Final Cut Pro X vs. iMovie

rebbi wrote:

… I am beginning to love this software. 😁

and you haven't edit a single movie yet!

Organizing clips is nice… but when you dig deeper into the endless options to 'compose' your material ... 😎

Try to force yourself to use FCPX two-handed: the full potential of this software is only avail via the keyboard short-cuts. The fun, esp. for us hobbyists, starts when editing lightning fast, not waiting endlessly for things 'processing'.

Last word from here:

Compounds are evil.

… in 99% cases, there's a better way in FCPX than creating a 'compound'.-

California… Bat Mizwha… sounds like fun to me!

Happy Movie Making!

Hey Karsten, I am doing my projects with all compounds. What is it you don't like?

AppleMan1958 wrote:

Hey Karsten, I am doing my projects with all compounds. What is it you don't like?

I did know, my 'mantra' leads to debate ... 😀

very simple:

a) I've seen so many people (ab)using compounds as 'tracks replacement' - therefor missing the many advantages of the one-and-just-one storyline concept

b) there's no need for compounds. full stop.

... wow - b) sounds very absolute…and we know: absolute is absolute wrong 😁

even me have to object, there are (rare) cases, there's no other way to realize specific 'effects' without compounding a few clips to a solid new one.

but … which one? name me a few …!

I don't need compounds:

• due to magnetic-timeline there's no need to 'group' a pile of clips - just move the one they are all connected to.

• in case you have 'piled' some 'tracks' of clips (e.g. to 'position' cut-aways) - when done, just 'add to storyline' ( cmd-opt-arrow down = most unknown keyboard-shortcut in FCPX) ) and no 'tracks' anymore - and no need for compounding them.

• … to position a cut-away I should use the better suited trim-tool in the storyline anyhow .........

• there's a 'Position' tool - in case you want to 'free' a clip from the magnetic timeline

• you don't have a storyline when start editing? therefor you have to have layers of tracks and have to move groups of clips 'free around anywhere'? c'mon, sure you have ... otherwise, you wouldn't know where you like to put your clips; use placeholders .. a tiny shift in woirkflow: Make up your mind, before launching the computer ...

• compounding to apply 'effects' to a group of clips? select all, cmd-shift-v …

• compounds to dissolve a clip on secondary? why is it on secondary anyhow?

• and so on, and so on, and .......

_________

compounds are evil

… is meant as a friendly slap to your back-head:

free your mind of that old 'grouping' metaphore,

… magnetic timeline 'groups' automatically. (wowy!)

And … this isnt meant as grumpy and wise-guyish as it sounds/looks - if you're happy with your groups of clips… do it. That's why they are a legal feature in FCPX.

compounds are great - just still haven't found out what for 😝

Hi Karsten,

It appears we are thinking about compounds in a very different way. Let me show you how I am using them on a current project.

The project is a marketing video. I have an Intro, a Closing Sequence and 5 or 6 interview sequences. I interviewed 9 people and asked their opinion on 6 questions. I then edited together their answers by question. The project makes heavy use of multicam clips (because of multiple audio sources), and I used the keywords feature heavily to organize things.

So I made a compound clip for each sequence. They are sort of like chapters.

Here is the opening sequence. ( A compound clip)

Here is one of the question sequences. (A compound clip)

After I have created all the individual sequences (compound clips), I put them in the project timeline.

Here is a closeup of the project timeline.

Here is the entire project timeline.

So the project timeline is a series of compund clips. The new snapshot feature makes it easy to capture the state of all these compound clips at any point in time.

Works great for me. I could have done all this in a single timeline, but that would have seemed, well, so iMovie! (ha!)

AppleMan, I use a similar workflow.

While I understand that compound clips should not be overused - which I think is the gist of Karsten's advice, I do feel that working on "Chapters" is one case where they really come in handy.

The project timeline becomes extremely neat and, more importantly, it is logically organized.

(This is the closest realization in FCP X of the concept of nested sequences from legacy FCP or FCE)

AppleMan1958 wrote:

… So I made a compound clip for each sequence. They are sort of like chapters. …

so, you do use compounds 'just' to avoid clutter in your timeline? 😉

why not …

No, as Luis a 100% correctly said: in such a case, compounds are just nested sequence.

A fundamental use of 'grouping' clips, as you would group layers <sigh> im Photoshop.

AppleMan1958 wrote:

… It appears we are thinking about compounds in a very different way.

no, no - if I would do 'chapters' I would use compounds too. … ok, may be not 😀

As I said before: I do see people using compounds not as groups-of-clips, but as 'track replacements' - and it is indeed a bit different, NOT to think in layers when editing video. For sure, for compositings you HAVE to have layers (Brady Bunch Effect).

But, diff. example, there's still some very weird 'tutorial' @YouTube, which explains how to create a multi-cam clip - by stacking and manually adjust clips in compounds (within compounds within compounds) .. and THAT makes me stubborn to call compounds as evil.

… to be honest: I do use compounds myself: the intro for each weekly soccer-report is a compount… I created a 'general' one with place-holders, but with the right timing, so each week I just have to replace the grey clips with an actual content of that actual week....

Thanks fro sharing your workflow, appleman...

…… anyhow: compounds ARE evil ........... 😠

😁😝😁