Final Cut Express 4: Visual QuickStart Guide

625 Pages·2008·23.777 MB·English

by  Brenneis, Lisa

VISUAL QUICKSTART GUIDE
FINAL CUT
4
EXPRESS
Lisa Brenneis
Peachpit Press
Visual QuickStart Guide
Final Cut Express 4
Lisa Brenneis
Peachpit Press
1249 Eighth Street
Berkeley, CA94710
510/524-2178
510/524-2221 (fax)
Find us on the Web at: www.peachpit.com
To report errors, please send a note to [email protected]
Peachpit Press isa division of Pearson Education
Copyright © 2008 by Lisa Brenneis
Editor: Karyn Johnson
Production Editor: Connie Jeung-Mills
Illustrations: Jeff Tolbert
Compositor: WolfsonDesign
Indexer: Emily Glossbrenner
Cover Design: Peachpit Press
Notice of rights
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of
the publisher. For information on getting permission for reprints and excerpts, contact
[email protected].
Notice of liability
The information in this book is distributed on an “As Is” basis, without warranty. While every precaution
has been taken in the preparation of the book, neither the author nor Peachpit Press shall have any lia-
bility to any person or entity with respect to any loss or damage caused or alleged to be causeddirectly or
indirectly by the instructions contained in this book or by the computer software and hardware prod-
ucts described in it.
Trademarks
Visual QuickStart Guide is a registered trademark of Peachpit Press, a division of Pearson Education.
Throughout this book, trademarks are used. Rather than put a trademark symbol in every occurrence of
a trademarked name, we state that we are using the names in an editorial fashion only and to the bene-
fit of the trademark owner with no intention of infringement of the trademark.
ISBN-13: 978-0-321-54432-2
ISBN-10: 978-0-321-54432-3
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed and bound in the United States of America
Dedication
For my folks, Jon and Aida Brenneis—from
you I learned that if you treat your friends
like family and your family like friends, you’ll
build a large friendly family.
You are the best.
Acknowledgments
I feel very lucky to be working with editor Thanks to all the men and women of the
Karyn Johnson who took the helm back in Final Cut Pro discussion forums: 2-pop.com,
2005 for the FCE HD edition—she is smart LAFCPUG.org, and Creative Cow. You lead
and funny, and she races Ford Pintos at the FCP community by example, and I am
Altamont. Thank you, Karyn. indebted to you. Keep posting.
Thanks to the Peachpit Press people: publisher Internet radio just keeps getting better
Nancy Ruenzel, executive editor Nancy Davis; and better. These are a few of the stations
Production-Editor-for-Life Connie Jeung-Mills, that make it a pleasure to work long hours:
compositor WolfsonDesign; Tonya Engst, KEXP.org (Seattle),wefunkradio.com
Jill Marts-Lodwig, Lisa Theobald, and Kelly (Montreal), RadioDarvish.com (San Jose),
Ryer, the editors of the previous editions, davidbyrne.com/radio and those crazy ska
who built a fine foundation for this edition. lovers over at Ska Jerk Radio. Viva!
Thanks to Ghretta Hynd and Jim Churchill for Thanks to a group of very important people
appearing in the book illustrations. Jim really who defy classification: Michael Wohl,
isn’t that stiff, but Ghretta really is a great Andrew Baum, Cawan Starks, Ross Jones,
yoga teacher. Philip Hodgetts, Josh and Michelle Mellicker,
Larry Jordan, Elina Shatkin, Tom Wolsky,
Thanks to my dad, Jon Brenneis, for gener-
Bill Davis, Kevin Monahan, Michael Horton,
ously allowing the use of images that appear
Ken Stone, Ned Soltz, Lowell Kay, Michael
in this book.
Rubin, Steve Martin, Ramy Katrib, Ben
Thanks to the whole Final Cut Express Gardiner, Nick Meyers, Fred Huff, Bruce
team at Apple Computer, Heavin, Christopher Gray, Andreas Kiel,
Anders Holck Peterson and Daniel Swett.
Thanks to my collaborator and friend Brett
Spivey, who concocted the compositing and Eternal gratitude to Marjorie Baer,
special effects chapters with me. a remarkably gifted editor, mentor, and
friend. She left us too soon.
Thanks to Lauren Coyne who continues to
astonish me with her mystical ability to spot
errors where nobody else can. I’ll have what
she’s having.
T C
ABLE OF ONTENTS
Introduction xvii
Chapter 1: Welcome to Final Cut Express 1
Your First Final Cut Express Project: Start to Finish. . 2
What Is Nonlinear, Nondestructive Editing? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Touring Your Desktop Post-Production Facility. . . . . . 5
Useful features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Menus, shortcuts, and controls. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
T
a
Customizable interface. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
b
l
Onscreen help . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 e
o
Editing and Effects Windows .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 f
C
The Browser. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 o
n
The Viewer. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 t
e
The Viewer’s Effects tabs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 n
t
The Canvas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 s
The Timeline. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
The Tool palette. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
The Voice Over tool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Input and Output Windows. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Capture. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Print to Video. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Import and export options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
About LiveType. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Do You Need Final Cut Pro? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Chapter 2: Installing and Setting Up 19
System Requirements. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Real-Time System Requirements. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
What’s the Difference Between DV and Digital Video?. . . . . . 21
Hardware Selection and Connection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Basic hardware configuration. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
v
Table of Contents
Recommended setup for DV/HDV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
HDV: HD for the Masses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Storage Strategy for Final Cut Express . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Connecting a DVcamcorder. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
FireWire Cables: Handle with Care. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Monitor Full-Screen Video on a Computer Display . . . . . . . . . 27
FCE Protocol: Disk Names. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Connecting an external NTSC or PAL video monitor. . . . . . 28
FCE Protocol: Controlling External Video Output. . . . . . . . . . . 29
Installing Final Cut Express . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Installation Options for Live Type Media. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Where to install FCE?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Upgrading to Final Cut Express 4. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Registering and choosing an initial setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
s
t
n Optimizing Performance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
e
t The Bottom Line: Running FCE on a “Base-Case” Mac. . . . . . 36
n
o
C Troubleshooting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
f
o
e Chapter 3: Presets and Preferences 39
l
b
a
T About Easy Setups, Presets, Settings,
and Preferences. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
How to “Trash Your Prefs”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Using Easy Setups. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Modifying the Settings of an Existing Item. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
How to choose an Easy Setup. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Apple FireWire vs. Basic FireWire. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Specifying User Preferences and System Settings. . . . 45
