Final Cut Timeline

Been a long time user of Final Cut and I have a pet peeve on the fact that I can't "name" timelines. Used to use Premiere long ago and I hated that software and that was the only redeeming thing I can remember is being able to name each timeline.
Anyone have any idea if FC will ever make the jump to change this simple request?
Cheers

I thought that was probably what you were referring to ... and I agree; that would be a very handy feature.
-DH

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Motion and Final Cut timeline audio

Working on a long Motion/Final Cut project for the first time. Started off with a ten minute long screen recording of my narrator recording a keynote presentation. Brought that video into Final Cut and have been sending chunk after chunk into Motion to create the actual graphics, all of which are heavily matched up to the sound.
Now, (of course!) the narrator wants to rerecord almost all of his dialog. In tests, if I place a new audio in the Final Cut timeline (along with the Motion clips), there's no way for me to tell the Motion file to use the updated audio - if I link the Motion clip and new audio in the Timeline, then edit the Motion clip in Motion, it still references the original audio. Is there a simple way I can tell Motion to use the updated audio instead, or (what I fear is the case) am I stuck with having to manually dump each edit audio clip directly back into the individual motion file? Because my video is heavily audio-timed, I need to have the audio in the Motion file.
Thanks!

this sort of thing happens all the time. Of course you really have to lock down the audio before spending too much time on the pictures, but even with the best intentions it happens.
You could try to edit the v/o in fcp against the preexisting pictures first, to try and get it to work better. But then your only option is to send audio to the motion projects.
Its too late now but it might be useful to think about in the future. Rather than sending clips to motion, i export it frrom fcp, could be audio, could be pictures, could be both. I bring that clip into a motion project and work on it. If it needs updating, I re-exeport from fcp and relink the media in the motion file.
hth
adam

Final Cut Timeline Feed as video source for iChat?

I was at the Apple NAB presentation in Vegas a few weeks ago, and one of the things they showcased in regard to iChat AV was the ability for an editor to videoconference with several other people at once and one of the video feeds in the chat window was actually the output from the editor's Final Cut Pro timeline. As he made changes in the FCP timeline, he could play it out in real time and all the people in the chat could see the video feed and make comments on the edit.
OK- so we were excited because that's a workflow issue we have here. So, we bought some iSight cameras and Tiger and started to do some testing here. The only problem is that it doesn't seem very easy to set up. At first I just thought, "well, they are just playing the timeline out of the firewire port on the FCP machine and another computer is ingesting that firewire stream as a video source for iChat." except when you connect 2 Macs together with a firewire cable, the FCP system doesn't detect a DV video device to output to and the iChat system doesn't detect the incoming firewire stream as a "camera". I spoke to tech support and they said it's not something they support so no luck there.
I did find an article on Creative Cow about someone doing something similar, but it involved exporting the FCP timeline out through a Kona analog video card into an external tape deck that does analog to DV conversion which then can be imported back into iChat as a DV stream, but last time I checked, a Kona card would run me around 1500 bucks.
Anyone have any other ideas?

HI Jeremy,
Welcome to the Aple Discussion Pages.
Based on the Auto Responding iChat Accounts that play films I would guess they were either using an AppleScript to import FCP as the Video sourdce or usiing an Add-On like iChatUSBCam that also alows you to change the video source to the desktop.
iChatUSBcam has a new beta for Tiger http://www.ecamm.com/mac/ichatusbcam/
Ralph

Good quality quicktime movie looks poor when played thru Final Cut timeline

I created a quicktime file with moving text in After Effects 6.5..when i play the movie file it looks fine..no aliasing or jagged edges on the text...
when I import the .mov file into finalcut (4.5HD) and immediately launch & play it in the viewer, it also looks fine...
but when i place the .mov file onto the timeline and play it from there, or when i relaunch that .mov file from the timeline into the viewer, the quality of the text looks degraded...
...so i'm thinking it's a setting issue...i don't think it's an AE issue because I was able to get a good quality image into the viewer in Final Cut...I'm using the DV NTSC 48khz standard settings...720 x 480...could it be the 'millions of colors' or the 'YUV video processing' settings selected in the sequence settings?
...thanks for any help!
peace
G5 Mac OS X (10.4.5)

thanks...that helps...i've been watching it back on
the computer monitor..guess i'll have to do a quick
dvd burn to see how it appears on tv to see if that
was the issue...(no monitor or space to use a tv as a
monitor yet)
Whoa there! You shouldn't waste time burning a DVD to check the quality of your renders. In fact, you should be working with the video monitor (or TV) hooked up to your DV Deck or DV Camcorder as you work. That way, you can always be aprised of your quality. This is the way the manual says you should be set up at all times. However, you are cutting in a space that does not have room for a small video monitor? Wow, must be a closet or something.
If a video monitor is not convenient, then you can see an aproximation of the quality you'd see in a video monitor if you do the following: Zoom out your Canvas to precisely 100% and Uncheck Sq. Pixels in the Zoom pop up. You may need to resize the Canvas to see the whole image and if you are working with a small computer screen.

