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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Te6B7pn_FNM&feature=channel

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2506486?start=0&tstart=0

• Suppose you shot video on an iPhone and want to edit it in FCP:
  • iPhone records to 720p24 h.264 with 44k aac audio+
  • FCP can part-handle the H264 but not any kind of compressed audio.
    • It will play H264 video but not any Real Time (RT) effects.
• Transcode it e.g. by using Compressor:
  • Drag your video file into Compressor
  • Under Settings type LT into the search box.  The top hit should be for Apple ProRes 422 (LT).  Select it.
  • Duplicate it (since only a duplicate can be altered).
  • Fix the audio:
    • Select the duplicate in the top window and the inspector will light up.
    • The first Inspector tab is for the Summary - we need to press the second one to get access to the encoders.
    • On the Encoder tab, switch the audio from Pass-through to Enabled.
    • Then, to its left, press the Audio: settings button.
    • Change the Format to Linear PCM, Stereo (L R), 48kHz, sample size 16 bits. Press Okay.
• How to make a Droplet to do this conversion:
  • In Compressor’s Settings window, Clear the Search field.
  • Open the Custom Group (not essential)
  • Select the iPhone to FCP (ProRes LT) and press the button at the top left of the Settings window that looks like a video file with a down arrow.
  • Save the droplet to your desktop (say).
• Now you can drag your iPhone movies to the droplet (no need for Compressor to be open), it’ll throw up a dialog box, press submit and Compressor will transcode them to a ProRes format suitable for FCP.
  • The original article at https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2506486?start=0&tstart=0 provides a link to a ready-made Droplet app that allegedly accomplishes this.  But I had no need to try it out.

http://www.daun.ch/Hamingja

Final Cut Pro X (ten) - FCPX.  Wannit now!!!

• http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2383503,00.asp
  • NAB 2011 (April): Final Cut Pro SuperMeet Presentation on FCPX:
    • Best recording: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-77beFICSlI
    • Photography Bay’s LiveBlog: http://www.photographybay.com/2011/04/12/final-cut-pro-user-group-supermeet-liveblog/
    • http://www.macrumors.com/2011/04/12/nab-final-cut-supermeet-coverage/

 http://forums.creativecow.net/thread/8/1092244

• DON’T:
  • Don’t edit HD footage on a SD timeline.
    • Pasting into an SD timeline is the worst thing you can do. FCP is terrible at conversion of HD to SD. At the very least send your HD Quicktime movie of the timeline to Compressor and have Compressor make the conversion.
    • A much MUCH better way would be to invest in something like an AJA Kona board which does full broadcast conversions in realtime.
  • Don’t ever down-convert HD to SD before encoding to MPEG2. It’s not only completely unnecessary waste of your time, it’s an unnecessary re-compression step that will make your DVD hideous.
  • Don’t “Export using Compressor” directly from the timeline.
    • you can keep editing in FCP while Compressor encodes
    • Compressor is faster when working from a single file, because it avoids the look ahead clip by clip encoding features of VBR encoding that pretty much creates more problems than it solves.
• DO:
  • File > Export > Quicktime Movie.
    • Leave it set to “Current Settings”
    • You can export a Reference movie if you’d like, meaning leave “Make Self Contained Movie” UNchecked.
  • Take that Quicktime movie into Compressor.
    • Choose the DVD Compression of your choice, such as DVD 90 Minutes High Quality.
      • Compressor will create a Standard Definition 16:9 MPEG-2.
    • Also select the Dolby Digital Audio to create the AC-3 audio file.
  • Launch DVD Studio Pro and bring the MPEG-2 and AC-3 into your project.
    • Now create a DVD!
    • DVD Studio Pro will create a DVD in 16:9 widescreen format that will automatically play Letterboxed on a 4:3 TV and full screen on a 16:9 widescreen.

Some people have reported problems:

• http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=12881918&tstart=0
• <<I upgraded to 10.6.6 from 10.6.4. I installed 10.6.5 a few weeks after it was released and cause under exposing in all Final Cut Studio programs so I downgraded back to 10.6.4. I was hoping that 10.6.6 would solve this issue but it has not!  >>
• http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2710542&tstart=0
• << while I edit, I got a “Out of Memory” Error and an “Invalid Operation”. Can’t reopen the sequence on my MacBook but it opens with no problem on a Mac Pro.>>
• << Did a fresh install of 10.6.6 and no luck. Still the same error. Reverted back to a vault version of the project and worked slowly with it. No errors so far. Seems if I import in a particular PSD file, that out of error message comes back eventually. >>

At startup (by default), in addition to “new project” options, it offers:

• Quick Tours
  • http://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/whats-new.html
• Online Tutorial
  • http://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/resources/

On my system at least, these load surprisingly slowly, then if either of the above are selected then the Motion GUI closes, leaving the Motion app active (but, as far as I can see, useless).  Maybe I’m missing something?

