Multicam editing with FCE

Beeing relatively new to FCE and coming from iMovie, I have had high expectations for better ways of doing multicam editing whenever I have shots from several camera positions that I want to move between at the same course of time in the timeline.
For instance, say I got three cameras and I want to see what each of them displays "simultaneously" while doing playback. Is this possible in FCE? Or at the very least, is it possible to quickly hide/unhide a video layer during timeline playback, so that I can see what is going on "beneath"? That way I could at least see "simultaneously" two camera positions...

You are probably right, but I cannot find those menuitems or shortcuts anywhere. The closest thing I have got is the Toggle Clip Enable (Control-B) key combination that hides or unhides a given clip, but this also stops playback. Can you tell me what shortcuts and/or menuitems I should be looking for?

Similar Messages

Multicam editing with multi-track audio?

Does anyone know how to do multicam editing with multi-track audio? Apparently, the multicam editor can only see Audio Track #1 in the Source Sequence. I tried mixing my original audio tracks #1, #2, and #3 (submixes) to the master audio track in the Source Sequence and if I listen to the new Multicam Sequence (the nested Source Sequence) all 3 original audio tracks are there (combined), but when I go to do the multicam edit in the multicam monitor window, I"m back to just Audio Track #1 of the Source Sequence and audio tracks #2 and #3 are missing ??? Thanks for your help!

I have run the gambit of different techniques. The one that is most efficient is listed in Colin Brougham's response number 9
There's a far easier way to do this: after you sync your angles, hold down Alt/Opt and select or lasso just the video portions of the clips, and nest those. The audio stays put, but the video moves into the nest, and you can then enable Multicam on the nested sequence.
One of the best things about this is that it circumvents Premiere Pro's totally BS "Render Required Files" nonsense.
I must admit the ALT lasso tip was one of the best features I have seen. Like a revelation when I discovered it some months ago while watching a tutorial about something not related. As far as the "Rendering required files" That was kicking my but for a while doing multicam editing. If you do edit both audio and video in multicam you might find the "Rendering required files" issue. Basically the problem stems from having a lot of cuts to process at the same time both audio and video. 1080P is a huge amount of data when you multiply it by four cameras plus multiple audio cuts and effects ,(audio gain, Deessing etc.) So Pre-rendering the audio by clicking in the main sync timeline and then at the top Click Sequence/Render Audio.This takes care of the issue when you are cutting multiple tracks at once. It is a good practice to work from a main sync sequence and then copy that to a new sequence preserving the main sequence as unchanged. I found the solution is to "render audio" only in the master sync sequence this will then pass through to all subsequent copies that are made "downstream" allowing you to easily clean up anything. If you make a mistake you can always start from the main sync sequence and not lose too much time. Takes a little bit of time to render but once that is done you can cut all tracks video and audio like butter. I have been doing a lot of 1080p multicam editing over this past year and had quite learning curve. Most of the work I do is multicam editing by choice it is much faster for me to edit this way because I am used to working in live events where we need to look at all shots at the same time make a "best choice" and keep rolling. Have fun with it!

Multicam Edit with Audio from 2 Cam

I'm editing a multicam project with 5 cameras. I want to use the audio from 2 cameras. What is the best way to do this?
Right now I have the main audio all the way down and I dragged just the audio from the 2 cams I needed onto the timeline. They aren't part of the angle viewer. Is there another way.? I had to manually sync it. Hope that makes sense.

In a multicam you can choose to switch audio and video, only audio or only video, so you can just use the 5 angles corresponding to the 5 cameras, and work with that.
It is perfectly easy to do in Angle Viewer. Just click the appropriate button at the top of the Angle Viewer.
In the picture above the "video only" button (blue) is selected; in this situation, if you click to cut to a different angle you'll cut and switch only the video, and keep the same angle for audio. You can click the audio/video or the audio only whenever you need, and it will act accordingly. Very easy, very effective.

Multicam edit with camera that starts and stops

I am editing a multicam shoot and want to create a multicam clip with my two cameras. Camera A never stopped running, but Camera B stop several times. The time code was synced on Free-Run so there is no issues with syncing, but I want all camera B's footage to be on the same video track. Right now when i select all the clips FCP creates a multicam clip with several video tracks (for every new clip). Is there a way i could have it place every clip from camera B into one track so i can edit using camera 1, camera 2, as opposed to going up to camera 50?

