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The Trial V10.0.6
Posted by strypes
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The Trial V10.0.6 November 02, 2012 06:55PM |
Since the 10.0.6 release, I figured things have changed enough to download the trial to re-assess its suitability for work. So hence, I'm on the trial, after initially deciding I wasn't going to pay for an expensive beta that was the 10.0.0 release (we don't tip for bad service, I don't pay for beta). I'm planning to give it a fair shot. If it's good, I'll buy it and use it for what it's worth, and have an extra tool at my disposal.
One of the reasons I'm trying out FCP X again, is because I hope to use the search tools and organization tools (eg. Keywords, smart collections, etc) found in the software, and that looked pretty good in the Steve Martin presentations. Also, I like the speed that you can insert clips into the timeline, and also the ability to ripple a b-roll sequence in a secondary storyline or a music clip without having to worry about it affecting the rest of the timeline.
Experiences so far:
- I've popped 2 AvcHD cards that I have previously edited in PPro for a half day gig. AvcHD playback is smooth. Smoother than in PPro. Zero lag on hitting play, and this is native (Avchd but re-wrapped to QT). In PPro, I get slightly over a 1 second delay on hitting play, unless the clip has been buffered/cached. AvcHD is not exactly native in FCP X, because the footage needs to be re-wrapped to QT, but that happens in the background, and you can edit while all this is going on, except that you can't see the waveforms, and the thumbnails take a while to load.
- Encountered an oddity when I imported some clips and I shut FCP X, then re-opened the program and the media went offline. The files are all on my local drive, so that shouldn't happen. Initially I thought it went offline because I pulled out the drive with my source mags, but nope, the files would have been on my local drive, because I forgot to set the event to my external drive. But anyway, re-connected the drive, and everything went back. Then I disconnected the drive, and re-opened FCPX and everything was online, so god knows what happened there.
- Popped a clip in the timeline and played with it. There is dynamic trimming, but it's two handed (shift X for extend while it is playing), not the JKL that I'm used to, but I can get used to that. For some odd reason, Apple didn't map play during trim mode to loop around playhead so I suppose I can use the loop around playhead shortcut when doing a dynamic trim. And I hope dynamic trimming is part of the FCP X's way of working, because I'm quite fast with that.
- Waveforms is good. It's instant, like in PPro. Thumbnails seem take a while to refresh, but not too bad. Contrast/color of the waveforms can be improved, but it's kind of useable.
- Now I'm running through the footage in the event browser. I've some 20 odd gigs of AvcHD footage in an event folder. Scrolling in the event browser is a little laggy, not great, but useable with a bit of patience. I'm trying to find an interviewee, located the interviewee, and zoomed in for more precise controls. And presto. I lost my clip there. Need to wade through the footage again to find that clip. Tried zooming again, and I lost my clip again. So I've decided to slowly scroll through the footage to find my clip. Googled the zooming issue. Seems like we need to wait for Apple to fix it.
- I've now found my interviewee again, and I've kept to zoom at 2s to prevent me from zooming and losing my interviewee for the sake of precision when I finally find my clip. Then I realized that markers don't work the same way as they do in the rest of the NLEs. I know I have loads to learn about sorting media in FCP X. And I figured that I can create a keyword collection of selects, so I created a keyword collection and called it "selects", and dragged that clip into it. Then I found another story point, and I dragged that into the selects keyword collection. Now, I need to name the little subclips so I can locate them later (not sure if I'm using the right term, but anyway). Hmmm... Got a problem here. If I rename the clip, all the keyword subclips also get renamed because they came from the same parent clip. Not too good. And I can't extend the subclip in the keyword collection.
I need to learn more about footage organization in FCP X, as not being able to see a list of all the interview points means I can't plot my scene before I start cutting. I have long abandoned the concept of editing from bins in the traditional NLEs as I find it slow and the controls too imprecise for navigating footage.
The good parts of FCP X so far is that the concept of "patching" in FCP X is really fast and simple. No patching of tracks, and I can toggle video or audio or turn both on, and I can choose to attach as a primary storyline or connecting clip, so I don't need to unpatch A1 and A2 then patch V1 to target V2 for a picture-only insert as a Broll.
When dragging a clip in the timeline with the position tool (aka segment mode, aka select tool), I can't see the incoming/outgoing frame. Not a big deal, but I rely on that function to see where i'm actually shifting the clip in FCP, PPro and Avid.
One more point to add, is that if I do an L-cut (eg. Expanding video and audio and extending the head of the audio), then I collapse the video and audio, the L-Cut still exists even though I can't see it in the timeline. So it will still play the extended audio even though the playhead has yet to visibly reach the clip, because the L-cut has been made, except that I can't see it because the clip has been collapsed. Nutty, not a bug, but one of the quirks of the software...
