Real World FCP-X.

[William Hohauser]

I seem to remember that I was able to apply a copied preset to a selection of clips but as my edit station is not in front of me I can't verify that until later. I am starting a new 30 sec. HD commercial project today on X that has to be delivered for weekend broadcast tomorrow, wish me luck.

[William Hohauser]

The commercial is edited and running as we speak. I didn't get a chance to try to paste a color correction across a series of clips but I did try to copy an adjusted audio filter to two audio files and couldn't do it. The audio filter really helped the voice over so I typed in the adjustment values but I would have preferred to copy and paste ala FCP7.

FCPX is not great when it comes to building a project to an audio file as I had to leave a gap clip over the audio track for the entire edit or the edit would collapse in weird ways when it was removed. Layered video tracks don't take transitions unlike layer tracks in FCP7 unless you turn them into compound clips.
This could be solved by having a choice of replacing gaps only where you drop the clip even if that means there's still gap fillers on either side of the clip. This would keep the project the same length. Some of the included blur transitions worked great so I was happy to have them available and I used a couple of filters to give some very flat graphics a breath of life.

Edit rating FCPX versus FCP 7: 60/40
Plus: built in audio and image filters, built in transitions, clip scrubbing and favorite marking.
Minus: track layering needlessly hobbled

[Michael Wisniewski]

William,

When you say you used a "gap clip over the audio track for the entire edit" do you mean that you put the gap & video clips on the main storyline with the audio as a connected clip?

Just trying to understand, I feel like I'm doing the exact same thing but completely different, by putting the audio on the main storyline as the base of the edit and then using a secondary storyline to place the video.

[Craig Seeman]

Originally Posted by Charles Newcomb

Yes, I understand that. But I would still have to apply those presets to each individual clip, rather than having them applied automatically if I had the presets on a track.

It's not impossible to work around. It's just not as well thought out as some of FCPX's other features.

There's keyboard commands to apply color correction from previous, two edit prior, three edits prior. You can also Copy and Paste Effects although that copies everything if you have other effects. Also have you tried creating a Compound Clip of all the targeted clips and then pasting the Color Correction? Also creating a Secondary Storyline, selecting the Storyline "bar" above the clips and pasting the Color Correction? The latter allows you to paste to the entire "track."

[William Hohauser]

Originally Posted by Michael Wisniewski

William,

When you say you used a "gap clip over the audio track for the entire edit" do you mean that you put the gap & video clips on the main storyline with the audio as a connected clip?

Just trying to understand, I feel like I'm doing the exact same thing but completely different, by putting the audio on the main storyline as the base of the edit and then using a secondary storyline to place the video.

Let me say that I am a horrible instruction reader but perhaps that's from giving up after years of trying to deduce equipment from poorly translated instructions or reading software instructions written by engineers (good programmers don't always make good writers), so I don't try until I hit a blockage.

Unlike 7, you can not just build an audio track and then introduce the video later. X wants something in the main track at all times if there is audio. As I had a VO track that was in two pieces to accommodate a sound byte from a video clip and a 15sec music loop that needed work, I set a gap to the time of the commercial and went from there. This forced all the video clips to be overlays as using the replace function on the gap clip (which I found so useful on another job) caused the magnetic timeline to wreck the audio edit I did already. Finally I made the selected video clips into a compound clip where I could apply transitions. If there is a better way to do this, I'm all ears. This was a rush job and I was editing to the VO.

[William Hohauser]

Originally Posted by Craig Seeman

There's keyboard commands to apply color correction from previous, two edit prior, three edits prior. You can also Copy and Paste Effects although that copies everything if you have other effects. Also have you tried creating a Compound Clip of all the targeted clips and then pasting the Color Correction? Also creating a Secondary Storyline, selecting the Storyline "bar" above the clips and pasting the Color Correction? The latter allows you to paste to the entire "track."

Something that might help with the keyboard shortcuts:
Final Cut Pro X Keyboard Cover for Apple Ultra-Thin Keyboard

[Michael Wisniewski]

Originally Posted by William Hohauser

If there is a better way to do this, I'm all ears. This was a rush job and I was editing to the VO.

It was interesting to hear about the workflow you came up with because we had the exact same problem and solved it differently. And I wanted to try your workflow next time just to see what happens. Part of the slow process of learning to "think" in FCP X.

[Craig Seeman]

Originally Posted by William Hohauser

Something that might help with the keyboard shortcuts:
Final Cut Pro X Keyboard Cover for Apple Ultra-Thin Keyboard

And Logickeyboard should be out with their's in a couple of weeks too.

The problem is that they keyboard shortcuts for copying the color corrections are not assigned. You have to know they exist and then go in to the Customize Commands and create the keyboard shortcut. In addition there's no buttons for it as there was in FCP7 nor is there a way to add buttons in FCPX.

It takes a lot of exploration of the Customize Commands to find out there's a lot of keyboard shortcuts that aren't assigned. One I just created is to nudge the color board pucks up, down, left right. They're hard to do detailed control with the mouse and no slider/small increment area. I assign the nudge as follows Shift 4 left, Shift 6 right, Shift 8 up, Shift 2 down. There's also a shortcut to go from puck to puck which can be useful if you have two pucks on top of each other as selecting with the mouse is difficult in that situation.

[William Hohauser]

Thank you for that info. The color board adjustments were really annoying me with the lack of single increments.

[Denny Kyser]

Have not read all the posts here, I am an Premier Pro 5.5 user.

I have been reading on the photography forums how easy this new software is to use, so sounds like Apple made it easy for people to switch, and if they have never used a video editing program, it seems to be quite simple.

Many claim they are making decent movies after a couple hours of playing and watching how to videos.

Probably not what the video community wants to hear, but just like photoshop, software making things easier is not always welcomed by everyone.

Also a 30 day trial will get many people to try it, (like me)