[T. Payton]

Shane – I totally hear you. “Technically” Roles are for media stems which means if you want to export differently you need to export with roles options. But send a feature request to Apple as it will make Roles much more flexible and like tracks. Or better yet call them and ask why it didn’t work the way it was expected and make the feature request on the phone.

However, it is pretty painless to disable the clips based on the role, but there is a trick to it. You have to filter the clips in the timeline index based on the Role name. See here:

You don’t need to switch your focus to the timeline to disable clips, just hit V in the timeline index.

——
T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque

[T. Payton]

First let me clarify that this was not a feature film, but a feature length student film. About 2000 edits. 90 ish minutes long, so it is “feature like”. I got the assembly edit that was done in iMovie and tightened the edits (hundreds of l & J cuts), audio sweetened, color correction and a bit of looks. This was not a high end project by any means, but was still a large amount of work.

I’ll share a few of the benefit below, but to answer your question the thing that caused pain was what I call the “database bloat bug”. When a project/event gets over a certain size, between 40-60MB things in FCP X get very slow (at least on my MacPro). And since the database is written with every keystroke and click (hence ‘automatic saving’) , FCP X slows to a crawl while editing. (I was about to bail and go back to FCP 7 several times, but I figured out a few workarounds https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/335/21342#21399 .) I have confirmed this on multiple machines. Here is a bit more info where I outlined some of the issues specifically with this project:

https://forums.creativecow.net/readpost/335/21413

On a positive note here are some good things I encountered:

1-Grouping sections in compound clips
Incredible time saver and helped to organize the project. There were about 25 sections. I could open one at a time and work as needed but still have an eye on the big picture. I can’t imagine working any other way. I see one big timelines of feature films in FCP 7 or Avid and there is no grouping of scenes. I can’t imagine the difficulty of working that way.

2-Adjustment layers for applying grades
This was again an incredible time saver. For each location, I applied a basic look to the adjustment layer and then tweaked an individual clip as necessary. When the director asked to make a flash back sequence look more romantic and less contrasty, it was a matter of changing one adjustment layer.

3-Roles
Since I was doing the sweetening in FCP X, I created audio Roles Dialog, SFX, Music, and Ambient. Video roles for Effect Shots, Adjustment Layer, and Titles. I could easily solo a role, or highlight as I made a sweetening pass. The roles can be turned on and off regardless if the role resides in a compound clip or not. Which meant I could be on the master timeline where I was viewing the major sections and still toggle roles. Very cool.

4-To Do Markers
These made revisions from the director almost fun. 😉

5-Magnetic Timeline
After the first or second full review by the director (I supplied those on DVD, no chapter markers for scenes was a big negative BTW). There was a scene that needed to be shortened and rearranged. In FCP 7 this would have been a terrifying task and taken considerable time. In FCP 10, it was effortless. It was so easy that it emboldened me to be very free in trimming a few frames here and there rather than thinking it was going to be a daunting task to make a proper selection to remove a frame from a shot. The only gotcha is that I needed to trim or extend the compound clip in it’s parent because the in out point of the compound clip is set in the parent.

6-Secondary Color Correction
I was a heavy Color user and while FCP X only has a small subset of features from Color, the secondary color correctors in FCP X are wonderfully easy and always real time. Correcting for light spill with a mask, adding a linear gradient to a sky and some tweaking a big of color with a range was wonderfully fast.

7-Using and Stock Footage, Music, etc.
In FCP 7 I have had to been meticulous organizer of assets for stock footage, needle drops or stills. Carefully copying them to the project assets folder and then importing them into FCP 7. I used digital haven’s “loader” in recent years to help with this. However in FCP X there is no need since I was letting it organize my footage with “copy to File Cut Pro Event” enabled. I would download whatever, drag it to my event or the timeline and get back to editing. I only had to transcode some public domain FLV footage, but all other media types came in without transcoding.

8 – Auditions
I used auditions on all my effect shots so I could flip back and forth between the original shot and the effect shot in the timeline. Kept things very clean and tidy in the timeline and it was a nice way to show the director shots.

In summary, I believe FCP X could handle a feature length project without much issue, that is when Apple deals with the database problem. Of course when it came to spitting out an ELD for conforming, that is another issue altogether.

I hope this helps.

——
T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque

[T. Payton]

Haven’t had this problem. Sounds like you might have a corrupted audio file in there somewhere. I would try to isolate it by disabling clips with “v”.