On MBP, I tried starting-up Compressor but its icon just bounced up & down (on the task-bar) for ages.  Attempts to right-click it revealed a “Not Responding” condition.  So I searched for a solution.  I discovered a check-list Compressor: Troubleshooting basics at http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1888?viewlocale=en_US.  From that check-list, the fix that worked was to delete my account’s Preferences for Compressor, as follows:

• In the Finder, go to ~/Library/Preferences
  • (where the tilde (~) represents your Home folder).
• Remove the following files from the Preferences folder:
  • com.apple.Compressor.CompressorSharedService.plist
  • com.apple.compressor.Compressor.plist

I discovered the checklist at http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1408723, which also gave some more tips.

Links:

• Quick intro to the layout and the main editing tools/operations
  • http://its.lafayette.edu/downloads/pdfs/handouts/FinalCutProI-05Intro.pdf
    • Four-pager.  Really nice second half; can ignore the first half (capture of DV & analog)
• Keyboard Shortcuts:
  • http://intranet.cshgreenwich.org/ewebeditpro4/upload/USEFUL_FINAL_CUT_PRO_SHORTCUTS_for_website.pdf
    • One-pager
  • http://faculty.mdc.edu/jvanvori/Docs/FCP%20Keyboard%20Shortcuts.pdf
    • Three-pager
• Courses:
  • Lynda.com
    • http://www.lynda.com/home/tutoriallanding.aspx?lpk4=56208
  • ? Anywhere to get more interactive kind of course?  I tend to guess/know the basics, it’s uncertainties over certain specific details or big-picture workflows that tend to block me, and I only know them when I see them.

One of the uncertainties holding me back from weaning myself off Sony Vegas to FCP for real projects is over Markers.  In Vegas I can do everything easily, and routinely use markers to identify cue-points, ideas, problems, all kinds of things.  I use them at media, timeline and project/sequence levels, sometimes promoting them from one level to another.  So how easily can I follow a similar practice in FCP?  Google: [fcp markers]:

• markerTool
  • http://www.spherico.com/filmtools/markerTool/index.html
    • markerTool … allows to move markers from clips to the sequence level, from sequence level to selected tracks, moving an arbitrary selection of sequence markers in time, exporting the marker settings to the clipboard and finally creating sequence markers with data from a tab delimited text file.
    • It also does allow to collect all sequence markers from nested sequences.
• Markers
  • http://www.geniusdv.com/news_and_tutorials/2009/09/all_about_markers_in_final_cut_pro.php
    • All about Markers in Final Cut Pro, by Sandy on September 1, 2009
    • Varieties: Chapter Markers, Compression Markers, Scoring Markers, Sequence Markers, Clip Markers, and the list goes on
      • Clip Markers are Pink, Sequence Markers are Green
        • …with Final Cut Pro 7:
          • …you can … color-code clip and sequence markers of your own.
          • You can add notes while the clip is playing and when you export your marker list, your custom names are exported also.
      • … default marker is the Note Marker.  This is the marker that is created when you add a marker to a clip or a sequence.
    • Markers can be used for making comments, synchronizing multiclips, adding DVD chapters, and even making subclips.  Usually, markers are placed only on a specific frame, but you can also create a marker with a longer duration.
    • To add markers:
      • …add markers to clips or sequences by hitting the “M” key.  To name your markers or add comments to them, simply hit the “M” key twice.
      • …you can also go to the Mark Menu > Markers and add them from there.
    • Varieties in more detail):
      • Our default marker is the Note Marker.  This is the marker that is created when you add a marker to a clip or a sequence.
        • Wonder if can have different colours for different purposes (e.g. problems, opportunities, suggestions, review status).  Looks like FCP7 might alow this.
        • Ideally would like user-defined type where each type had customizable look (size, colour, font, whatever) and one could filter the display to only show the required combination of types (e.g. via list-of-types checkboxes).
      • Chapter Markers automatically become DVD chapter markers to be used in DVD Studio Pro
      • Compression Markers can be added to tell Compressor or DVD Studio Pro that it should generate an MPEG1-frame during compression.  You want to add these where there is an abrupt visual change from one frame to the next within a clip, to improve MPEG compression.
      • Scoring Markers are used to make visual cues to sync music to and can be exported to Soundtrack Pro
      • Audio Peak Markers, when you have them activated, can show you where in your clips that the audio level should be reduced at that point.
        • Sounds highly useful.  In Vegas I instead preview everything and watch the meters.
      • Long Frame Markers can be added if your clip has long frames that you might want to avoid using in your sequence.