It's an option,
No, it's an elegant and practical solution to the production problem caused by your shooter. Free running timecode will drift (rather hopelessly) so you're not really gaining anything tanglible. You still have to sync the clips visually, you won't be able to depend on t/c except as a guide. Which is convenient but not solid.
im working with DVCproHD and a very big project so i don't want to take up more HD space.
You want to get the project done? Go buy another drive for $200.
Also, everything is logged beautifully
Logging incorrectly-acquired footage doesn't amount to much, but, if you need to recapture, you're in luck. If you consolidate the footage into a single clip as suggested, recapturing is simply a question of replacing footage into the master clip and exporting it again.
I've also heard about using camera angles. does anyone know if this would be an option for this?
You only have two cameras and two angles. What have you heard about angles that would suggest them as a solution? Maybe if we understood how you have misunderstood angles, we could help you clear that up.
bogiesan

Multicam editing with Transitions

Hi. Does anyone know if its possible to have FCP use a default transition (e.g. a Cross Dissolve) rather than the standard cut whilst Multicam editing?
It is easy enough to go back and drop in a dissolve on each edit point, but we are working with shows and concerts sometimes >3 hours so it's a bit time consuming! It would be great if FCP could automatically use a cross dissolve - any ideas?

Shane,
Just getting started with FC Studio 5.1, and successfully used it to do a short multicam edit. After adding a cross dissolve at every angle cut, saving the project, and later re-opening the project, I can no longer use the multiclip in the viewer to change angles in the timeline. Is this due to the addition of the transitions, or to having ended the edit session, and later coming back to it?
Btw, the multiclip was created and synchronized without the use of a common time code, which was not available.
Ernie

Cut videos before editing with FCE ?

Hi,
This might be a dumb question and I may tackle this the wrong way : basically, I have several Video cameras (HD, non HD, etc etc) and when I shoot something, I usually store it all on my Mac and save it for later editing. Problem is that amongst all the footages, a lot is not usable but I keep it all anyway and as a result :
- It takes plenty of space on my HD
- it makes it painfull to edit in FCE when I want to make a project later.
As such, what I want to find is an easy (and cheap) way to roughly cut raw footage as soon as I transfer it on my IMac and keep only the usable things (I also thing it is a good thing to do it when the "event" is fresh in my memory). It will save space and make it easier to edit. Of course, I could do that with FCE but it's quite long to open and use and I feel it is a bit painfull to use it for such a simple task. I see that QuickTime alows to trim the footage but you can only cut from the start and from the end, not to cut a piece in the middle and also converts it to .mov after trimming while I'd rather keep it in the original format as I'm affraid to lose quality on HD videos.
Also, I was wondering what wa sthe best format to use to edit video in FCE ? because depending on the format (.mov , .mp4 ,...) it can be very long to render.
Anyway, is this makes sense and if anyone as an idea, it;ll be welcome,
Cheers,
Jean

>what wa sthe best format to use to edit video in FCE ? because depending on the format (.mov , .mp4 ,...) it can be very long to render.
That is most likely the reason you feel FCE is too difficult to work with for cutting footage. FCE only works with DV and AIC. All other formats must be converted to one of those two BEFORE importing into an FCE project.
Once you've converted the footage to the proper format, cutting in FCE will be a breeze.
-DH

Dropped frames on MultiCam editing with Canon XF305 Footage

Hello,
I recently purchased three Canon XF305 series cameras and have been conducting a series of tests to determine the best recording format and editing workflow. First, does anyone have experience with these new Canon cameras?
Using the log and transfer utility, I've been bringing the files into FCP natively using the canon codec (which is actually mislabeled as a Sony codec). Once in, the footage looks good to edit, without requiring rendering.
However, when I setup a multiclip sequence with the three cameras, the render bar turns green and I'm getting all kinds of dropped frames on playback. Is this a computer processor issue, drive speed, or codec? The multiclip is the only time I have trouble -- once I collapse the multiclip, I can edit fine without any drop frames.
I've done tests using 5400x and 7200x drives using both firewire 800 and eSata, no changes. I believe that rules out drive speed.
Is this a processor issue? What can I do to resolve this, as our workflow involves 100+ hours of footage from 3 cameras.
Thanks in advance