Setting Editing Preferences. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Customizing the Timeline Display . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Specifying Render Control Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Setting Scratch Disk Preferences. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
FCE Protocol: Scratch Disks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Specifying Search Folder Preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Specifying Memory & Cache Settings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
vi
Table of Contents
Specifying Playback Control Settings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
Setting External Editors Preferences. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
Customizing Final Cut Express . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Creating Custom Screen Layouts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Creating Custom Shortcut Buttons. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
FCE’s Button List: Source of Secret Powers. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
Chapter 4: Projects, Sequences, and Clips 67
Anatomy of an FCE Project. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Project item types. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
About Projects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
Using Save As to Protect Your Work. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72 Ta
b
Viewing and setting project properties. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 l
e
o
Using the Autosave Vault . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
f
Setting Autosave Vault location and preferences. . . . . . . . . . 76 C
o
Using Autosave to recover from a crash.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 n
t
You Need Backup. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77 e
n
t
Undoing Changes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 s
FCE Protocol: Undoing Changes in Multiple Projects. . . . . . . . 78
Reconnecting Offline Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
FCE Protocol: Broken Links. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Using the Offline Files dialog boxto reconnect. . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Reconnecting Online Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
FCE Protocol: Offline vs. Missing Clips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Deleting Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
FCE Protocol: Deleting Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Project Maintenance Tips . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Editing in stages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
The Last Mile: Tipsfor Final Assembly of BIG Projects. . . . . . 89
Restoring a sequence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
Tracking used and unused clips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Removing a project from your drives. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
Setting Up for Multiple Projects and Users. . . . . . . . . . 93
File access . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
Creating and saving files. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
vii
Table of Contents
What’s a Sequence? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
Creating a new sequence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
Time Stamp for Sequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Changing the Settings of an Existing Sequence. . . . . . 99
Working with Multiple Sequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Nesting and Sequences: A Glossary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Creating nested sequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
Copying and pasting from sequence to sequence. . . . . . . . . 103
Editing a sequence into another sequence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104
Making changes to a nested sequence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
FCE Protocol: Updating Nested Sequences. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
Assembling Nested Sequences with Transitions. . . . . . . . . . . 108
About Clips . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
s
t FCE 4 Update: Master Clip Identity Now Travels
n
e Across Multiple Projects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
t
n FCE Protocol: Clips and Sequences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
o
C
f Viewing and Setting Item Properties. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
o
e
l Chapter 5: Capturing Video 119
b
a
T
Anatomy of the Capture Window . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
DV Timecode vs. FCE Timecode: What’s the Difference?. . . 120
Preview section. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Capture controls. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Capture tab. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
Setting Up for Capture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Is Your SystemCapture-Ready?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
Entering Information on the Capture Tab . . . . . . . . . 127
FCE Protocol: What Are Offline Clips?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
The Art of File Naming. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
Selecting a capture bin.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Entering clip information on the Capture tab. . . . . . . . . . . . 130
FCE Protocol: Auto-Incrementing on the Capture Tab. . . . . . 133
Logging Tips . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
Capture Clip: Capturing Video with Device Control . 134
Capture Strategies to Manage Project Media. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
viii
Table of Contents
Capture Now: Capturing Video without
Device Control. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136
Capturing analog audio . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
Capturing HDVVideo. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
HDV Capture Setup Checklist. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Capture Project: Batch Recapturing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
Preparing to recapture a project. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
Using DVStart/Stop Detection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
Troubleshooting Capture Problems. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
FCE 4 Update: Log and Transfer for Post-Tape
Post-Production. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
Chapter 6: Importing Digital Media 151 T
a
b
l
Importing Still Images. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153 e
FCE Protocol: File Location Is Critical . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153 o
f
Setting the default durationfor stills. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 C
o
New In FCE 4:Automatic Image Scaling. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154 n
t
e
Working with Adobe Photoshop Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155 n
t
Preparing a Photoshop file for use in FCE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155 s
FCE Protocol: Updating Photoshop Files in FCE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
Importing a layered Photoshop file into Final Cut Express. . 160
FCE Protocol: Layered Photoshop Files. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Importing Audio Files. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
Converting Audio to 48 kHz on Import with iTunes. . 163
Importing an iMovie Project. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
Really LiveType. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
Chapter 7: Organizing Clips in the Browser 169
Anatomy of the Browser. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
Browser columns. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
Browser window icons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
What Does “NotSet” Mean?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
Using the Browser to Organize Your Project . . . . . . . 173
Sorting items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
ix