My issue is that was given footage as a FCX library, rather than the individual files. I do not own a Mac.
Can I open a FCX library in any Windows based editing software such as Premiere Pro, and if not, is there a way that I can 'extract' the files from the library on my PC?
The library can't be opened on a Windows machine. You can't even put it on a DOS formatted drive. How did you get the library? That might give us a start on what you can extract. Anyway will it will need some help from the FCP provider in terms of a library XML file that has been converted use the XtoCC utility to change it into an XML format that can be read by Premiere.
The people I shot the footage for use MACS so I copied to Mt Mac formatted drive on their machines. Usually i would then get the footage onto my windows machine by using HFS Explorer but this time the footage is in a library rather than the individual files.
You can in fact copy a Library to a FAT drive, it's just very useless once you do.
Go back to the Mac guys, have them right-click the Library, "Open Package Contents", and copy just the video files out of that. A Library is a "package" on a Mac. It has lots of stuff hidden inside of it. Windows doesn't recognize packages, so it gets useless with a Windows OS.
If they're editing with FCPX, and you're using a different NLE in Windows, then they need to give you the raw footage to work with, and maybe an FCPXML file processed through XtoCC, if your NLE reads XML files. And that will be a less than perfect solution.
All they need to do is share (export) the video files you need as separate movies or pull the items out of the Library original media folders. It's easy. But you all need to agree on the same formats and how you're going to work in your two different universes. That's not easy but lots of post houses work with a mixture of hugely different platforms and software. You will need to find a movie format that is accessible on any machine in the process loop and a drive system that is universally mountable.
I don't want to make any assumptions here but this project could be a total disaster. both parties have exhibited ignorance of some fundamental stuff. Ignorance can be fixed with some communication and a few tests. But ti's going to be VERY easy for one or both parties to accuse the other of failing to adhere to standards and protocols. As deadlines approach this chaos is a direct pathway to total meltdown,
Thanks for the replies guys. Thankfully the edit was done by myself on their machines, I just quickly grabbed the folders they had given me onto my drive (time definitely was not on my side). The only reason I took the footage was for myself to review so I can get back to them at some point and open the package to get the raw files I'm after.
Can I use a FCX library on a PC