but my experience with the 305's in ProRes is that it makes it a bigger file(more than double)
Of course it will. XDCAM is a highly compressed format. ProRes is a larger file type, higher data rate. It will be larger. Did you not notice that the ProRes footage from the 5D were also about 5 times larger?
and still needs to render.
If you worked in a ProRes timeline, then you shouldn't need to render. If you still do, than something is wrong. Create the file...make a new sequence, cut this into that sequence...FCP will make the settings match. If it does this, and you STILL need to render....you did something wrong.
when I actually converted to ProRes, it seemed like it was more taxing on the computer, took up twice the hard drive, and more than three times the time to transcode compared to native.
It is less taxing to actually edit with. GOP formats require the computer to constantly process the GOP footage to show you frames...since there are no real frames in any GOP format. Well, there are 3 frames every second, then a bunch of pictures, and the computer has to guess what is next by looking at the frames, and then the pictures, and make up the in-between. PRORES is a full frame format...no guessing, no computing. And larger files are not more taxing on the computer...they might require faster hard drives...and larger ones, but they are less taxing. Yes, longer to convert than native, but when that is done, things are easier.
But, do what you want. I just gave a suggestion.
Shane

Using two displays with FCE

Hi
I wanted to see if anyone out there uses two screens when editing with FCE HD. I use a Powerbook g4, and wish to use the laptop screen for viewing editing timeline, maybe soudtrack or live type and a 2nd LCD screen to maybe see the output or toolboxes. For example, if you set up dual display mode in system prefs, and do a powerpoint show, the laptop screen shows something different (such as upcoming slides etc.) to what is output to a projector connected to the DVI port.
Is there something like this on FCE? Thanks
Abhi
PowerBook G4 Mac OS X (10.4.6)

I have now got FCE 3 and answered my own question. For any others who might be interested...if you have FCE and are looking to make use of more than one display, you have two options.
One is to use the OS's inbuilt multi-display options and have the different windows (timeline, viewer, canvas etc.) on different screens, making each one bigger. Or even have livetype open on one and FCE on the other. (Though G4s seem to struggle with this.)
However, a better solution (particularly if you have an HD capable display attached) is to use FCE's Video Out feature (Tools > Video Out). This outputs your canvas in full screen on the second display. It's great to work, and watch a huge full quality version of the final video at the same time.

Multicam editing and live art

I've been doing a little bit multicam editing with FCPX now and when using multiple cameras on a single occasion everything goes nice and smooth. But now I have a different kind of situation that I need some good ideas with. I have been shooting a live art performance with a single camera in multiple occasions and I want to cut them as a one multiangled video. The thing is, the show is never quite the same. There is (pre-recorded) music and dance that always goes the same, but there is speech and other not beat-by-beat stuff in between. Syncing is a nightmare since the whole thing is unsyncable.
I am now open for all kinds of ideas, so keep them coming. Should I edit every music/dance-piece by themselves as a multicam clip, export, import and put together in a new project? The speech parts might be undoable with multicam tool, but that won't need lots of cuts anyway. I've been trying a bit of this and that, but have no idea what would be most convenient way to do this. I think some kind of splitting into scenes kind of thing needs to be done anyway for my media.

If I understand correctly, you want to make a movie out of multiple takes of more or less the same performance and I'm not sure how Multicam doesn't create more issues than it solves. The idea of multicam is to display different angles of a single take – usually with a common audio source. So unless I'm overlooking something (which wouldn't surprise me in the slightest) introducing multicam into the workflow would make your task more difficult.
One approach would be to lay out the parts (clips) of the performance you feel best tell the story on the primary storyline. Then use secondary storylines from the best takes to add interest as cutaways. Alternatively, if you wanted single source sound, you could experiment with a music bed as your primary stroyline, but then I think you would constantlly be wrestling with sync.
Best of luck on your project.
Russ

Multicam editing problems with RT

I am having an issue in Final Cut Pro with editing with the multi-cam editor. We are us-ing a G5 Quad with 4.5 GB of Ram. We selected 4 clips from the Browser, control clicked and chose "make multiclip". Then dragged the Multiclip in to the viewer window, or double clicked it to get it there. Dropped the multiclip to the timeline. Played the Clip, and chose our views in real-time. The video on the Canvas cuts out when we made a new selection. There were cuts made, but they did not show up in the browser. Then we had to play the clip back to get the cuts to show up. I know this is not how it is supposed to work. With the Lesson files in the Final Cut Pro book, you are able to cut and see the edits in real time. I have also seen this done on a less powerful machine than what we are using. Also I have the RT set to Unlimited, and Dynamic. Any Suggestions?

