[John Burgan]

Check your project file size. If it’s above 10-12Mb, you need to slim things down and adopt a different workflow.

Break the project down first into Media/Edits, then further down into chapters/acts/interviews, whatever seems most logical. Also weed out redundant edits by archiving them, keeping the project with your main edit up to date and as lean as possible.

There’s no problem for FCP to have multiple projects open simultaneously, you can copy, cut and paste between them.

Also, make sure that you regularly save your projects using the “Save As…” dialogue, forcing the whole file to be re-written from the ground up on a regular basis. Apparently months of saving to the same file is a recipe for corruption, and simply backing up a buggy file is no insurance against losing your work.

[John Burgan]

Hi Chris

Skype is similar to iChat and is basically (freeware) internet telephony/instant messaging with a file transfer function. It’s multi-platform and the Windows version already has a video version. Take a look at the website link I posted earlier, it’s fairly self-explanatory. Easy to set up, it works best with broadband.

Here’s a Wikipedia article
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skype

PS I was asking about Pan Zoom, I’ve had a look already and like what I see. Need to test it a bit more first, but was impressed by the positive feedback here.

[John Burgan]

Try a reboot, then trash your prefs if that doesn’t work. Make sure your sequence settings are correct too.

[John Burgan]

Incidentally, if both parties have broadband it would so much easier to use a VOIP app like Skype (www.skype.com) to do super quick and easy file transfers without having to make them small enough for email. Export scene to Photo JPEG codec and press send, that’s it. Skype runs on Mac, Windows, Linux etc and is freeware.

Of course you’d have to persuade your client to give it a go in the first place. But it could be the way to go.

[John Burgan]

Thanks for all the feedback folks. Sounds like a very good plug-in.

[John Burgan]

Window menu > timeline or Apple 3 on the keyboard

[John Burgan]

320×240 is the right size. You just need to use the default Offline RT Anamorphic Easy Setup and there will be no need to fiddle around at all with settings.

[John Burgan]

You don’t need to go through every bin chronologically: follow this method.

Take half of your stuff offline (alphabetically, whatever seems logical) and see if you can load up; if not, exit FCP and take the stuff that was offline online, and the material that was online off again (in other words swap). You will then see which half of the material is causing the problem. Repeat, always dividing the material 50/50 to narrow down where the problem is.

Of course this works quickest when there is only one or a few corrupt clips, but at any rate it’s quicker than going through each bin separately.

[John Burgan]

Try opening the most recent Autosaved version of your project.

You may also find this article helpful:

https://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/restore_corrupted_project.html

[John Burgan]

BTW hello Chris – didn’t see it was you. And there’s me going on like a cracked record 🙂