I thought this might be interesting.

At present I'm cutting a series of short stories. Vignettes that will eventually be joined together as a mini documentary. It's all been shot with Canon CS300 with a combination of normal and slow speed. The images are absolutely stunning!

Anyway these films are going to be very similar to another project I did with this director called The Trainer a film which launched the Canon 5D in Australia.

It took the best part of a week to put this together and while these short films aren't as complex they share many of the attributes.

So here's the thing….

I'm getting each short film of about 4 minutes duration done in 2 DAYS!
I'm not believing it and nor is my director who keeps asking if I'm been thorough.
Basically it's one day of making selections and one day of editing. Once you've gone through and catalogued your footage, made favourites and placed markers on key moments you are now in the sweet spot of how FCP X enables you to edit with speed, precision and most importantly flexibility.

There is absolutely no way I could do this job in this amount of time with any other NLE.
WIth FCP X I spend most of my time adjusting content to best tell the story while with others I was spending an equal amount of time just dealing with the schematics of how to go about making changes.

My hat is off to you Apple.

Very nice

I recognize the background music but don't know the name of it

It's all Soundtrack Pro royalty free. That why we used it.

There are some absolute gems in there and if you are upgrading to FCP X definitely don't delete the Soundtrack Pro libraries. They are substantialy better than what you get with X.

That's from soundtrack pro disc? Man I gotta dig that media disc out

Yes mate. 2 discs full of goodness. Have used it extensively in broadcast.

Yes, great music indeed. That actual song is the music in my trailer for "Don't Walk In The Woods", a horror indie film that has been in and out of production for two years. I also noticed that same song on a commercial for some local tax attorneys....heh, heh, heh !

Sean,

I'm really impressed with "The Trainer". I just do video for my web businesses and personal music and family stuff, but as I do and understand more video, I'm much more appreciative of the skill and art you all put into your work.

This might be better as a new post, but I'd love to see more of what you and the other pros that post here have done. Some people put links in their signatures, but not enough of you do as far as I'm concerned. When I get to see your work, I not only gain respect for the people posting, but I can see how you utilize the concepts and tools in FCP. It's fun to see how you all take simple cuts, transitions, effects, and music and bring a bunch of "0s" and "1s" to life. Oddly enough, when I watch TV or movies, I don't take as much from it as when someone I know actually did the editing.

(And, I never bothered with Sound Track Pro as I was using Logic and didn't see or have a need, but I had no idea all those royalty free .caf files were buried there in my Library/Audio/Apple Loops/... folder. Very cool!

Thanks for the post,
Dave

Nice to see that there are other clips than "yearbook" in the STP library.

The testimonial about speed, I can only sign. FCP X is brutally fast. I'm no full time editor (more stuff to do on the job), but FCP X Is helping me to get home to wife and child early a lot of times.

While I think that Adobe CS is a better replacement for the whole FCS suite, X is terrific for quick turnaround.

Thanks so much for your kind words.

The craft of editing is something I'm absolutely passionate about and it frustrates me no end when I see posts looking for plugins to make their work meaningful.

I'm thinking of starting a series on editing. Not sure where yet. But I feel it's about time people remembered that the best editing is the the editing you don't notice but FEEL.

This is why Walter Murch is so good. You don't notice so much the cut but you're driven by it it.
Here's a link to some of the best editing I've ever seen.




From 4 minutes on this video still hypmotises me today. It is a masterpiece of how editing can convey a story..

I used to say to my students that if you can get anywhere close to this then you're doing well.

It's now out of print, but there was a really fantastic book on editing titled "Apple Pro Training Series: The Craft Of Editing". I've taught that as a college course a few times. Never had more fun with teaching a course. Wish that book would be updated for FCP X.

Sean,

Thanks for the link. I watched and payed close attention to 4 minutes and forward. It looked like a "good scene" to me, but I couldn't tell you exactly why. Clearly, there was nothing tricky in the editing except for the excellent choice of footage cuts. Are there some specific moments in there that I could pay closer attention to?

I always thought at this level of movie making that the director would be sitting in the cutting room and making a lot of the editorial decisions. I take it that this wasn't the case. I know the name Walter Murch, but at this point, it's just a name.

Would you mind expanding a bit more on what you believe sets this editing apart from most everything else? I'm not a real editor, nor do I have any aspirations of ever becoming one, but the whole genre is fascinating and I'd love to understand more of the "art" behind it (and then get back to making my instructional and simple music videos).

Thanks again,
Dave

BenB wrote:
Something that can be brought up to Michael.

DaveG wrote:
For me it's the rhythm of it. You could turn off the sound and this story would be no less understandable. When cutting drama I often review my edits with the sound off. Just to make sure I'm capturing the 'spirit' of the scene.

Gives a whole different perspective, and allows you to really see the performance rather than being seduced by the audio. Of course the audio is just as important but this a useful technique to help hone your style.

Many of my colleagues in education share an exercise when teaching film making. Watch great classic movies without the sound. You learn a lot about not just editing, but blocking, lighting, etc. Remove the sound, and you start to notice lots of other stuff.

When I color grade films for people, I never listen to the audio. I don't need audio to grade/correct color. In fact I find it distracting even if I could. The best films I've graded are the ones in which I understand the story once I'm finished grading.

