How can I back up project with just the used part of the clips?

Have no tried this yet but should "Project Duplicate" with option "Used Clips only" do the job?

Did you use feedback?

Ok, interessting that the "Used Clip only" option still copies unused media. Not very clever indeed.

However this was never relevant in my workflow. i first backup any orgininal media anyway thus for the project itself its just the project file and maybe some render stuff. But its definetly an issue if you want to forward your project to an external person.

Is there a way to delete unused sections of clips in the event? I had a 1 hour long clip that I imported. I only needed the last 1 minute. If I select all of the clip in the event (minus the last 1 minute), and right click and "delete", will this work?

For Zak's quesion, didn't FCP 7 have a manage option to backup a project with all the events together, since FCP 7 used a "scratch" disk, and not a separte event like FCPX does?

Thanks

I think you would not delete anything from your media files because FCPX only works with references pointing to start and ends in clips.

A workaround maybe a project with one clip, cutting and exporting as ProRes file which then can easily be re-imported in a new event. Not very elegant though...

Nobody hears knows or can say what may or may not do. You could use feedback to make a feature request.

I noticed a new app was released recently to do backup just for FCPX - http://npassociatesllc.com/

I doubt it can do what you want though - I don't see how it's going to know (at the file system level) what "part" of clips you're using.

Each to their own, but I can certainly believe this feature isn't available. It's absolutely no use to me.

It would create such a half-useful backup where I'd be limited to "already used" portions - even deciding a transition should be a few frames longer would be off the cards with such a backup?

I would have thought this is a feature from the old days where hard drive space was much more expensive.

I'm fairly sure Apple assumes most people want to keep their original footage... "forever." Media management in FCPX has received quite a lot of praise from professionals.

Everything comes down to prep and organization.

Projects are just pointers into media clips and render files. If you want to trim down your projects, go to the File menu and select Delete Project Render Files...

Deleting Event clips will kill a project no matter what. Archiving a project without the associated Event media is pointless. Best advice is to always keep your original media. That way you can reconstruct an Event later for the clips your project requires. As far as I know, there is no way to delete (to the trash) Event clip ranges.

If you know that you won't be using 90% of your footage and want to delete the extraneous original footage, I would recommend using Quicktime 7 Pro and selecting the ranges you think you'll need beforehand. This is easily accomplished by opening your original clips, setting an In and Out point (just like in FCPX) -- select Copy, then File > New and Paste. Save as a Self-Contained clip and import it into FCPX. QT7Pro does not alter the original footage (as much as possible, I imagine it has to occasionally build an intitial i-frame if your original is something like H.264, but other than that, you can't tell the difference.)

To preserve a project entirely, you will need to back up the associated Event clips as well. Those are the clips you need to worry about trimming. You should use Copy files to Final Cut Events folder on Import. You should be able to delete any transcoded media (High Quality and/or Proxy) before archiving (don't take my word as an absolute on that -- Tom probably knows for sure.) For simplicity, you should create an Event for JUST the clips you will be using for the project to backed up. That way, at the end, you can group the Event folder and the Project together for archiving (and with the smallest footprint).

You could also simply Export your (trimmed) project as H.264 (FCPX uses the highest quality settings) without titles, effects, generators or transitions to retain the portions of clips you want to save/archive and delete all the original media — and forego everything stated above. You will still have an exceptional quality source for any subsequent projects using the same material and it would be compact enough. I wouldn't archive with ProRes (except maybe Proxy... it's about the same bitrate as the H.264 generated, except I think the H.264 would still be a better choice.) Using ProRes kind of defeats the purpose of archiving.

you should be able to delete any transcoded media (High Quality and/or Proxy

Yes, I've done that (after first seeking advice).

Just delete the "High Quality Media" folder (with FCPX closed)