[Mark Morache]

Roger… can you do this without breaking up the clips or applying the transition to the video as well?

I know you can apply transitions to the video and audio with a keystroke (CMD-T) but I don’t want a transition on the video, just the audio.

[Mark Morache]

Limited in duration? How long?

I’ve been looking for the best way to ride gain on two channels of audio. I generally just need to do this for as long as a soundbite. 20-30 seconds max.

Really easy in FCP 7… Apple, you listening?

———
Mark Morache
Evening Magazine
Seattle, WA

[Mark Morache]

I think if they made a keystroke for crossfading audio, then it would seem more like we have tracks, and remember that we don’t have tracks. There are no tracks in FCP X. You have been liberated from tracks.

For adjusting audio levels, I like using the R key to select a region, and use the cmd+ and cmd- to adjust the audio for that region. But I’m more than miffed that I can’t apply level adjustments on individual tracks, without breaking the clip apart. I think I’ll just need to break the clip apart and then group them back into a group clip.

Another easy thing made more difficult.

Still tryin’ to make it work.

[Mark Morache]

Thanks Craig… that’ll work, but that’s not my favorite solution. Breaking the video from the audio makes it difficult if I want to make any changes later. Why should I have to break the connection between my video and my audio to get the simple cross dissolves I can already get in FCP 7?

That little fader they’ve placed at the end of each audio clip is a thoughtful touch, but there needs to be a simpler way to operate it, or add it automatically.

I understand 2 steps forward and 1 step backward, but with FCP X, it feels like we have 99 steps forward and 99 steps backwards, in addition to about 1000 steps sideways.

Tryin’ to make it work.

–> Mark

[Mark Morache]

I haven’t had any issues with phantom audio bleeding from other clips.

I’ve had luck using opt-2 to make my edits video only. I’ve also been able to go into the audio inspector and drag the volume of the clip down to zero, or deselect the audio checkboxes to turn off the tracks.

You can also break the clip apart into its components, then delete the audio tracks.

Actually now that I think about it, I DID have some strange audio, and I didn’t know where it was coming from.

I went through and soloed clips one-at-a-time until I found the errant clip, expanded the clip so I could see the audio, and saw that an audio clip had been extended.

If this is a bug, you should still be able to find a workaround to isolate that cough. There have been a few times where I’ve replaced a clip with itself, to reset a clip back to its original state.

Good luck.

———
Mark Morache
Evening Magazine
Seattle, WA

[Mark Morache]

I have been wondering about this a lot. For our show, we archive our stories onto tape with 4 channels of audio. We put narration on 1, nat sound on 2, stereo music on 3 & 4.

How do I do this on FCP X?

I think the answer will be in the metadata tags.
Apply the tag “narration” to all the narration tracks. “Music” onto all the music tracks, etc.

In the timeline index, you can use the searchbox to find all the narration clips, select all, click on one in the timeline, and they are all selected. Now you can perform an operation on all of them at once. Pretty cool.

You can solo all the narration, and export an aiff file.
Then solo all the music, and export a stereo aiff file.
Now turn on all of your audio tracks, and disable the narration and the music, and you will have all of your video with just the natural sound of the clips. Export that as a quicktime file.

You can use FCP 7 or Quicktime 7 to assemble the separate files into a quicktime with four channels of audio.

With only 2 tracks, you could pretty easily select one type of sound file to pan left, and pan everything else right to output a split track quicktime.

Of course, in FCP 7 you don’t need the workaround. I can export my 4 channel quicktime with no problem.

Apple’s FCP faq says they’re working on it:

Does Final Cut Pro X allow you to assign audio tracks for export?

Not yet. An update this summer will allow you to use metadata tags to categorize your audio clips by type and export them directly from Final Cut Pro X.

I’ve just edited my second story that will air locally on our show in Seattle. I’m trying to make it work, but I have a buttload of questions for Apple, and I’m hoping they’ll keep the faith and fix it.

–> Mark

———
Mark Morache
Evening Magazine
Seattle, WA

[Mark Morache]

I love it when I discover exactly what I need on the cow. That’s why I’m posting to a two-year old thread.

When I cut on Avid, if I had 2 or three raw tapes with sequential time code, I’d put the entire clips into a sequence, and make the sequence timecode match the clip timecode. That way I could put all of my raw tapes into the source viewer at once, find all my timecodes by typing them in, and never have to hunt for clips or change the source. It was uber-quick.

I’m so glad FCP anticipated that workflow with the Overwrite Sequence Content function.

I’ve memorized the keyboard for insert and overwrite sequence content. With my HDV camera creating 100s of individual clips, it’s still the best way to scroll through your content to find just what you need.

I’m trying to make my fingers learn the default FCP keyboard shortcuts. They exist for just about everything you would want to do.

I do however use the buttons for my customization. I have learned to love the buttons. I now have buttons for insert and overwrite sequence content living on my timeline. How awesome is that?

Mark Morache
Evening Magazine
KING-TV Seattle
FCP, Avid, Sony Xpri

[Mark Morache]

No, that’s not the problem. I’m pretty sure it has to do with some timecode breaks.

Again, I can run through the entire clip in quicktime, but bring it into FCP and it’s truncated. This happened with two different clips.

Frustrating.

———
Mark Morache
Evening Magazine
Seattle, WA

[Mark Morache]

Same thing. Short clip.

I tried opening the clip in quicktime and using “save as”, selecting the reference movie instead of exporting a self contained clip.

I imported this reference clip and it showed the entire length of the file, however, the audio became out of sync after the break.

Arrrgh.

I’m afraid I’ll be forced to redigitize the media without the timecode.

There’s gotta be a better way to handle a clip with a timecode break.

———
Mark Morache
Evening Magazine
Seattle, WA

[Mark Morache]

It’s in the manual… it’s called “Fit to Fill”

Set in and out points on the clip and in the timeline, click the viewer, drag it to the canvas, drop it in the “fit to fill” space.

I just love “fit to fill”. It’ll be your new best friend.

———
Mark Morache
Evening Magazine
Seattle, WA