Towards a better NLE

[Gregor Queck]

Some of his ‘wishes’ can easily be done by keywords and makers. Just saying….

. . .

[Simon Ubsdell]

The reason I think this is interesting is not so much to do with specific features – it’s a more general point.

As editors we are paid to have ideas and solve problems.

So it’s a shame that we tend to approach our software as passive consumers rather than people with ideas who know how to come up with solutions.

Simon Ubsdell
tokyo productions
hawaiki

[Oliver Peters]

A central point he brings up is that most editors think visually. As such, an NLE interface should be designed to accommodate visual organization in a freeform manner. Media Composer partially does that. No other NLE does. Every other NLE (and apps like Motion and AE, too) structure the interface design along a spreadsheet-like grid. You can sort lists according to some alphanumeric criteria, but you can’t simply rearrange frame tiles at will or add some sort of markup to the bin.

– Oliver

Oliver Peters – oliverpeters.com

[Joe Marler]

[Oliver Peters] “…most editors think visually. As such, an NLE interface should be designed to accommodate visual organization in a freeform manner… Every other NLE…structure the interface design along a spreadsheet-like grid. You can sort lists according to some alphanumeric criteria, but you can’t simply rearrange frame tiles at will or add some sort of markup to the bin…”

It’s ironic he said “open letter to….Apple” and “NLE software hasn’t changed in decades” when FCPX entailed vast changes and is by far the closest to implementing his ultimate goals.

Many of the things he was complaining about can be done right now in FCPX, he’s just not familiar with it. Maybe not done the *way* he’s thinking but that’s an implementation detail. Examples:

Bell: “….huge amounts of material, greater and greater every year, more and more cameras..I need to manage this footage…in an effective way…”

FCPX gives him that. I was 1st AE on a documentary that had 230 hrs, 8,500 4k clips, 20 TB of material. FCPX was not perfect; it had various issues but it was far better than when I did large docs in Premiere.

Bell: “need…visual tools….all these clips over here”

What he needs is improved media management. He he’s thinking of it visually — and that’s OK — but it’s not the only or necessarily the best way. This is an old issue that goes back to the origins of database management. This has been debated and researched ad infinitum for many decades. People tend to think of data navigationally or hierarchically, e.g, “Brown” is before “Smith”, or Smith is in nested folders Year/US/State/City. The problem is it’s not effective to design databases that way. Since the 1970s it’s been generally understood that a relational database query/response model is better, more flexible and more scalable.

In the relational model Brown does not exist before Smith, only queries and result sets exist. If you want Brown you request where lastname = “Brown”. Many other criteria can be added such as state of residence, age, etc. This is essentially how the Finder query works. You do CMD+F then start adding query criteria for files. It’s not an unfamiliar concept to Mac users.

FCPX media management generally uses a similar model, although it has Events as a single-level folder.

Walter Murch used a cobbled-together primitive version of this method when he edited Cold Mountain in legacy FCP. He used a Filemaker Pro database to keep track of scenes and clips. He kept Filemaker print outs on his table. He pasted up a physical “Event Browser” next to his desk. In this photo it looks like a crude mocked-up prototype of what FCPX provides today: https://newcdn.transom.org/wp-content/uploads/2005/04/M1246.jpg

Bell wants to make notes per clip. You can do that in FCPX per *range*. Admittedly this currently requires list view. The overall idea of clicking on a clip in thumbnail (or filmstrip) view, then adding pop-up queryable notes seems valid. FCPX could be improved but it supports range-based notes and querying now.

He wants “bin overlays”. What he meant is he wants to selectively filter on clips containing his assistant’s notes. FCPX has this right now in keyword collections and notes. He described it as a graphical spatial implementation but FCPX already achieves his ultimate goal, he’s just unaware of it.

Bell: “I don’t want to always load the clip into the source monitor to see the notes I’ve added”

This was a fundamental design issue on FCPX — to allow rapid browsing of video and metadata without loading each clip into a source monitor. So he can already do that on FCPX if he only knew about it.

He made various remarks about visually organizing clips in Avid’s “Frame View”, which is like FCPX’s filmstrip view shrunk to one frame per clip and without the skimmer. He mentioned drawing on the screen, annotating clips with icon images, scrolling in two dimensions around the frame view window with a mouse. Those are simply one way to browse and organize material — not necessarily the best, only, or most scalable way.

Imagine if a die-hard still film photographer’s only exposure to organizing media was putting prints on a table. He has little notes stuck to them. They are in piles. He’s running out of table space. When describing his ideal computerized version he will tend to think in terms of his limited experience. He might request a computerized version with a larger virtual table he can scroll around faster. He might request computerized post-it notes since he’s using those. It’s unlikely he would envision or request the database organizational system that Lightroom uses today, yet it works a lot better than a 2D scrolling virtual table with graphical post-it notes. Photographers think visually just like videographers. Yet they mange to use database systems like Lightroom to organize, manage and navigate large amounts of content.

The European feature film The Unknown Solder had 500 hours of 4k material (168:1 shooting ratio), and was edited by Ben Mercer on FCPX. He feels strongly that FCPX helped him manage this huge amount of material. Maybe video editors think visually but Mercer had no problems using the spreadsheet-like database features of FCPX. He’d like an enhancement to allow spatially repositioning clips in the Event Browser, but that’s very different from saying “NLE software hasn’t changed in decades”: https://www.provideocoalition.com/art-of-the-cut-with-ben-mercer-on-editing-unknown-soldier-in-fcp-x/

I think if Alan Bell was more familiar with FCPX he could make a more compelling and informed argument. FCPX is not perfect and I’ve had many problems with it. It needs improvement in various areas. But it already provides solutions to several of the things Bell mentioned. Other professional feature film, TV and documentary editors are using FCPX effectively to manage and edit very large projects.

