Tonight’s the night

[Bill Davis]

[John Davidson] “Even though we started about a month ago on X, it seems like it was a LOOOOONG month in terms of how much we’ve figured out. It was the same way with legacy FCP. I still cringe when I think about some of the hacks I did to just play back a sequence correctly in the old days.
“

Ah…

That makes perfect sense.

Bravo and congratulations on looking past the first months hassles. Trust me, the deeper into X you get the more you’ll find to love. And yes, you’ll find plenty of other annoyances that have to be overcome – and even some that remain in the “this is more difficult in X” column in the long run. It’s not perfect at all.

But I suspect that you’ll also find what many of us here have discovered –

After a few months, the vast majority of the the big hassles recede (some, like magnetism, so quickly you’ll wonder what the big deal was all about) – and here typically comes a point where if you have to go back to editing on your former tool – you suddenly find yourself deeply frustrated by how slow and clunky the old way seems.

Thanks for the time.

And hopefully, you can talk to those promo guys and get them to send you something other than a (video plus 3-channels of embedded stems) clip!

“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Connor

[Chris Harlan]

[Bill Davis] “And hopefully, you can talk to those promo guys and get them to send you something other than a (video plus 3-channels of embedded stems) clip!
“

Bill, you just do not live in multitrack land, do you? For me, multiple channels is a way of life. And, its a good one. That I can get a single ProResHQ file with all stems attached as split tracks makes my life so much easier than back in the middle part of the last decade when you had to dump them off a DA-88, that I just can’t imagine not having that ability.

[Bill Davis]

[Chris Harlan] “Bill, you just do not live in multitrack land, do you? “

Nope.

My production flow starts at field shooting – and while I often record to two tracks, it’s normally boom and lav or lav and house feed – so I can choose the single mono track I want to actually use – everything else tales place in post and 99% of the time I deliver mono out to avoid stereo image problems and comb filtering.

[Chris Harlan] “back in the middle part of the last decade when you had to dump them off a DA-88, that I just can’t imagine not having that ability.”

I always wanted a Tascam DA-88! Never owned one tho. About the time I started being able to afford to spend that much on audio gear, a large government agency I did a lot of work for installed two of them in their fancy new studio. Less then six months later, ProTools started really taking off – and I don’t think those two expensive 8-track Hi8 tape units ever got used for a single job! Probably $10k spent for something that became a functional boat anchor all too quickly.

Hopefully, the “multi-channel audio” stuff in X that Apple has now formally pre-announced will solve some of your issues with X in the coming months.

We’ll see.

“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Connor

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Neil Goodman] “i def do care.. I’m an editor, the more tools the better, and im not one of those guys hoping for it to fail..thats why i was asking, not to flame bait or whatever…not too mention i payed for it, so yea eventually id like to get my 300 bucks worth 😉 I have a full time Avid gig, but i also do a ton of freelance, which is why i got into Final Cut in the first place. In the event someone asks me to cut on FCP-X you can bet I’m not gonna turn down the job if there paying my rate. Right now i feel like i can cut something in it, IF i had too, but not in the way that i typically cut, which is inevitably what i want. “

Yeah, it’s different, and if it offers no advantage to you, maybe there’s no reason to learn it as it might just be that goofy, I don’t know, it’s a personal preference.

There are some things that are completely missing. A good multitrack audio workflow is a big one for me, but they say it’s coming. A viewer for matching is pretty big, but my guess is that it will be selectable (like the multicam viewer is now) and that will be good. Better trimming window feedback would help. It’s already there, but only when you use a mouse. The trimming “two up” view does not work with keyboard trimming. There’s a few things that aren’t there, and there’s definitely some things that are too simplistic at this point.

But.

There’s a lot that is, and it does work a little bit differently. I can’t tell you if you’ll like it, but I wouldn’t try and make it work like Avid or it just won’t work.

As far as training, there’s a ton. I like Ripple Training, but there’s a lot of others. Lynda Training and Larry Jordan are others.

