[Charlie Austin]

[Andy Neil] “You should be able to just check the box on import that says, “Separate Mono and Group Stereo audio”. Otherwise, you could select all your clips once you’ve imported and in the inspector change the audio configuration to dual mono instead of stereo.”

Correct, it’s a button click away. FWIW, any common attributes of multiple selected files, audio or otherwise, can be manipulated in the inspector.

As to OMF, get X2Pro (LE or Professional) and send ’em an AAF. It works great and will import to most common DAW’s (Logic, ProTools, Nuendo etc) If they insist on an OMF, use Xto7 to bring it into FCP 7, do whatever cleanup needs doing, and export OMF from there. I would add that it is very important to assign the correct Roles to your Audio before you start cutting. You can do it anytime, but trust me, you want to do it in the Event. Do that, and everything is super easy. 🙂

————————————————————-

~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Charlie Austin]

[Oliver Peters] “f you analyze how X is designed and built, it excels at fast-turnaround, news-oriented productions.”

It excels at fast-turnaround anything really. Cutting trailers and TV spots for features really is great in X. I guess I’m in the 2% subset of the “Hollywood 2%” Shane references above that actually prefers cutting in X.

Forgive my rant but… The silly thing here in my little Hollywood niche is how misinformed people still are regarding X. Here’s what it can’t do yet: Allow multiple users to share Events/Projects concurrently. If you need that use MC. There’s this popular belief that X can’t share projects at all though. But X can do sneakernet project/event sharing like FCP 7/Pr quite easily. It requires about 3 extra steps compared to the “old” way, but it’s easy.

I’m not gonna say X is perfect, it isn’t. But most everything, as far as getting your cut done, really does work the same once you get used to it, which isn’t instantaneous. 🙂 X does need 3’rd party apps if you need EDL’s/ AAF’s. A little digression…

X2Pro’s Role handling has made getting elements to a mix so much easier than it ever was in track based NLE’s. I know this doesn’t apply to everyone, but I need to work fast. Pre-X, in FCP 7 or whatever, I’m not spending time when I cut to make sure all my “tracks” are perfectly organized… I’m just trying to make them fit in the timeline so I can see them, complete the cut, and get it to the client. I’m not finishing spots for air/exhibition in X, though lots of people do… As a result, when it’s time for finishing, I need to go back through and spend the time to split everything out nicely. In FCP X, spend 2 seconds assigning Roles to clips when initially importing them, and X2Pro does it with a button click. Still blows my mind. 😉 And EDL-X let’s you edit the source table for the list. That’s huge, particularly when you’re cutting from 5 different versions of a feature with 6 reels in each version and someone forgot to assign reel names to 3 of those features. Not having 001 as the source for 2/3’s of the cut make online editors happy.

Anyway… I think the biggest sticking point to X in “Hollywood” is still the timeline, and all the self-reinforcing company town negativity. I see it right here in my office. I’ve been cutting in X, and loving it, for over a year. Yet some editors here still repeat the “everyone hates it” mantra. And they’re too freaking lazy to spend the time to learn how to cut in X. It’s ridiculous. It’s all the same crap we wen’t through when people started switching to the original FCP. Except there were tracks in everything. People are terrified of the magnetic timeline. But they can’t admit that, so they call it names. lol 🙂

There certainly are some gigs for which X isn’t currently the best choice, just like it was for FCP 7. But I really believe that a lot of the resistance to X in some circles is just the fact that it isn’t the same as everything that came before it. I’ve been editing for almost 2 decades, and was a Post Audio Mixer for years before I started with picture. I’ve worked “professionally” with MC, FCP Classic, ProTools, AudioVision (remember that?), and dabbled in countless other random NLE’s and DAW’s. (I include PPRo here, as I’ve used it, but not for paying work…) I like cutting Video and Audio in FCP X, warts and all, better than any of them. Yes, Clip Connections do require workarounds sometimes in a complex timeline, but it’s no big deal really, and Apple is addressing that stuff.

Back to the original point, use whatever tool suits the gig, and as a freelancer, you really should be able to use them all. But, IMO, aside from some valid technical issues here and there, most of the resistance to FCP X is just stupid.

