Another media manager question

> You can use a program such as "R-Name".

You can't anymore if you're running an OS higher than 10.6.8 Snow Leopard. Lion and Mountain Lion got rid of Rosetta, which allows the Intel-based Macs to run R-Name. There are alternate ways to rename large numbers of files, however.

> What I would do, being a bit less set in my ways now, is to batch rename the clips in the Finder and re-importing them back into FCP.

The downside to doing this is that your final file names won't match what you used in the logging process. It means that either you should capture at online quality, or you need to come up with a system that allows you to recapture the files using the old names, and then be able to rename them with 100 per cent accuracy. This can be achieved if your batch-renaming system has a fixed, unmovable logic to it. For example, if you add "Reel_001_" (substitute actual reel number for "001" ) as a prefix to every clip, and you are completely accurate in the reel names of every clip, and you use the same prefix for every renamed clip (right down to spaces and symbols), then you can re-create those file names at will. I do this when clients or FX artists send me badly named files like "logo" (what logo?), "Comp1" (which comp?) or "final_version" (it's never guaranteed to be final). I add a prefix like "Wells Fargo Logo 101_" or "fx_sc059_" to the clip, while retaining the original bad name as a suffix. My new prefix allows identification of the item's contents, while the old, bad file name allows me to communicate with the file's creator/source, which can be crucial when a client is deciding on a version, or if the FX artist needs to replace the file.

Trust me when I say, naming the files properly at the first stage -- at logging, before ingest/capture -- is the way to do it. You think three seconds per clip is a lot? Wait until you try to conform a project that had to change stations/drives and everything goes offline, and now as the editor you have to figure out if "Clip 158", "Clip_158" or "Clip_158_2" is the correct shot you used in your sequence, out of 10,000 possibilities. Wait until you have to rename the files later because of duplicate names, and now you have to reconnect clips to files whose names don't match the original, and now you have to do every single clip by hand and direct it to a new file name. It takes 30 seconds to a minute to reconnect a single clip whose name doesn't match its file, because you have to verify its identity every time.


www.derekmok.com

>You can't anymore if you're running an OS higher than 10.6.8 Snow Leopard. Lion and Mountain
>Lion got rid of Rosetta, which allows the Intel-based Macs to run R-Name.

Not really. There's a UB version of it, so it's not just PPC code. I'm using it. I have it on my Google Drive too. That will die once Carbon dies. Which means FCP7 will also die. Also, the OP is running FCP6, which will not install in recent OS's due to PPC code used in the installer module. And I have a replacement app for R-Name lined up when Carbon dies, which is from our dear forum friend, Jon Chappell.

I did a Google search and here it is... R-Name UB:
[movieconverter.online.fr]


> It means that either you should capture at online quality, or you need to come up with a system
>that allows you to recapture the files using the old names

Actually, my main method of re-capturing from the source mags is via FCP's "batch capture", which will launch L&T and allow an automatic re-ingest from the files, and that allows batch re-ingesting from the source camera files even if you rename the file names with R-Name. And if you transcode the footage via Compressor, those transcoded files will still carry clip id metadata, so you can batch capture from the source camera mags too.

But I always keep reel name in my file naming system, if not also the original file name if possible. I also preserve timecode and reel name from source. So I have a bunch of very helpful metadata for manual clip by clip relinking, or I can use ReTooled.net's relink tool for an automated relink with metadata.

ReTooled.net's Relink Retooled:

[www.retooled.net]

For drama, my naming scheme is <prj name>_<Episode number>_<Scene number>_<Date of shoot>-<Cam Angle><Card Number>_<Clip number>.mov

I only run into issues with this when I need to use EDL. So I avoid EDL workflows, otherwise, I will simplify the naming system.

So yes, this is one area where I really really like Apple's system for file re-connection.



www.strypesinpost.com

Gerard and Derek, thank you for taking so much time to answer real stupid questions. Well not stupid questions maybe, but questions from someone uhm.. ah never mind.

So now that I know that's it's not only perfectly ok, but the only right thing to do, to spend time and do manual labor renaming each and every shot, I most certainly will. It just seemed at first a job that FCP should do for me, like the v7 way of calling something Reel_xxx_Clip_xxx.

So when I call up L&T next time, I'll call the first clip something like Reel_xxx_Clip_xxx and use the little symbol on the right of the clip name to increment for me (if that doesn't do what I think, some copy and paste plus a number will be fine too). As you pointed out, the name is really meaningless until it might become meaningful at some later point.

And no, I've never cut a narrative film. Right now, it's a documentary and we don't even bring a slate. By the time we put the writing on the board, we might have missed what we intended to shoot in the first place, so that's not an option (at least not for the current project). But yes, it should be the goal for everything else.

Thanks,
Stefan

--
macpro 2x3 ghz dual core intel, 10.6.8, FCS 2

>the only right thing to do, to spend time and do manual labor renaming each and every shot

After you log and transfer them, you can batch rename the clips in the Finder and re-import them back in, so you can do this in batches. Most of the metadata will still remain (reel name, timecode, clip id), except for log notes, so add log notes after renaming the clips. In fact, this was what I was doing before FCP7 came to town.



www.strypesinpost.com

Excellent - I'll give that a try.

Thanks,
Stefan

--
macpro 2x3 ghz dual core intel, 10.6.8, FCS 2