My most favorite grading job to date (an indie feature film co-produced by Harry Shearer here in New Orleans), I've yet to watch it with the sound. I fell in love with the film, and it has a special place in my heart. I feel if I turn the audio on and watch it, it will ruin it for me. Weird, but yes, there you have it.

A friend and I are actually working on a web site that will be focusing on the language of editing. It should be live soon.


Another resource is the book "In The Blink Of An Eye" by Walter Murch. The last half is about technology and is very out of date. But the first half is interesting with great insight into the language of editing. Only issue I have with this book is that I know many folks who read it and take his personal editing style as law. For example, I know someone who got rid of his chair and edits standing up, only because Walter does. That does not make Walter a good editor, it's just his personal preference in office furniture, so to speak. So watch out for what is someone's working style versus what is the "language of editing".

Editing is totally based on how our brains perceive and process information through out our daily lives.

I've dropped Mr. Wohl a note asking if the Craft Of Editing book would ever be updated for X. Crossing my fingers. Although I have gone through and rewrote the first lesson myself for use with X (using the same footage), for my personal use in presentations on editing I do.

I also want to add that the way FCP X sort of forces folks to actually organize their media is great, IMHO. I can't tell you how many times I'm called to consult on a film project, especially documentaries, because no one bothered with media management seriously until it was too late, and they couldn't find anything they needed off of the three dozen FW drives laying around.

I have a few students from my X classes and seminars who've reported that through organizing their clips by making keywords, smart collections, and marking favorites, find they sort of formulate the edit in their heads during this process, so by the time they start dropping clips into the Timeline, it goes really fast. Spending most of their time trimming edits rather than making the rough cut.

I'm relatively new to the forum and hope I'm responding in the appropriate topic line. All the praise given in these testimonials sounds like nirvana when I've been having so much problem with FCPX. I'm having continuous crashing episodes when trying to load AVCHD footage from a Panasonic GH2. Recurring visits to the Apple Store have only been temporary relief...my most recent visit has again failed to show a cure. I've been told that my Imac meets only minimum specs for using FCPX but that it is adequate non the less. The resident Apple Store FCPX expert made a comment that upgraded equipment would be most helpful but would not guarantee that the change would resolve the crash problems. I'm not trying to start a FCPX bashing session but rather looking for some guidance from those who have success and praise for FCPX.
I have decided to upgrade my computer, give FCPX one last try and then move on to another Editing program if the problems aren't resolved.

My question to the forum is this...What should I be looking for in the new system to ensure the best performance to use FCPX with speed and efficiency ?

My present system is an iMac ( I think @ 4yrs old ) with Model Name:iMac
Model Identifier: iMac10,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 3.06 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 3 MB
Memory: 8 GB
Bus Speed: 1.07 GHz
Boot ROM Version: IM101.00CC.B00
SMC Version (system): 1.52f9

ATI Radeon HD 4670:

Chipset Model: ATI Radeon HD 4670
Type: GPU
Bus: PCIe
PCIe Lane Width: x16
VRAM (Total): 256 MB
Vendor: ATI (0x1002)
Device ID: 0x9488
Revision ID: 0x0000
ROM Revision: 113-B8030C-253
EFI Driver Version: 01.00.367
Displays:
iMac:
Resolution: 1920 x 1080
Pixel Depth: 32-Bit Color (ARGB8888)
Main Display: Yes
Mirror: Off
Online: Yes
Built-In: Yes
Display Connector:
Status: No Display Connected

FireWire Bus:

Maximum Speed: Up to 800 Mb/sec

Thanks...Creagle

Karel Reisz and Gavin Millar's The Technique of Film Editing and On Film Editing by Edward Dmytrk are the real classics. The Karel Reisz book was updated a few years ago and is still great. Another excellent book is Ken Dancyger (?) The Technique of Film and Video Eduting: History, Theory, and Practice.

Let me start by stating you will have issues with any NLE. Fix the issues you have. Moving to another NLE will only give you new issues to address.

Never ask an Apple retail store person about Final Cut. They are clueless, trust me. I've been through many of these stores, and they have no clue. I've had several of their FCP specialists in my classes, and they are clueless. They are taught to do one thing, and one thing only, sell hardware, period.

A 4 year old iMac has a very weak GPU. FW800 drives are minimal for serious HD video work. So a new iMac with better GPU, 16 GB RAM, and a Thunderbolt drive would be great.

But before that, let's get some usable info.
1- What version of FCP X?
2- What version of OS X?
3- How much RAM do you have?
4- Are you putting all of your Events and Projects on an external FW800 drive, or on the internal system drive?
5- What is the capacity of each drive connected (including the internal drive), and how much free space does each have?

Have you run both Disk Utility to repair all drives, and Disk Warrior to rebuild the directory of all drives?

Are you optimizing your media? What are you doing when it crashes?

Creagle wrote:
Don't want drift to much from the topic, but if it meats the minimum requirements it's hard to believe its the hardware causing. Not saying its not, I just wouldn't point my finger to soon at the hardware.

I have old Mac Pro 1.1 with a ATi HD 5770 at home which gets used with Final Cut Pro X and had no issues with so far...

As Ben mentioned little more info on the software side might help us, help you.
BenB wrote:
Yeah, you can say that about any iMac to date.