————————————————————-

~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Charlie Austin]

[Oliver Peters] “This is destructive error within the Event,”

I think a simple “You are about to Change a Master Clip. Are You Sure You Want to do This?’ warning would be a good idea. Along with a “don’t show this again” checkbox. I’d hate to see this function hobbled.

————————————————————-

~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Charlie Austin]

[Nick Toth] “a reminder or other option to help during those late night sessions.”

I think after about 2AM, pretty much everything you do should cause an “are you sure you want to do this?” warning dialog to appear. 🙂

————————————————————-

~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Charlie Austin]

[David Eaks] “Have you been able to access any area of the developer site today? I haven’t been able to get past the log in screen at all today.”

I can get into the bug reporter, haven’t tried the main site… Just checked and got a site maintenance splash screen…

————————————————————-

~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Charlie Austin]

[Jeremy Garchow] “True. I thought that was already mentioned.

Apologies.”

Apologies? What for? 🙂 I better go back and reread the thread… maybe it was mentioned. Anyway, it would be nice to have a V + modifier for video only. 🙂

————————————————————-

~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Charlie Austin]

[Paul Figgiani] “I contacted apple and asked for clarification. Obviously never heard back.
“

FWIW, if you haven’t, you should go here:

https://developer.apple.com/bug-reporting/

and create a free developer account. You may get a better response, and you’ll be able to track your bugs. Would be worth it for a situation like this. It’s obviously not a place to post random feature requests or gripes, they’ll likely be ignored, but actual technical questions/concerns should get addressed…

————————————————————-

~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Charlie Austin]

[Jeremy Garchow] “You can, it just isn’t as immediately available in the inspector.

You can’t do it without breaking apart and disabling the video track. “

Or you can just go to the inspector and set the opacity to 0. No kb shortcut but it’s just a couple clicks…

————————————————————-

~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Charlie Austin]

[Loren Risker] ” might be worth submitting a bug report.”

I would absolutely submit a bug report. They need/want to know stuff like this…

————————————————————-

~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Charlie Austin]

[Marcus Moore] “Of course, I’m arguing in the abstract for an idea that doesn’t exist yet. If they don’t do something with Roles organization in the timeline I’ll be very disappointed.”

I’m with you. And I’ll add that if they don’t do something with Roles organization I’ll be very surprised. 🙂

[Marcus Moore] “there’s no way I’d ever want to go back to Bins from the metadata tagging, Keyword Collections, and Smart Collections way of doing things. Never.”

Me too. I have to pop back and for between X, 7, and sometimes Pr… And while I can understand Lance’s feelings, I have quite the opposite reaction. 🙂 Honestly, I think it depends on what type of program you’re cutting.

[Marcus Moore] “I think the attractive *idea* to me about what FCPX is doing with audio is that once relationships are set up it allows you to completely focus on the picture side of the edit only. In Legacy, cutting picture in a deep A/V structured timeline- you can get bogged down selecting audio elements involved in that picture edit.”

Exactly. This is what now drives me crazy when cutting in track based NLE’s. In X I can focus on just cutting. “I/O -> edit” . Versus “traditional NLE’s: I/O -> figure out where everything needs to go -> reassign tracks -> edit”. I guess if you don’t have a lot of “tracks” to worry about this isn’t an issue, or if you just like working this way. Not me. for any given shot/title whatever, I’ll potentially have 2-6+ stereo audio clips associated below it, overlapping from one to the next. The ability to just drop something into the timeline without worrying about it’s “assignment” saves me tons of time. Of course YMMV…

[Marcus Moore] “The idea of Connected Clips, and Roles- should technically allow for an audio structure that takes more time up front to set up, but saves time on every edit down the line. “

Yep, and it does take a little more time on the front end, but then you’re done, and manipulating/muting/soloing, locating, effecting, selecting various audio elements is orders of magnitude easier than with tracks. You can, of course, do the same thing with tracks, but agian, organizing in tracks is a constant thing, “where does this go?” is a part of every edit decision. I like leaving that part out. 😉

————————————————————-

~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~