[T. Payton]

[Lance Bachelder] “Not sure what you mean by PPro being much more of a Swiss Army knife than FCPX”

This is another can of worms. I’m sure Shane could speak at length about this. But FCP X just isn’t there as a serious production tool able to handle many different workflows. Features like broadcast monitoring, tape import/output, EDL, XML, OMF Import/Export, batch export, Proper handling of anamorphic Footage, etc. PPro also has extensive codec support.

I know FCP X could and will have some of these features (and I hope it does!) but it is not there yet.

BTW. I really like FCP X alot, and for my workflow it is working well (no tape, 90% of work ends up on the web, simple collaboration needs), but it is obvious that it is not as flexible as other NLEs.

——
T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque

[T. Payton]

For non complex projects* I have been editing right in compound clips in an event. I keyword them as “Sequences” and I duplicate just like I would in FCP 7.

The other way to make revisions is through auditions. Grab an entire timeline (or part of it), compound clip it and then duplicate as an audition.

If you have a complex project, then keeping your timeline in a project and duping that is the way to go with versions.

*Complex Project – at this point in FCP X 10.0.2 and on my every Mac I have tried, any “Currentversion” of a Event or Project that is over about 30MBs. That could be a 2 minute or 10 hour timeline. Once you start creating compound clips, or duplicating as auditions you’ll see the current version literally double each time you do it, and currently that nasty bloat bug slows FCP X down to a crawl.

——
T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque

[T. Payton]

You’re right FCP X rendering on the timeline is slower than FCP 7 (and others). Mainly because it is rendering in very high quality float (not 24 bit or 32 bit but “float”). Render time is also compounded because when rendering the timeline it doesn’t utilize the GPU. However, when exporting FCP X does use the GPU to render and it is about 10x as fast as rendering on the timeline (yes 10 times as fast). Here are some test: https://fcp.co/forum/4-final-cut-pro-x-fcpx/2175-looking-for-a-reason-to-actually-render-in-fcp-x

Most of my clients review proofs on YouTube, and I am frankly shocked at the speed of FCP X. I never render my timeline, no matter the codec, I just export and it is about 1.5x times real time including upload. So for a 5 minute video, from the moment I click “Share to YouTube” until I back to working, 7 minutes. And I’m on a 2006 MacPro.

I haven’t tested Premier Pro, but I hear it is quite fast.

Concerning the “not professional”. That is a big can of worms. However in my book a screwdriver can be a professional tool, not because it has a ton of features, but it is dependable reliable and becomes an effortless extension of the person using it. FCP X “can” do nearly anything (I worked on a students feature length film this fall. It worked but was painful.) But I would not consider FCP X a “professional tool” not because of the lack of features, but because of it not being dependable and has many omissions. The crazy thing is that I can recognize it’s brilliance, and I can see great potential, which is drawing me to it. I did a project a month ago, editing in FCP X on set, did several revisions with posting on YouTube for the client, and FCP X was glorious. Not a single hangup! Unbelievably good! But not all projects go that way. With my current projects I afford a bit of a learning curve and a bit of downtime, so I am quite content learning FCP X and seeing what pans out. However, if I had a very large production and lots of people depending on me, I would be a fool to use anything less than the most dependable NLE I could find.

With that said, I would encourage you to test both Premier Pro and FCP X on a project. Adobe does an excellent job on their products, and Premier Pro is much more of a swiss army knife than FCP X. Both can do the job, but you need to determine if the hope of FCP X is worth hanging around while Apple fixes it.

——
T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque

[T. Payton]

Speaking of rendering time. I would also try to delete the render files and then just export without rendering. I’ve found on my projects that rendering takes about 10x as long compared to just exporting, plus if your trouble is with render files it might resolve it.

——
T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque

[T. Payton]

Did you try adding the audio only cross fade to main storyline without detaching the audio? That transition that Alex made wa meant to be used without detaching audio.

——
T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque

[T. Payton]

I just check this and actually the waveforms in STP were computed when filters were added to the “action list”, but only after you applied a filter, not while adjusting parameters, and it was a much slower process. The waveforms in FCP X redraw while you adjust parameters.

I just did a quick test and FCP X seems to compute the waveforms about 3x as fast as the beloved STP.

——
T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque

[T. Payton]

James,

Are you still having trouble? It looks like you had some replies on your other thread. I grabbed some 8 channel p2 footage, and I can make you screencast showing the workflow if you would like. Let me know.

– T.

——
T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque