how to change the folder where projects are stored?

No.

Within any given physical hard drive, your Events have to live in a folder called Final Cut Events and your projects have to live in a folder called Final Cut Projects.

When first create an event on any drive, Final Cut Pro X will create the necessary folder structure on the drive. Same with projects.

On the Macintosh HD, those Final Cut Events and Final Cut Projects folders are created within the Movies folder by default. You can't change them.

But you can move (or copy) your Events and Projects to another physical drive.

From within the Events Manager, select the event you want to move, then go File > Move Event. It will prompt you to select another hard drive. IMPORTANT: Let Final Cut create the necessary file structure. Don't try to do it yourself from within Finder!!!

Similarly, if you want to move Projects, from within the Project Library, select a project and go File > Move Project.

From within the Event Manager or Project Manager, if you select an Event or Project and just drag and drop it to another drive, Final Cut Pro X will copy it to the target drive and leave the original in place, so you'll have two copies.

R&B,

I note your warning about using Finder to move an event folder.

However, I have run a few tests in using Finder for such a move out and back and seem to have not problems.

Have you actually seen any issues?

Thanks.

Yes. FCPX can lose the link to the files it's referencing. I have been able to open an archive, and though the application will not allow importing, opening the archive can establish the reconnection. The reveal in finder function doesn't work however.

While it wasn't a conscious experiment, I got the same result. I had been using my system drive for media because I couldn't seem to capture to an external drive for FCE.

With the ability to more easily move the media files after importing into FCPX, I am able to make use of an external drive previously being used for photos and "sometime later" clip archives. This drive is backed up to a clone, and after the first backup, I found FCPX now only showed my backup clone, totally ignoring the existence of my "Scratch Disk".

So, yes, it does find the Event and Project files if you move them using the Finder, but while he doesn't need moral support from me, I concur with Tom that I wouldn't trust the method.

I now just turn the backup disk on when I choose to periodically do the back up.

All good points. I am really just seeking a workflow to keep my video clips in another folder outside the FCP x Movie folder.

I think I may settle into the following workflow (I use a Canon video camera with SDHC card)

1. Use FCP x to select and import clips from SDHC card to a new event in the FCP X Events folder.

2. Move that new event subfolder from the FCP x Events folder to another location of my choosing (never having used those clips in a project to that point)

3. When ready to undertake a project, move the event subfolder back to the FCP x Events folder and use normally in a project.

4. When project is completed, use Move Project and Referenced Events to my archive disk.

I think that should work.

If step 3 balks, I can always Import from File back into a new FCP x event.

Anyway, I'm not Stephen Spielberg editing "Jaws" so if I encounter a problem it's not the worst thing I guess.

Rex, that sounds like a good plan insofar as it reduces the number of events that load into the Library on any given session, especially if the clips aren't general B roll and are destined to be associated with a particular future project.

Your flow should work just fine. It should forget the subfolder ever existed, and treat it like the Prodigal Son when it returns.

Remember, however, if Step 3 doesn't work (can't imagine it won't), you can leave the files where you moved them and import without copying. This will place aliases in the "Original Media" folder and not duplicate your media.

I have just done this. Having just installed new hard disks in my Mac Pro, and created a Raid, I had to copy the old files from two hard disks to the raid. My FCP X Project and Event folders were located on the removed drives.

I started up FCP X and it couldn't find the folders so just displayed the System disk, and the Raid Disks in the Project Library window, and the icon to Create a new Project.

I ensured that the Project and Event folders where in the root/top level of my Raid Disk. In FCP X I selected the Raid Disk, and then clicked created a new project. This did create a new project and at the same time loaded in all previous projects into the Project Library. Few!

Very happy with how that all worked ok.

Thanks R&B. Worked like charm!

When I upgraded from Snow Leopard to Lion all of my Events disappeared. After reading this I realized that FCPx was only recognizing my /Volumes/MediaRaid/users/Frank/Movies/Final Cut Events folder and was no longer recognizing and parsing my /Volumes/MediaRAID/Final Cut Events

It appears that under Lion, FCPx only allows you to have one FCEvents folder per drive.

Hope this is helpful to someone else.

This has always been the case. The application has never seen an events folder at the root level of the system drive.

Hi Tom, this is not the system drive.

system drive: Macintosh HD

user drive: MediaRAID

storage: Scratch

under SL FCPx would find events and load them from /Volumes/MrdiaRAID/Final Cut Events and /Volumes/Scratch/Final Cut Events. but now under Lion it only finds the later.

last night i found out the same is true for iMovie.

Please provide a screen shot of the root level of the drive. Does the drive mount in FCP or not? Trust me this gas nothing at all to do with the OS. I assume you're using the latest version of that OS and not an intermediate version.

My User directory:

Root of same disk as user directory resides (different from system disk):

View of events in FCPx (note that the even from the root of the MediaRAID drive is not visible):