End of day 1. Main gripe is the inabiliy to zoom into the event browser properly. Liking the smoothness of playback. Tomorrow I'll re-import the footage again, but remember to set the event to my external drive.
If anyone has any suggestions or workarounds, do let me know.
www.strypesinpost.com
One of the reasons I'm trying out FCP X again, is because I hope to use the search tools and organization tools (eg. Keywords, smart collections, etc) found in the software, and that looked pretty good in the Steve Martin presentations. Also, I like the speed that you can insert clips into the timeline, and also the ability to ripple a b-roll sequence in a secondary storyline or a music clip without having to worry about it affecting the rest of the timeline.
Experiences so far:
- I've popped 2 AvcHD cards that I have previously edited in PPro for a half day gig. AvcHD playback is smooth. Smoother than in PPro. Zero lag on hitting play, and this is native (Avchd but re-wrapped to QT). In PPro, I get slightly over a 1 second delay on hitting play, unless the clip has been buffered/cached. AvcHD is not exactly native in FCP X, because the footage needs to be re-wrapped to QT, but that happens in the background, and you can edit while all this is going on, except that you can't see the waveforms, and the thumbnails take a while to load.
- Encountered an oddity when I imported some clips and I shut FCP X, then re-opened the program and the media went offline. The files are all on my local drive, so that shouldn't happen. Initially I thought it went offline because I pulled out the drive with my source mags, but nope, the files would have been on my local drive, because I forgot to set the event to my external drive. But anyway, re-connected the drive, and everything went back. Then I disconnected the drive, and re-opened FCPX and everything was online, so god knows what happened there.
- Popped a clip in the timeline and played with it. There is dynamic trimming, but it's two handed (shift X for extend while it is playing), not the JKL that I'm used to, but I can get used to that. For some odd reason, Apple didn't map play during trim mode to loop around playhead so I suppose I can use the loop around playhead shortcut when doing a dynamic trim. And I hope dynamic trimming is part of the FCP X's way of working, because I'm quite fast with that.
- Waveforms is good. It's instant, like in PPro. Thumbnails seem take a while to refresh, but not too bad. Contrast/color of the waveforms can be improved, but it's kind of useable.
- Now I'm running through the footage in the event browser. I've some 20 odd gigs of AvcHD footage in an event folder. Scrolling in the event browser is a little laggy, not great, but useable with a bit of patience. I'm trying to find an interviewee, located the interviewee, and zoomed in for more precise controls. And presto. I lost my clip there. Need to wade through the footage again to find that clip. Tried zooming again, and I lost my clip again. So I've decided to slowly scroll through the footage to find my clip. Googled the zooming issue. Seems like we need to wait for Apple to fix it.
- I've now found my interviewee again, and I've kept to zoom at 2s to prevent me from zooming and losing my interviewee for the sake of precision when I finally find my clip. Then I realized that markers don't work the same way as they do in the rest of the NLEs. I know I have loads to learn about sorting media in FCP X. And I figured that I can create a keyword collection of selects, so I created a keyword collection and called it "selects", and dragged that clip into it. Then I found another story point, and I dragged that into the selects keyword collection. Now, I need to name the little subclips so I can locate them later (not sure if I'm using the right term, but anyway). Hmmm... Got a problem here. If I rename the clip, all the keyword subclips also get renamed because they came from the same parent clip. Not too good. And I can't extend the subclip in the keyword collection.
I need to learn more about footage organization in FCP X, as not being able to see a list of all the interview points means I can't plot my scene before I start cutting. I have long abandoned the concept of editing from bins in the traditional NLEs as I find it slow and the controls too imprecise for navigating footage.
The good parts of FCP X so far is that the concept of "patching" in FCP X is really fast and simple. No patching of tracks, and I can toggle video or audio or turn both on, and I can choose to attach as a primary storyline or connecting clip, so I don't need to unpatch A1 and A2 then patch V1 to target V2 for a picture-only insert as a Broll.
When dragging a clip in the timeline with the position tool (aka segment mode, aka select tool), I can't see the incoming/outgoing frame. Not a big deal, but I rely on that function to see where i'm actually shifting the clip in FCP, PPro and Avid.
One more point to add, is that if I do an L-cut (eg. Expanding video and audio and extending the head of the audio), then I collapse the video and audio, the L-Cut still exists even though I can't see it in the timeline. So it will still play the extended audio even though the playhead has yet to visibly reach the clip, because the L-cut has been made, except that I can't see it because the clip has been collapsed. Nutty, not a bug, but one of the quirks of the software...
End of day 1. Main gripe is the inabiliy to zoom into the event browser properly. Liking the smoothness of playback. Tomorrow I'll re-import the footage again, but remember to set the event to my external drive.
If anyone has any suggestions or workarounds, do let me know.
www.strypesinpost.com
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