*sigh* This part of editing has been sooo stressful. Why? Because I know what the problem is but I can’t find a way to avoid it and make the dang error messages go away.

On the Apple FCP X Discussion site there are several postings about this same problem that and Internet searches turn up numerous hits about it too, but so far I have been unable to find the solution to “fix” it.

Workflow that creates problem:
Click on clip in the Event window and ensure there is a handle on each end. It can be a whole clip or just a portion of one but have a handle on each end.
2. Drag clip into the Project Time Line. *plunk*
3. Repeat step 2 for the second clip. Note: each of the clips can be long, say > 10 seconds.
4. Select the Transitions window then select Cross Dissolve (my default is 2.0 seconds long)
5. Drag the Cross Dissolve into the Project window and spot it between the two clips.

At this point two things can happen:
(a) the Cross Dissolve is inserted and everything is great, or……
(b) an error message comes up that says: “There is not enough extra media beyond the clip edges to create the transition.”

Sometimes things work fine and sometimes they don’t. And when they don’t the error message says:
“Do you want to overlap (ripple trim) your media to create the transition? This will decrease the total duration of your project.” The error message provides two options:
“Cancel” or “Create Transition”

The clips are long, much longer than needed for the transition, so there is something else going on.
The clips appear to abut eachother and according to the procedure of dragging and dropping a clip the application is supposed to make them abut automatically and I trust that it does because even when zooming in it looks like they abut. However, when the cursor is placed between the clips I don’t get the double yellow symbol on each of the ends where they are supposed to join and this concerns me. In this one case the left clip is red on the right end and the right clip is yellow on the left end. The red end denoting there is not enough clip media available to make the transition.

Question:
Why isn’t there enough media available? Before it was copied from the Event window there was a handle on each end and now the right end is red. What gives? How do I fix this?

FYI: Same problem I have: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3869020?start=0&tstart=0

Hi John,

Before you add a transition between clips, such a simple dissolve you need to make sure you have enough extra footage or "handles" on your clips.

For example if you want a 2 second transition between two clips, you should have one second or more of extra footage at the end of the first clip, and another second or more of unused footage at the beginning of the second clip. The extra footage available before and after your edit points are the handles. If this extra footage is not available then Final Cut X will give you the option of creating the the transition by overlapping footage that is already in use on the timeline.

You may already understand this, if not, I hope I haven't added any confusion.

Kevin - I've read the gist of this before but the way you explained it is a lot clearer. There are a few things that confuse me or leave me wondering about the "one second rule."

1. Does the "one second" have to be inside or outside the handles?

2. If the one second has to be outside the handles, then if one selects the ENTIRE clip in the Event and pastes it in the Timeline, then I would assume there would be no room for a Transition (assuming no ripple)?

3. If one wanted basically the whole clip with the plan to put a transition on both ends, then one would have to very carefully select the clip and leave behind (i.e., sacrifice) one second on each end. This would really slow up the editing process. In this case it would be nice to somehow select the clip in the Event section and specify there will be a clip at one end or the other, or even both, and have the application make one second available. But isn't this what is happening when I make sure there are handles on each end?

Just for fun I'm going to do a trial and error on the idea of taking only a piece out of the interior of a clip and make sure there is the second at each end and see what happens. With one of the clips I was sure that is what was done but I'll go back and make sure.

Just finished running a test and it appears "the one second" has to be outside the handles.

Went to the Event section and took a section of a clip then put it in the Timeline.

To determine "the one second" I used two indicators, the one in the middle of the desktop and above the Timeline that indicates minutes, seconds, and frames, and the timer in the Event section that shows up in the clip. The latter one is more difficult to read because it is small but the location is better because that's where the curser is. I'll have to work these two for a bit to see which one is the easiest to work with.

Anyway, I actually worked with two clips by just grabbing a part of them, making sure the one second rule wasn't broken and they both took the transitions just fine. Wa-hooo!

I hate to say how much I worked on this problem but it was more than it should have been.

Thanks for the help, Kevin.

Can't wait to find out what my next editing problem is going to be!

Yes, I think you misunderstood handles at first. The handles are the extra, unused portions of a source clip in the Event Window that are not used in the Project. If you have a 10 second source clip, then select, say, the center 6 seconds and drag that 6 second portion into the Timeline, then you have handles - extra unused footage outside the portion being used. If you drag all 10 seconds of the source clip into the Timeline then you don't have any handles. If you select and use the first 6 seconds, then you will have a handle at the end of the clip in the Timeline but not at the start.