Brett Sherman
7
COW Coins
Forum Replies Created
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This is great. I’ve thought about doing something like this, but don’t know AppleScript well enough. Would you be willing to share the AppleScript so I can see how you’re doing it?
Ideally, I want to be able to enter a project name. Have it create a library, have it create a media folder with the same name, and import from the camera cards connected to the computer. Maybe even add Finder tags to the media folder.
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[Oliver Peters] “It’s films that gave us 24fps, rightly or wrongly. And try as the industry might, the majority of people still seem to prefer that visual experience. Understanding film technology helps engineers to add that (and other technologies) to the video feature set.”
Yes the difference between 24 fps and 60 fps gives a different aesthetic. But what about 30 fps? I actually think this example says something different. I doubt the end viewer could even perceive the difference between 24 and 30 fps. So then the question becomes “why do films continue to be shot in 24 fps?” The number one reason is inertia. Whole workflows have been developed for 24fps. To change to 30 fps would be costly for little to no gain. The second, much lesser reason, is that 24 fps has become synonymous with quality because film was superior to video for many decades. Including when many of those who work in the field started out.
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[Oliver Peters] “For most editors who work in news, commercials, corporate – if they started in the tape days – the starting point was a tape operator. …
I think today, people entering the field come from a more rounded background, where the experience isn’t just editing. It’s a combo of production, graphics, and post. So that starting point is varied for the majority of the business.”
+1. I’ll also add to that rounded background, more general communication experience including mastery of social media, tweeting, writing, communication strategy, etc. What people on the board may not like to hear is that I think there is a convergence of communication tasks going on that encompasses video as part of it. It takes time to develop these skills in addition to video skills. That mythical kid who got his first camera will have a difficult time breaking in in this environment also. Yes, there will always be room for specialists at the high end. But it’s easy to forget that communication is the goal, not producing the most technically pure video.
And this evolution isn’t all good. Artistry takes a hit. Methodical planning of productions takes a hit. Time to work an individual production takes a hit.
But a look at job postings show this is what employers are looking for. The number of job listings in my area that require multiple talents far, far, far outweighs specialized job offerings. It could be I’m in a unique area. Or it could be that I’m in a non-LA, non-NY area.
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If you’re talking about an Adjustment Layer available in FCP X. You create a Text template. But ONLY delete the text, not the background layer. If you delete the background layer it won’t affect underlying video.
But I’m wondering why do this. Would you not be better off making a FCP X effect template. You could still apply that to a “blank” Adjustment Layer. You’d have the option of applying it directly to the clip or using an Adjustment Layer.
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If I’m understanding you correctly. You can accomplish the same thing in Motion by creating a Group. And putting everything under it within that Group folder. You can then apply motion and effects to the Group. It’s actually more powerful than an Adjustment Layer in that you can determine exactly what is affected and what is not. If you don’t want the bottom “background” layer to be affected, don’t put it in the Group.
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I have a simple “Position and Scale” Motion Template I made. You could apply that, then apply the letterbox effect on top. The reason the regular transforms don’t work is that they are applied at the end of the chain. Having a Motion Template allows you to set the order of effects.
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[Oliver Peters] “Logic Pro X has a companion mixing and control app that runs on an iPad for use in tandem with a Mac running Logic. Why is there no equivalent app from Apple for FCPX?”
One thing about Logic Pro is that if you’re recording yourself, you’re usually not next to the computer so it is enormously helpful to have a remote control panel. Secondly you’re making audio changes, which means you don’t need to look at the screen, you only need to hear what you are doing. With video you have to see what you are doing, so you can’t look down from the screen.
I do think with FCP X there would be uses for an iPad screen. But as many have said, not so much as a replacement for tactile controls, but rather an information screen. For example, with the new time-synced captions, it could show you the text of the timeline which would allow you to quickly jump to a specific word by touching it on the iPad.
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Modifying Motion templates is going down a big rabbit hole! I don’t think there is any easy answer to your question. Because of grouping and linkages it can get really complicated, it just takes a lot of time to figure out how they are accomplishing things. A good working knowledge of Motion helps a lot.
I don’t know why copying and pasting into the new scene isn’t working. I would double check that the Fade-In, Fade-Out effect also got moved. Start with disabling that, then check position coordinates (zoom way out to see where in 3D space the text is.) It maybe looks like they are using Spin and Grow/Shrink to move the text. So you’d have to alter those parameters.
I hope this helps a little.
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[Walter Soyka] The advantage of a precomp is that it IS a separate, project-level container.
To me that’s not an advantage of a Precomp, but rather an advantage of being able to have multiple Compositions within a Project, which everyone admits is a weakness with Motion. In Motion, you can solo a Group Layer and set your view to an orthogonal view which is basically the same as working with an isolated Precomp in AE. Or you can edit it in context of everything else in the Composition. AE works only in one way.
[Walter Soyka] The latest release of After Effects includes a massive new feature that will totally change the way people work in Ae, once people start discovering it: master properties. You can expose some properties inside of a precomp as external properties when it’s used as a layer in other comps. Essentially, you can now instance and rig comps inside of Ae:
Interesting. This is a powerful feature. If a bit time-consuming to set up. For repeated uses this is great.
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[Warren Eig] “I’ve moved to storing the Library on my RAID for that very reason. Goes against all conventional wisdom.”
Select the library in the Browser window. On the parameters tab where it says Library Properties, click the “Modify” button under Storage Locations. Select wherever you want to store media and render files (cache). Pretty simple.