What do you mean with "There were cuts made, but they did not show up in the browser"? The cuts are not supposed to show up in the browser. Did you mean the timeline (your sequence)?
Have a look at this excellent article at Ken Stone's Final Cut Pro Web Site
The Essentials of Multicam Editing in Final Cut Pro, by Steve Martin

Any known problems with FCE-HD and "Capture Now" or edits

I've been working with FCE for almost two years now. I've had the same problem ever since-- The SPINNING PINWHEEL OF DEATH when: playing back edited video from the timeline and the playhead passes over various edit points, usually cuts. Is it a CAPTURE problem, or camcorder RECORD problem, or something else? I use a SONY DCR-TRV38 with firewire; FCE-HD;
Any thoughts on why I get this problem so often, and what I can do to avoid it in the future? should I just switch to Avid or Premier??
Thanks for any help...
Shawn

Hi Shawn.
I don't think there is a "known problem".
I assume your HDs are not more than 75% full or fragmented?
If you have not already done them, try the old chestnuts of Trashing the Preferences and Re-installing FCE.
1. Make sure you trash all 3 of the Preference Files as detailed in this article:-
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=93690
2. If that does not work then re-install FCE but make sure you delete all the old FCE files first as shown in this link:-
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=301182
Good luck.
Ian.
PS. When you write in with a problem, remember to give all possible APPROPRIATE details eg.
Computer model and external Hard Drive.
Operating System.
FCE version.
Camera type.
Did the problem suddenly occur or has it NEVER worked?
Have you recently loaded new Software or Upgraded ANY programs, Operating Systems etc.
Have you moved or altered your source files?
Have you captured the clips from a DV camera or an A/D Converter etc.?
Is it Standard or High Definition Video?
What type of files are you using?
Also include details of exactly what you were doing before the problem occurred.
Is your film hours long and filled with numerous transitions and effects etc.?
THIS IS A GENERAL LIST. SOME OF THEM WILL NOT APPLY TO YOU.

Multicam editing in premier pro cc 2014, problem with one camera display size

Although the clip works fine in a sequence all by itself in multicam editing it is much too large and only a portion displays. The other camera is fine. The clips are from different types of cameras 1 is a DSLR, it displays too large, the other is a Sony PD 1570, a pro videocam that uses tape, it displays fine.

Have your tried re-ingesting the media. It's possible the file(s) are corrupt. I run into this on occasion, especially if the results shows up in the render (which is a dead give-away to file corruption) and re-ingesting fixes it.
It's also possible that the drive the file resides on has issues as well. Are you using a raid? We need more information regarding the specs of your machine and process.

Few questions on exporting out with fce 3.5 for web distribution

Hello I have been trolling here for a few months reading up on things and I know my way around a search pretty well I have gotten some of these answers from reading but id like to have my own thread so I can keep it all in one place...
First..
I run websites that need video's for surfers to be able to view.. these videos are in length from 20 min to 1 hour or longer... now I have figured out that when I render with the h.264 out sorry fce calls it export... I choose the quicktime setting of lan and it seems to be about right for what im used to in high quality from rendering out with pinnacle studio for a wmv or an mpeg.. now heres where I get confused with fce
I see there is a wmv setting to export to.. but when I do it.. it only exports a bit of it...
now these are the formats I want for video...
.mov
.wmv
.mpg
I have compressor but I have no idea on the settings in there and can't find what I need
in those formats I would like to have a
high
med
low
as far as quality go's
can someone help me out so my life is easier please... in fact I have 50 bucks via paypal if I can get someone get my settings down right maybe even in compressor so I just have to edit... this part always messes with my head when it comes down to render out...
there has to be some editors on here that know excatly what im talking about without having to say it on here... if you want to chat in private you can email me chris (at) themibcorp (dot) com I will give you my ichat name from there maybe you can help me and ill help you with some paypal
I want the video to play on all forms of computers..
our's and the other kind.. LOL

This isn't something someone can decide for you. It's up to you ti make up your mind. Either will do the job. If you want to spend the time to experiment with settings to better suit your media and you know what you're doing and want to spend the money get the more expensive version. If you'll be happy to use the basic presets based on average media and file sizes then get the cheaper version.