Importing 3GP Files into a Final Cut Timeline

I'm trying to import 3GP files from a cell phone video camera into Final Cut to edit. I've read that it can be done, but I'm having difficulties setting the correct presets in FCP.
When I import a clip into FCP I get the following settings in the clip window:
FRAME SIZE: 352 x 288
Vid Rate: 10 fps
Compressor: H.263
Aud Rate: 8.0 KHZ
That said, I cannot replicate these settings when I try to set the "Sequence Settings" and therefore, the clip does not appear in the timeline when I drag it down. Is there a preset for using this file format? Is there an easier way to do this?
Thank you in advance for your help.

as your mobile phone footage is a non standard tv format, you really need to start off with a proper sequence setting, SD PAL, SD NTSC 4:3 then import your footage into the browser, drop it onto the timeline and let fcp auto conform to the sequence. You could also look at compressor to convert it to the right frame size, or use mpeg streamclip to turn the footage into DV QT movie
but as the mobile footage is small and highly compressed @10 frames a sec it is never going to look great anyway

Colors rendering differently to original final cut timeline

i have color corrected all the shots in a video i am working on but when it comes to rendering the footage, everything comes out differently. i have used many different options to render out. share>youtube, export via qucktime conversion, and i have also used compressor. is there anything i can do to keep the colour i see in my timeline.

I'm starting to make a lot of web content including video. The average Mac user will be watching videos on the new Quicktime Player 10. Some of my content looks horrid on Player 10, but great on properly preference ticked Player 7.
It seems pointless to be pacified by choosing to watch our Final Cut exports on Player 7 with the Final Cut compatibility box checked when almost none of our audience can be expected to have done that.
I really don't know what Apple's QuickTime engineers expect content providers to do when they designed a spiffy new player (10) that doesn't properly display the color in Apple software produced content. It really tests my loyalty.
The end of the joke is that my H264 video from Final Cut Pro actually looks more accurate in Windows Media Player than Quicktime 10.
How about upgrading the QT player 10 with a simple gamma and color fix?
Would be great if a discussion mediator could provide a work around, or some kind of assurance that something is being done to make it easier for content providers to get matching at least across Apple OS users machines. If anyone has any more info or answers to this topic, please let me know here.

Need advice on a workflow (mixing HD and SD on Final Cut timeline)

Hi
I'd love some help with the following. Thanks in advance.
I have shot full HD 1920 x 1080 24P PAL footage with the Canon 7D. I have also shot SD footage with the Canon XL2 (16:9, PAL, 50i).
I am using Final Cut Studio (Final Cut Pro 7). I am running FCPro 7 on a MacBook Pro and a Mac Pro (both intel).
What is the best set up (audio/visual set up) in Final Cut, before I bring in the footage? There are so many different set ups. When I export, how do I export? What settings do I use? If I want to export using compressor, what should I do in there? If I want to just make a simple DVD in iDVD, what do I export as from FCPro?
In the end, I want a high quality DVD. I realize I can't do a Blu-Ray disc because some of the footage is SD.
What is the best work flow? Thanks very much for the help. I really appreciate it.

interdiscipline wrote:
Here's the configuration we're considering:
Processor: Two 3.2GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon (8-core)
*Don't do it!* Stick with the dual-2.8GHz config. A jump from that to the dual-3.2GHz gains you only an approximate 9% increase in power at a 52% increase in cost! Not worth it all. That money is much wiser spent on RAM, RAID array, or a broadcast monitor.
Memory: 16GB (4 x 4GB)
Hard Drives: 300GB 15,000-rpm SAS (for OS X, Final Cut, & other programs) plus 2 x 1TB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s (for video storage)
Graphics: NVIDIA Quadro FX 5600
We're thinking about spending the extra $1600 to get the best processor available, since we want this machine to be the hub of the business for about five years.
The processor is only one part of the whole, and as I just mentioned, the power:cost benefits are not good.
The graphics card is where we're most torn - specifically between the Quadro 5600, the GeForce 8800, or perhaps even getting the computer with the standard card (or no card) and getting a different third-party card. We do mostly DV now, but we foresee doing HD projects in the future.
Quadro 5600 is pricey, but I'm not sure about its benefits for people in our field. Even if I had the money for it, I would be hard pressed to consider it considering, again, money is liekly wiser spent elsewhere.
Also, it looks like we're gonna buy Final Cut Studio 2 and are considering also getting Final Cut Server. It seems the combination would allows us to use the Final Cut suite on other computers (both Mac and Wintel) that don't have their own version of Final Cut installed. Is that the correct interpretation?
I don't know much about FCServer, but my impression is that it is -- simply speaking -- Final Cut version of Avid Unity. In other words, I am pretty certain that your understanding on that is false. I may be wrong.

Instructions: Create Blu-Ray disc in Compressor with Final Cut TImeline

I searched mightily for simple instructions on how to do this. The Compressor help files are woefully inadequate in providing a simple walkthrough to do this. Burning a Blu-ray directly from Final Cut does not allow one to optimize the conversion like compressor does. So:
1) Right click your chosen sequence in Final Cut
2) Click "Share" The Share dialog box will come up.
3) Choose "Blu-Ray" in the destination drop down in the top-left corner of the Share window (don't forget to choose the destination location of the files at the top of the dialog)
4) Click "Send to Compressor" in the bottom-left corner
Compressor will open and a job will automatically be created with Blu-ray video
and Dolby ac3 audio. Set options and submit as usual in Compressor

The send to compressor option occasionally creates problems. Most people would recommend exporting as a self-contained movie, then bringing that into compressor and using your workflow from there.

Exporting Final Cut timeline in highest quality Quicktime (self-contained)

Hi, I am wondering if you can help me. I just finished editing a film in HDV, 24P in Final Cut Studio 2 and need to export it as a stand alone quicktime file to take it to the color correction people and then for downressing in order to write to DigiBeta tapes.
My question is, do I simply export to Quicktime movie self-contained file using default (current) setting? I also see there are options such as Applre ProRes422 HQ, uncompressed 8bit and 10bit. From what I've heard uncompressed 8 and 10 bit and also apple ProRes422 are higher qualities? Am I wrong?
But going to Uncompressed 8bit or even to Apple ProRes won't make a difference since I only have HDV quality and that's the highest quality I can get anyway?
Please advise.
Thank you

Exporting a self contained QT Movie, and not recompressing will get you an HDV file that is full quality. But unless the facility you are going to has FCP on the machine they load this, they won't be able to see it. Same with ProRes...which would be the better choice for color correcting (10-bit, I-Frame format instead of GOP). ProRes and HDV (and DVCPRO HD) are codecs that only come with FCP, and any computer, even a mac, that doesn't have FCP installed cannot even view those file formats.
Shane

Audio popping between clips with timeline imported from final cut xml file

So i imported a final cut timeline that was synced with pluraleyes into adobe and between all the cuts there is an audible popping noise. I've tried using audio cross fade but it seems to make it worse. How can I fix this??

If anyone else has this problem - you fix it by making sure you pan the audio to the center, not left or right.

Final Cut and After Effects "file is busy"

Hello All-
I am running Final Cut Pro 5.1.4 and After Effects 7.0.1 Pro (on OS 10.4.8) and I have a question. I have a series of After Effects animated DV Quicktime clips edited together in Final Cut, and when I make changes to the After Effects project files and try to rerender, I get an error:
After Effects error: unable to overwrite - file is busy (delete) (-47) ( 3 :: 3 )
It's like Final Cut is "holding onto" the files and not allowing After Effects to rerender them. If I close down Final Cut, I can rerender just fine, but this gets real annoying closing it down and restarting it every time I need to rerender a clip. The problem is, because of my workflow, I need to do this dozens of times a day with clients in the room and I'm spending a lot of time closing and restarting Final Cut over the course of a day... is there way to do this without closing down Final Cut?
I assigned After Effects to be the "External Editor" for "Video Files", and used Final Cut's "Open In Editor" command. It sends the quicktime file to After Effects (not exactly what I want) and you would think that at this point Final Cut would have relenquished its access to the file so that I could rerender in After Effects, but nope, I still get the error. I have tried this with the User Preference setting "Always Reconnect Externally Modified Files" both on and off, no difference. I have also tried "Embed Project Link" in After Effects's quicktime output options, but this didn't help anything (I believe this only affects other Adobe apps).
The weird part of this is that when I drop a Photoshop file onto the Final Cut timeline, I can do "Open in Editor", it throws it to Photoshop, I can alter it and save with no problem, and pop back into Final Cut and it will be updated. But no such luck with Quicktime files and After Effects.
Let me know if there is a solution to this, or if I am stuck having to shut down Final Cut every single time I need to rerender one of the After Effects animation clips in the timeline.
- Bob Wilson
MacBook Pro 2.33ghz Core 2 Duo 15" Mac OS X (10.4.8) 3 gigs ram, 160 gig HD

What i have to suggest is more of a work around than it is a solution. i've had this problem off and on as well. What i do is add a number to the name of the newly rendered file, (ie. "monkey_throwspoo2.mov") import that file into FCP, open it in the viewer, and then copy it (apple + c). Provided it's the smae length as the previous file, you can right click on the previous file in the timeline and paste attributes, making sure to click on the content button for video (and audio if there is any). This should replace the old file in the timeline with the new one. Granted, you end up having a bunch of files that you're not using, but it's faster than restarting Final Cut (and looks more like it's something you're doing on purpose rather than a problem with the program to your clients). Hope this helps.
Craig

Audio out of synch after I export from Final Cut

I have a video on a Final Cut timeline. If I play in FC, audio is in synch. If I play the file in QuickTime player from my captures folder, the audio is in synch. If I export from final cut, or from quicktime pro, the audio of the resulting file is off by about 1 second. I was trying to make a h.264 file, but it does the same thing if I export to other formats as well.
This only seems to be happening with this particular video. I have a number of project loaded right now, and do not have this same problem with the other projects.
Weird....any help would be greatly appreciated.

You didn't include any of your specifications for the sequences or exported movies but a problem that only exists on a single item is directly associated with that item and can be identified but they're usually subtle.
My first guess is that the audio on the original media is set to a slight different sampling rate. Could be off a thousandth of a decimal. The reason it works in the timeline is it's being conformed to the sequence settings in realtime. The export would reference the original.
I can't tell from the post where you're getting this loss of sync. Can you try exporting a self-contained movie and then use that to go to h.264?
bogiesan

Final Cut to iChat???

Yesterday, quite by accident, I discovered something.
My DV deck was connected to the G5 via firewire as I had been capturing.
I plugged in my iSight to chat with someone and discovered that it was, instead, looking at the DV deck.
I played "live" video from the deck through iChat.
I have done this with QT movies through ShowMacster, but not from a connected video deck.
My question (Ralph) is... could it be possible to play a Final Cut timeline directly into iChat?
I have a number of clients with Macs and it would be great if I could show samples without having to first encode to mp4 and then emailing or ftp-ing the files for review. Any thoughts?

Hi Rick,
This is one of those things where technically it is possible but you would have to write the software.
For instance ChatFX contains loads of samples of Quartz Composer tweakes to any Video input you select.
(Quartz Composer is part of the Developer Tools
Install Developer Tools
Go to the Folder where ChatFX stores the Quartz files
Duplicate the one you want
Open it (Double click) in Quartz Composer and play around with it.
One choice is the Desktop.)
Showmaster has an option to display part of the Desktop as the Live feed.
I have not tried this witha Video window actually run as that part of screen space but might be worth a trial.
What is needed is for you to be able to grab and split the Video from Final Cut and feed it to iChat.
Showmacster invokes Quicktime to play movies which shows that something can be done.
At this point I don't have that knowledge or even the knowledge to point you to anything I know that already does this. Having siad that take a look and Marratech from this list http://www.ralphjohnsuk.dsl.pipex.com/EZJim/EZJimpage7.html
As I hinted at above the closest I know that might work is the Showmacster with the Desktop option.
This would require a fair amount of processing power as you would be processing the same video twice/three times. (Final Cut/Showmacster/iChat)
Oh, One thing on the ChatFX front.
The Quartz Composer only does the Video.
For iChat it still takes the sound form the Mic.
I could not comment on anything said about Desktop Sharing in any forthcoming OS
10:06 PM Tuesday; April 17, 2007

Final cut keeps on crashing

I've just upgraded to Leopard. Every time I play my final cut timeline it crashes. The computer freezes. THe cursor disappears and the only option is to hold the power button. Please help.

#44: FCP acting weird - Trash Prefs
Shane's Stock Answer #44: FCP acting weird or unusual. Just not like is normally should
If the program was working fine, and now isn't, or just isn't working the way it should, the first things to do are:
1) Trash your FCP preferences. Download the appropriate version of FCP Rescue at http://www.fcprescue.com and run it.
http://www.kenstone.net/fcphomepage/trashing_fcpprefs.html
2) Open the Disk Utility and Repair Permissions.
3) Shut down for 10 min. Go for a quick walk around the block and get SOME exercise today. Come back, turn on the computer and see how things are.
4) (optional) Do the Hokey Pokey and turn your self about. Results may vary.
Shane

Xdcam cs4 project into final cut ?

is it possible to export xdcam work out of cs4 into final cut pro and see all the clips and edits ive done in cs4 on final cut timeline ?

In CS5, possibly. In CS4, I don't think so.

Final Cut Timeline

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