FCP sound preview

Hi

I like editing to music. It often surprises me how differently things turn out
when your cruising to a track instead of silence.

My problem is that I have so far not found a way to preview tracks with FCP
without having to first import them. I want to load up the video, go to import,
files folders, sound track pro content, tracks, and click on them to preview
which ones I want to try without having to import it. At the moment that
click is the only sound I hear unless I import and load it to the timeline.

Is there anyway I can preview ? Thanks for any responses

FCP is not the most convenient place to just listen. Use iTunes, or Soundtrack Pro itself.


www.derekmok.com

Aroo? I must misunderstand the question. Cause what you described is precisely how it works. You go to the File menu, Import submenu, Files option, then navigate to the folder of choice and click on files to preview them. Works with both audio and video media.

Well that's what I thought but when I click on the wave its silent.
I have to import to FCP to hear it play.

Well thanks for your responses and I appreciate any input, I have been
trying to get an answer for this for some time and just work around it.

But to clarify.
Everything works for preview on both sound and video (as you say)
as long as I do not try to preview the file via FCP browser.
All other apps including motion. STP. Itunes you name it has no problems.
But with FCP. no. I am astonished and Pluge

What I do is instead of importing, I just navigate to the folder in Finder. I click on the audio file I want to preview and press the space bar. Finder will open a preview window and play the clip. You can use the arrow keys to go up and down each audio file and preview them just as you described. Press space bar to close the preview window and just drag the file you like into your bin in FCP.

On the show I'm working on now, I find that some of the editors are bent on making "music projects." While I understand the benefits of having a bunch of music already in an FCP project, I think it's easier to preview music in Finder as I described above. Even if your music is already in FCP, you have to double click on the clip and play it in the viewer. In finder you just hit spacebar once and use the arrow keys up and down.

-Matt

iTunes is much better at this job. You can embed metadata, do conversions (MP3 to AIFF, WAV, etc.), make separate playlists, and navigate using the keyboard. And when you want to copy files, you can drag directly from a playlist or the library onto an OS folder location. Previewing in Finder is good for video files, but awkward and slow for audio, in my view.


www.derekmok.com

Quote

And when you want to copy files, you can drag directly from a playlist or the library onto an OS folder location.

You know how you can use a tool for years and years, and then sometimes somebody will come along and nonchalantly mention how that tool does X and you had no idea that it could do X?

This is one of those times.

> You know how you can use a tool for years and years, and then sometimes somebody will come
> along and nonchalantly mention how that tool does X and you had no idea that it could do X?
> This is one of those times.

Ha ha...you know when I found that function? Last year. Same damn thing. I used to Reveal-Drag-Reveal-Drag. Really dumb way to do it.


www.derekmok.com

Derek, I also didn't know I could do that. I'll give it a try...

and even better .. you can drag and drop the files straight from iTunes onto Digital Heaven's Loader tab
[www.digital-heaven.co.uk]

Another idea:
Open in Quicktime Pro.

I use Quicktime to quickly zip through audio tracks, as I find the scrub bar in the Finder (described above) to be a little small on a longer audio track.

Treatment