Can I use a MY Book Pro external 500 gig Triple interface HD with FCE?

Hey everyone,
I just recently bought a Macbook pro and purchased FCE HD 3.5. I want to purchase a high capacity external HD. I want it mainly for my projects with FCE and other members of the family will be backing up to it. I want to keep my projects on the external and work on them from there not my main HD.
After doing some online research I was about to purchase the LaCie Big Disk Extreme. However there seemed to be a lot of bad reviews about early disk failures. The G Technology drives sound great but are a little pricey.
I came across the MY Book Pro addition 500 gig Triple interface HD from Western Digital and found that the 500 gig pro had similar spec to the LaCie but they never mention in the specs that it can be used for video editing. They only mention "Fast enough for video editing" in the 1TB raid 0 version. I'm just wondering if anyone is having success using the My Book Pro Edition. I checked the forums first and even check specs from apple on external drives and FCE but I was hope for some real use advise. I'm not trying to cheap out, I'm just trying not to buy a lemon & get the most storage and speed for my buck. I'll buy they higher end if I should. My video productions right now are 10 minute long movies with some video clips and stills but I'm hoping to advance to bigger (High Def) things. Any advise in this matter would be greatly appreciated.
The specs from Western Digital are as follows:
My Book™ Pro Edition™
External Hard Drives
500 GB, Triple Interface
Rotational Speed
7,200 RPM (nominal)
Average Latency
4.20 ms (nominal)
Seek Times
Read Seek Time
8.9 ms
Track-To-Track Seek Time
2.0 ms (average)
Serial Transfer Rate
FireWire 800
Serial Bus Transfer Rate (1394b)
800 Mbits/s (Max)
Macbook Pro 17" 2.33GHz Intel Core 2 Duo Mac OS X (10.4.8)

The 500GB MyBook Pro should work fine. Just be sure to use a Firewire connection (not USB) to your Mac and format the drive as Mac OS Extended - Journaled. It will come from the factory as FAT32, so you'll need to reformat it. But wait - don't reformat it until you offload the ButtonManager, FW Driver and Retrospect software. You will need the first two to install your drive.
And that's one of the reasons I stay away from the MyBook drives - they were really designed for Windows systems, not Macs. For one, they have their own FireWire drivers and I see no reason to be required to install device-specific drivers on my Mac in order to use a consumer-grade hard drive. As far as I'm concerned, that's just bad design (or, perhaps design for systems other than Macs ...).
The 500GB Lacie Big Disk did get a bunch of bad reviews. However, the 500GB Lacie d2 Extreme is the same price and has much better reviews. The Lacie d2 Extreme drives are quite reliable; I have many and not one of them has failed me over the years. The 320GB d2 Extreme is currently $140 at newegg.com. See how that compares to the price of the MyBook.

Multicam editing: Can't get blade to show in angle viewer when trying to edit in Timeline

This problem just appeared. I have done lots of multicam editing in FCPX, it works great.
But, today I started on a new video and:
- I created the first multicam clip, it looks fine.
- I created a Project and appended the multicam clip into the Project, it looks fine.
- I see all the Angles in the Angle Viewer, it looks normal.
- I select the Event Browser and hit play, all angles play. I move the curser over an angle and I see a hand, just as I should. everything fine so far.
- I click in the Timeline and hit the space bar and the selected angle and audio start to play..........BUT the angles in the angle viewer do NOT play. Not right.
- With the Timeline still selected, I move the curser over an angle in the angle viewer, and i see the hand, NOT the Blade.
So, FCPX thinks I am still in the Event Browser, even though when I click in the Timeline, the Timeline background color changes to light grey, which says I am in the Timeline. FCPX is not letting me go into the Timeline (even though the background color changes).
I have to be doing something dumb, but I don't see it.
Any suggestions?

Turns out that was EXACTLY the problem --- I kept looking around and finally discovered the problem was that I was NOT in a project (although I thought I was).
Nevertheless, thank you for responding.

Multicam editing with FCE

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