mentioned, you hold option, and there is no ripple when grabbing a gap.”

I think I have a pretty strong grasp of what’s going on here.

I’m really surprised so many of you don’t see why you’d want to use the position tool to move a gap. Here’s a very simple example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72Pc56peq98

This is a very typical J/L-cut scenario with multiple audio sources. The connected clips are connected to the gap because that creates the correct sync relationship between them. All I want to do is move this connected group by a few frames or so to fix the pacing. I don’t care about overwriting the primary. I can’t use the select tool and holding down the option key doesn’t help. The position tool is supposed to let you place objects anywhere you want so I use the position tool. I think this is a totally reasonable thing to want to do based on the tool’s intended purpose. If you disagree, please explain.

Sorry Guys, I can’t give Apple a pass on this. Destructive behavior like you see in the video is not OK. If it’s not a bug it is without question a design, implementation, and QA failure. I’ll be very curious to see if this gets fixed in the next release.

_______________________
David Lawrence
art~media~design~research
propaganda.com
publicmattersgroup.com
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[Jeremy Garchow]

[David Lawrence] “Sorry Guys, I can’t give Apple a pass on this. Destructive behavior like you see in the video is not OK. If it’s not a bug it is without question a design, implementation, and QA failure. I’ll be very curious to see if this gets fixed in the next release.”

Again, can’t thank you enough for the example. It makes more sense now. In this case, yeah, I think Apple might want to protect the user. Point taken.

But of course, you have to hear me out. 🙂

Now, pretend that gap was a video clip, you couldn’t do what you want to do either without losing a few frames on either the gap (now video) clip or the surrounding clips, so why not just trim the gap a few frames and be done? It keeps the relationship of the video above and audio below.

You could also add that audio below to the primary and connect the video to it. Expanding audio in the primary would allow you to overlap the audio like you have it now. You could even connect the middle blue layer to the gap to keep your cut point of the top most layer, but I can’t see the rest of the timeline so perhaps that wouldn’t work, so ymmv as the kids say.

Thank you, David, for keeping this going.

Jeremy

[Andy Yoong]

[David Lawrence] “This is a very typical J/L-cut scenario with multiple audio sources. The connected clips are connected to the gap because that creates the correct sync relationship between them. All I want to do is move this connected group by a few frames or so to fix the pacing.”

I can think of a few simple other ways of achieve what you are trying to do.

1. Change the point at where the clips are connected by holding down command+option and clicking to a position not on the gap

2. Make the clips a compound clip and then change the connection position by command+option clicking.

3. More of your connected clips could be put into a secondary story line and the positioned within that storyline.

Hopefully this helps

[Andy Neil]

[David Lawrence] “The position tool is supposed to let you place objects anywhere you want so I use the position tool. I think this is a totally reasonable thing to want to do based on the tool’s intended purpose. If you disagree, please explain.”

I agree that the position tool should behave the same with gaps as it does with regular clips. That would keep confusion to a minimum. As I stated elsewhere, I’ve asked as a feature request that gaps be treated exactly like any other generator clip. However, since they currently are not…

There is an extremely easy way to do the operation you’re looking to do by using the trim keys.

Select your gap clip. Use the “<” and “>” keys to move the gap forward or backward by one frame in the storyline. Hold SHIFT to increase the movement to 10 frames at a time. If attaching clips to gaps is something you do often in FCPX, I would encourage you to use this shortcut as it works great.

Andy

https://www.timesavertutorials.com