What Has Happened to FCP? I want to like it, but I find it difficult.

Your system of filing is perfectly fine and there is no inherent problem with it, or with using it in connection to FCP.

One little detail that is not specific to FCP but to recent versions of macOS: you need to give FCP “Full Disk Access”, or the system may restrict its access to files in some locations like external volumes. Do this now if you haven’t yet.

FCP iz different and that can make the transition at times uncomfortable, but once you “get it”, especially the metadata capabilities and the magnetic timeline, I think you’ll appreciate it.

As you know editing, you can probably skim over several aspects of them, but still these two great tutorials, often recommended here, may help in overcoming some of the initial curve:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqUP7Zgeuck

https://www.izzyvideo.com/final-cut-pro-tutorial/

I would advise reaching out to Apple's creative media team. They will have to transfer you from there to another department who handles Final Cut Pro. They may be able to at least point you in the right direction on this.

I use FCP, but not on an external HD. I create my projects on my device then submit my completed projects, and move them to an external HD just to store a copy there.

Good Luck!

I don't think Shane went with the new FCP.

The problem begins on how you get your media onto the computer and into FCP. If you're getting it from a camera or camera card, FCP will want to put it somewhere. The default is inside the library bundle, which isn't a great idea for large productions. You can assign a location to store the media, but FCP will create a folder structure for it. If you assign a folder or drive the structure will look like this

Not ideal for most users I think. I would suggest you use Image Capture or EditReady or maybe just drag and drop or other tools to ingest your media to your drive, create a folder structure that you find useful, and then import into FCP using the Leave in Place option in the import window, or drag and drop using the Option key to leave in place. If you drag folders, these will create keyword collections, which is handy.

Tom Wolsky wrote:

I would suggest you use Image Capture or EditReady or maybe just drag and drop or other tools to ingest your media to your drive, create a folder structure that you find useful, and then import into FCP using the Leave in Place option in the import window, or drag and drop using the Option key to leave in place. If you drag folders, these will create keyword collections, which is handy.

I totally agree, of course.

I never import directly from camera to FCP, I use Image Capture or use the Finder directly to copy files into their folder hierarchy.

And, of course, I then import from there to FCP using "Leave in Place".

You don’t need additional software. You’re running everything through Compressor. Fine. I didn’t know that. I wouldn’t do it because most current systems can work with that media without needing optimization. Render files are not necessary for most systems. Most users switch off background rendering in FCP settings.

The terminology is different in FCP. It helps to learn it. A legacy FCP sequence is now called a project. The project is mostly analogous to the library. Bins are most like events.

There are no tracks in the timeline and there are no bins in the browser. A clip is defined my the tags you add to it, keywords, favorites, roles. They’re not defined by where they are, what bin they’re in, or what “track” they’re on.

Opened a project means opened a new library?

Imported how exactly? Leave in place or to the assigned location? Is FCP Storage Test the name of the drive ED1 or a folder on it? I guessing it’s a folder. That’s the folder you copied to ED2? Copying the folder to ED2 should make no difference to FCP if the media in the folder FCP Storage Test is still on ED1 and. ED1 is still connected. The application is following file paths. If the file path is disrupted the library will show the missing file alert.

Don Johns: "I have been editing for over 30 years...have continued to use FCP 7 up until a few months ago running Maverick with no problems... I copied all this over last night and disconnected the original drive...I got nothing but red files! I did the relink files and there are still some files that are showing red. This was my first project in the new FCP and I want to like it, but it is so different and confusing I found it very hard to wrap my head around it."

Don, you are having the same experience I did. The 2015 Will Smith movie "Focus" was edited on FCPX, and 1st Asst. Editor Michael Matzdorff became so frustrated when going from Avid to FCPX, he called Apple and asked for a refund! He later got used to FCPX and even wrote a book about it. BTW I below use "FCPX" for clarity, but Apple has renamed it back to FCP.

It's sometimes more difficult for experienced people to transition to FCPX than for new editors. You must understand it's not like going from Avid to Premiere or Premiere to Resolve. FCPX has a preferred way of working, and when used that way, it is very smooth and pleasant. When you tie one hand behind its back and try to force it to be Avid or Premiere, it doesn't work well.

Re media management in FCPX, this can work well if done properly. That includes only using disks formatted as APFS or MacOS Extended Journaled, not ExFAT or anything else. It also includes maintaining awareness of whether you imported the media using "leave files in place" or "copy to library". It includes using globally-unique filenames, IOW every file should be unique across all projects and all time. If needed you can use Finder to batch rename the clips upon offload to add a 5-digit unique suffix.

Unlike all other NLEs, FCPX can use "inode address resolution", which is a feature of Unix-derived file systems. After importing media using "leave files in place", you can literally rename every file on disk, move each file to a different location on the volume, go inside the library and delete all the symbolic links pointing to those files, and upon restart FCPX will instantly relink to those and rebuild all the symbolic links. However this only works within a volume, not across volumes, due to inode limitations.

I list below some of the main characteristics of FCPX. It is powerful but it can take an experienced editor time to accept the new workflow. I suggest you check out the various tutorials and books available on FCPX. Don't assume because of your experience you don't need that.

FCPX is the convergence of several concepts: 

(1) Pervasive database-driven media organization. IOW you don't pancake clips on a timeline as if that's your only organizational tool. You spend time in the Event Browser rating and keywording material before you touch a timeline.

(2) Curating material in the Event Browser is facilitated by an extremely high-performance media skimmer. Compare the update rate and latency of the FCPX skimmer to "Hover Scrub". The skimmer is full-screen and much faster.

(3) Organization in FCPX is *range* based, not clip based. You can have multiple keyworded ranges within a single clip. You can navigate between marked ranges in the Event Browser: Set multiple ranges in the browser in Final Cut Pro for Mac - Apple Support

(4) Due to the high performance and database organization, it's not necessary to sift through material outside the NLE and import only the "keepers". With FCPX you can import everything using "leave files in place" and do the initial assessment and selects there.

(5) After curation, use the database tools to query the material. Use keyword collections, smart collections and filter on favorites/rejects.

(6) Magnetic timeline, which includes an object-oriented encapsulated approach. In general, audio and video are not detached entities, which helps maintain sync. Instead of tracks, audio often has embedded "components" visible in the Inspector. Audio is assigned roles that helps further classify and organize it. Use the Timeline Index for this: View your project in the timeline index in Final Cut Pro for Mac - Apple Support

(7) Magnetic timeline, part 2: Beyond the "magnetism", the goal is to put most material on the primary storyline and supporting material on connected clips or a secondary storyline. For a music video, the primary storyline might be audio. 

Learn to think in these terms and use the product accordingly, or there will be problems. Experience indicates a remapped "hot key" approach for transitioning editors will not be successful.