What I like to do is mess around in fcpx’s superior keyboard editor. You can search by terms, like “trim”, you can press a key on the virtual keyboard and it will show you what it does along with all modifiers. You can also search by keystroke, and by category (like “editing” or “marking”). It takes time, it’s not the most “see/say” way of learning, but it does allow me to learn the terms, and also informs me of what’s possible and then I go and try and test it out. It’s truly poking around.

I have no idea how you work or way you need to do, but organization is big for me, so that’s where I started.

Then I moved to the timeline and all that goes with it. Again, I don’t want tell you what to do, but editing with the position tool on all the time helps to keep things in place while you learn how the timeline moves, hold the ‘a’ (arrow) key to use ripple when you need it.

The color board is different, but I have to say, I really enjoy the quality I get from it, even if it bucks color wheel science.

There’s a lot of fit and finish yet to be done, so you kind of have to go in with an open mind, don’t try and force it to be Avid, you will be able to decide if it’s worth it or not. It might not be, but personally I’m sticking around for a bit to see what happens. Fcs3 is still working for now.

[Chris Harlan]

[Bill Davis] “Probably $10k spent for something that became a functional boat anchor all too quickly. “

Yup.

[Bill Davis] “Hopefully, the “multi-channel audio” stuff in X that Apple has now formally pre-announced will solve some of your issues with X in the coming months.
“

That would be very cool, even if it is just to turn off tracks/channels you don’t want to use. I’m glad it is near the top of the list of things they feel they need to address in the short term.

[Alban Egger]

[Michael Aranyshev] “.In and out points allow for backtime edits. Ranges do not. That’s why they had to add a modifier key – to override the normal behavior. When did they think about backtime edits? Long after most of the app design was in place. What does it mean? The have no idea about editing.
“

Ahem….in FCP7 and I believe other NLEs I need a modifier to drag audio-disconnected from the video for a J-/L-cut. When did they think about J-/l-cuts? Long after most of the app design was in place. What does it mean? The have no idea about editing.

How does a modifier bother you? FCP7 was full of modifiers. FCPX understands in many occasions what you want to do without telling it. In FCP7 you need a lot more keystrokes or clicks to achieve the same results. A modifier is nothing else than a keyboard-shortcut. And in FCP7 I had to press “ssss” and “rr”. In FCPX one stoke is enough or often not even needed.

You say they have no idea about editing, when you mean they didn´t make a program that fits your conditioned workflow.

[Alban Egger]

[John Davidson] “Here’s an example – we had 3 channels of separate sound embedded in a single clip. We wanted to trim (but keep) just one channel and not the others – so we had to break the clip apart to do that. Then in the chaos of editing one clip lost sync with lip flap. “

Suggestion: break apart, and instantly create a compound clip of it again. Now you can step into this clip and fix the audio as needed. You can treat every track your way. If you have several clips just put them all into a compound and treat this section of the timeline that way.
You might also want to add roles to the audio-tracks.

Once done, collapse the compound clip and you have a nice block of finished audio.

In the end break apart the compound clip so you have the roles visible for outputting the different stems.

I have yet to have a sync-problem after 1 year of FCPX in an 8-track universe. Knock on wood…..

[Misha Aranyshev]

[Bill Davis] “Input any three edit points and X does the rest. “

You cannot enter three points in FCPX. There are always four point.

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Michael Aranyshev] “You cannot enter three points in FCPX. There are always four point”

Michael-

This is true, but the functionality is the same. You don’t even need to enter a range on the timeline, you can simply use the playhead as a point (it can be in or out depending on if you want to backtime or not).

If you want to use three points, ether the range on the timeline, then on the incoming clip enter either an in or an out. Yes, a range will be visible but only the in or out is important. If you hit an in, the out will be the end of the clip, just like fcp7.

It looks different, Michael, but it operates the same way.

And if modifiers bother you, how do you do any keyboard editing at all?

You also realize that you can change the keyboard shortcuts to your liking?

I actually find the FCPX default kb shortcuts to be pretty decent, and the shortcut editor is really easy to use and also helpful.

[Misha Aranyshev]

Visual feedback is the part of functionality. Visual feedback ranges give is different from the visual feedback in and out points give. With in and out points it is definite. With ranges it is ambiguous.

Modifiers by itself don’t bother me. Using modifiers in place where no modifier needs to be does.