[Oliver Peters]

This is a good summary, but, no offense, I feel like you are making a lot of presumptions about what you think he really wants.

[Joe Marler] “In this photo it looks like a crude mocked-up prototype of what FCPX provides today”

Well this is really just the paper equivalent of a filmstrip view. I’m not really sure that’s at all what Bell is getting at.

[Joe Marler] “What he meant is he wants to selectively filter on clips containing his assistant’s notes. FCPX has this right now in keyword collections and notes”

You can also do that in Media Composer using “custom sift”, just not on a range basis. And different bins can have different views and different sorts/sifts. So, list view for dialogue clips in one bin and frame view for a graphics bin, etc.

[Joe Marler] “He made various remarks about visually organizing clips in Avid’s “Frame View”, which is like FCPX’s filmstrip view shrunk to one frame per clip and without the skimmer. “

The difference is that Avid’s frame view allows things that other NLEs don’t, because thumbnail organization in all other NLEs is snapped to a grid. Not so in MC. There you can freely move around frames like in a lightroom layout and/or bump the more import clips up a bit in the row of clips.

[Joe Marler] “I think if Alan Bell was more familiar with FCPX he could make a more compelling and informed argument.”

That could well be, although Bell works on PCs, so X becomes a non-starter. ☺

– Oliver

Oliver Peters – oliverpeters.com

[Simon Ubsdell]

[Joe Marler] “I think if Alan Bell was more familiar with FCPX he could make a more compelling and informed argument. “

I think you are missing the point he was making.

It’s not that existing NLEs don’t provide the means to access the information – it’s rather than he is looking for a different model of interacting with the material.

He doesn’t (just) want lists and fields as conventionally offered – he wants a much more graphical way of flagging the stuff that’s important to him.

I can understand that this might not appeal to other editors but what’s interesting is that he’s looking at what NLEs could be from a different perspective.

We are very hidebound in the way we think about all of this so it’s good to throw away the blinkers occasionally and imagine other possibilities.

Simon Ubsdell
tokyo productions
hawaiki

[Bill Davis]

[Simon Ubsdell] “I can understand that this might not appeal to other editors but what’s interesting is that he’s looking at what NLEs could be from a different perspective.”

Hummm – where have I heard of something similar?

Oh yes. Pretty much precisely what Mr. Ubillos did seven years ago?

Well, we all know how THAT initially went. ????

The funny thing, is that Mr. Bell has at least one fully realized option that MIGHT provide him a path somewhat closer to a few of the things he’s apparently yearning for – yet he’s apparently managed, like so many, to largely ignore it to date. And of course, it might be 100% frustration and 0% joy if he did.

As busy as he must be – the time to get to that moment when the X system “clicks” for any editor – has been said over and over again to be inversely proportional to the level of that editors prior NLE experience. And so much of X’s strengths are the folding of typical AE tasks closer into the editorial process and the timeline itself – – and he’d have to both learn them (since they are so intertwined with the X experience) and then ignore much of them in order to get to the joys of magnetic assembly that might ease a significant tranch of his work.

For a while, I’ve been seriously thinking X’s future lies squarely in the generation coming up – rather than the generation currently sitting in the “big shop” seats. There will be exceptions, of course, but it requires someone who understands the return available in exchange for that mental adaptation.

Purely because it represents so much required re-learning – and returns too little immediate reward for editors who want to just bolt incremental changes into their comfortable workflows.

Asking for a company to slap a “Browser like” array into an AVID-style interface might be smarter for them than trying to get a long time editor to re-think their editorial flow thinking. And maybe AVID will go there. Good luck to them on walking that balance beam. I wish them well.

After all, Agility is NOT an aspect prized by any “establishment” group.

They tend to prize dependability and comfort.

Time will tell.

Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery.

[Simon Ubsdell]

[Bill Davis] “Pretty much precisely what Mr. Ubillos did seven years ago?
“

It’s almost like you’re saying that because the NLE has been refreshed once it can never be improved upon again.

But I’m sure you don’t mean that.

Come on, guys!!!

You’re brilliant, creative people, brimming with great ideas.

Don’t tell me you can’t think of innovative things to do in the NLE space. Cos I don’t believe you.

Simon Ubsdell
tokyo productions
hawaiki

[Bill Davis]

After I wrote my thoughts down above – I suddenly flashed on the (wait for it!) Fig Rig!

Remember that?

Two time Academy Award Wining director Mike Figis wanted to improve on camerawork, so he partnered with Manfrotto to offer a circular gizmo with the idea that it would improve ease of shooting in at least certain situations.

Kinda turned out fewer people than he likely imagined saw his solution as a huge advance.

Not saying a new quasi X-like Browser thingy bolted into other NLEs might not be the big improvement some might think it would be. But as an X editor, I will note that the REASON the Browser works so well in X is because it’s not a thing unto itself – it’s an ASPECT of a larger scheme that includes the entire RANGE ideas, Keywording, Magnetic Assembly – and more. All integrated into a wholistic thing.

Once upon a time, I was pretty interested in getting some time on a Fig Rig.

The opportunity passed. Oh well.

Just in a musing mood today.

Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery.

[Oliver Peters]

[Bill Davis] “For a while, I’ve been seriously thinking X’s future lies squarely in the generation coming up – rather than the generation currently sitting in the “big shop” seats. There will be exceptions, of course, but it requires someone who understands the return available in exchange for that mental adaptation.”

Those next-gen people will shift to Resolve and HitFilm.

– Oliver

Oliver Peters – oliverpeters.com