FCP doesn't see clip name when reconnecting (v. 6.0.6)

We're editing a feature on 2 machines, FCP 6.0.6. no SAN, shuttling / duping footage, etc.

Yesterday I broke down dailies, and gave the drive to the other editor to pull/ dupe onto his drives. He pulled the new clips and bins onto his internal drive, and then reorganized the clips on the external drives, since a new drive had come in.

So, there's a set of clips on his internal drives, and a duplicate set on the external drives. All drives are new. We did not change clip names in any way.

Today, neither his machine nor mine can reconnect the media to the clips I broke down yesterday. We used the Finder to verify that the clips did live on a valid drive (an internal in his case; a new external in mine) - but when we try to reconnect, the dialog box shows that FCP is looking for the old *drive* name, instead of the clip (name) we selected from the bin.

Is this a bug? Why would FC look for a bin name, instead of a clip name?

Thanks!!

Have you tried to manually reconnect a clip?

Noah

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Can you take a snapshot of the FCP dialog box?



www.strypesinpost.com

Yes, in fact, that was our preferred method - is there another dialog box we are missing?

Or am I misunderstanding you?

Also, we are using Prores 422, in case that matters...

Sure - I'll go grab a pic of it ...

Yeah, I second the request for a screenshot. Your description was really good, but for whatever reason related to my overall dumbness, it's not clicking in my head.

Lemme see if I get these details right:

Quote

Yesterday I broke down dailies, and gave the drive to the other editor to pull/ dupe onto his drives. He pulled the new clips and bins onto his internal drive, and then reorganized the clips on the external drives, since a new drive had come in.

So you had a bunch of Quicktimes on a Firewire, which you handed to another editor. That editor copied them (in the Finder, presumably) to his internal drive, then in turn copied them to another Firewire? Is that right? (I'm not trying to act all incredulous here; it's a reasonable workflow. I just want to be sure I follow.)

Quote

Today, neither his machine nor mine can reconnect the media to the clips I broke down yesterday.

Are you talking about the first Firewire drive, the one you handed to the other guy? Let's call that one Firewire A. You had Quicktimes on your system (Edit 1, let's call it), which you copied to Firewire A. Then they were copied to Edit 2, and from there to Firewire B. So do I follow you that today you can't get Final Cut to connect to the media on Firewire A?

Quote

but when we try to reconnect, the dialog box shows that FCP is looking for the old *drive* name, instead of the clip (name) we selected from the bin.

This is the part where I think I got lost. Final Cut (as you probably know) uses full path names to identify media. If your drive is called Firewire A, then Final Cut will look for the media at /Volumes/Firewire A/Mag A01/Clip A01S01T03.mov, or whatever. If you move the clip to another drive, Final Cut will still look for it in its original location, even if Firewire A isn't attached to your system any more.

Typically, the way I work, I might move folders of media around, but I don't typically move individual media files themselves. That's not a law or anything, just a tendency based on how I manage media. So when reconnecting, I'll give Final Cut a search path that points to the new location where I copied the folder full of media, and just tell it to find the Quicktimes itself. This works for me, because typically in my workflow I typically deal with whole folders of media (or mags, or bins, or whatever term you prefer to use for them). So Final Cut just has to discover that "Oh, these files used to be over there, but they're here now, okay, I'm cool, let's get back to work."

Anyway, I might not be following your description very well (see above, re: overall dumbness), so a screenshot of the media reconnect dialog would be awesome.

Here's the screenshot, hope it's not to small - I had to post it to flickr, and then rip it the ID off the 'view' ... heh



So yes, I think you understand me... I sent the media on external drive "A" - the other editor duped the media onto his internal... Now the other editor can't link to the (correct) media on his internal drive, and neither does my machine find the same/correct media on the newly-organized external drive "B". External drives are FW 800. We are cutting in prores 422.

Instead of, say, locating and reconencting sc 128-1, the dialog box is searching for clipname "Drive A" (for ex), instead of sc 128-1 (as the object of the search.)

Gosh, I'm really sorry, but I can't read that screenshot. So I can't really get anything useful from it.

Under the "search single location" pop-up, choose "Add search location." Then point Final Cut at the folder where the media is. Then click the "search" button. Final Cut should find the media files.

(This works best if you select all the offline media first, then tell it to reconnect.)

Right, so I'll have to ask the other editor how he moved the files. I suspect he pulled whole folders, but maybe not.

Anyway, we normally reconnect manually - I've seen FC get lost before, but in those cases the clip name in question was still listed correctly in the search section of the dialog box... then I might step through the new path, showing FC the new neighborhood, so to speak... we've never seen it list the original drive as the search object, instead of the clip name...?

But I will ask about the folders issue...

back soon...

Okay, it is too small to see the words...

If it's what I'm thinking of, I'm suspecting it's a project file corruption. try digging out the last autosave version and launching that. Make sure you duplicate your project file first.



www.strypesinpost.com

I will try that - thanks!

Ooo, I will try that autosave idea.

Meanwhile, I tried that "Add search location" idea. The problem is, even though I started by highlighting 128-1 in the project, FCP is trying to reconnect "FW Drive A"...

Ok - he did move the folders only. So that part is good.

He was finally able to reconnect individual clips totally manually, but only after removing the "by name" option in the reconnect dialog box... So now we're a bit concerned about losing the metadata per clip (this show is originating on film, and then going back to film (via DI.))...

I think you be fine regarding your metadata.

Now that you have your clips re-linked, select one, right-click and choose reconnect media. In the dialog box, does it show the proper name for the clip, or is it showing that drive name again?

If it's showing the proper name, then I don't think you need to worry any further. Just cancel out, and continue editing. Chalk it up to FCP/Finder weirdness.

If it's still showing the drive name instead of the clip name, then try this:

Cancel out of the reconnect media dialog.

Select all your online clips in your project.

Right click and choose: Rename file to match clip. FCP will warn you that you're changing the media at the Finder level. Hit ok.

If the clips in the browser have the same name as the media on the drive, you will force a reset of the names which should reset the connection between the browser clips and media.

I think something happened when the clips were moved and FCP became confused as to what the names of the clips were supposed to be.

Andy

This kinda problem had popped up several times here and on other forums and as said above FCP uses a hardwired link to the files which might it make complicated if not the same folder/file structure is available.
One way (as always ) is XML and a little free app of mine.
[www.spherico.com]
[www.spherico.com]
It does a bit simpler approach than FCP it only looks for a matching folder path rather than files. So you can replace the paths in the XML more or less automatically and then open the XML.

Andreas

P.S.
It's a good idea to the "Save with XML" button activated all the time.

Some workflow tools for FCP [www.spherico.com]
TitleExchange -- juggle titles within FCS, FCPX and many other apps.
[www.spherico.com]

Thank everyone! Super great info! Much respect!

Sorry I didn't find the previous threads - I looked before posting - I must have used weak keywords in my search...

Great to know the metadata is OK...

We will follow all your suggestions...
Thanks again!