Creating a New Project Shortcut Should Be Easy to Remember

By Shortcutter | Published: Saturday, July 31, 2010

Here’s a super-basic Saturday shortcut: creat a new project by hitting SHIFT CMD N

Now a dedicated Mac shortcut user might recognize that this is the same shortcut that creates a new folder in the Mac Finder, so this should be pretty easy to remember.

If you are a Mac user who does not use SHIFT CMD N to create new folders in the Finder, then you should commit this one to memory right now and start using it right away–the value of that shortcut in the finder actually exceeds the value it has as an FCP shortcut!

Posted in FCP 101 Stuff | Leave a comment

Setting a “Poster Frame” for Clips and Why You Would Want To

By Shortcutter | Published: Friday, July 30, 2010

There’s a neat functionality in the Browser that allows you to see “thumbnails” (“poster frames”) for each clip in your Browser and it has a very cool scrubbing feature to boot. To enable this, right-click on any Browser column header and toggle on the “Thumbnails” column and you will now see the thumbnails. Pretty cool, eh?

Note that this new column will appear to the left of whichever column you right-clicked and I like to have my thumbnails column on the leftmost side, so I right-click the left-most column to invoke (you can also drag it there, once it’s showing).

This gives you a very useful visual look at your clip content and by default, the first frame of the clip is displayed. If that weren’t enough however, note that you can use your mouse to actually scrub the content by clicking and dragging left and right in the thumbnail itself! When you release the mouse, the thumbnail reverts to the first frame again.

In cases where, say, all of your clips start with a slate, this can be kind of useless, but alas there are two ways to change the default thumbnail image to whatever you want it to be. The first is done by opening the clip in the Viewer, slewing to the frame you want and hitting CTRL P

The other way is even easier: while scrubbing the thumbnail in the Browser (as described above), simply press and hold the CTRL key, release the mouse button and voilà, you have a new poster frame!

In situations where you have a lot of clips to sort and assess and they can be easily recognized by a poster frame (maybe some are talking heads, some are outdoor, etc.), this can be a powerful way to save time in the rough cutting process.

Posted in FCP Ninja Level | 1 Comment

A Modest Browser Nicety For Log & Cap Tasks

By Shortcutter | Published: Thursday, July 29, 2010

Depending on your personal preferences, today’s simple shortcut might be worth remembering for whenever you are ingesting content. When you begin a log and cap or log and transfer operation, hit OPT B to set up the “logging” Browser column layout:

This will arrange the columns with the most useful information to the far left side so it will be readily visible without scrolling the Browser window over. The key change is that you can see the “Media Start” and “Media End” columns easily.

To switch back to the “Standard” Browser column layout, simply hit SHIFT B

This moves the “Duration” column to the far left as the gurus at Apple feel this is the most important thing to see for general editing.

I realize that this is probably a highly personal thing, but I tend to prefer the “Length” column as the “Duration” column reflects the trimmed duration of clips (i.e., if you have set ins and outs on the clips, the trimmed time is shown). When I’m scanning through my source material, I find I am more often looking for “that big long master clip” or something like that and, since I might be setting ins and outs on the same clip for several editable chunks on my timeline, I don’t pay much attention to the “duration” as it is kind of arbitrary for me.

If you want to, you can always set up customized bowser layouts, but for me, it’s not usually worth the effort and I am disinclined to become too dependent on customized settings (as regular readers may already know–hey, it’s just me).

If you want to learn more about Browser shortcuts, you can also read my post on being a “Browser Ninja.”

Posted in FCP 101 Stuff | 1 Comment

The Sweet “Log Clip” Workflow [UPDATED]

By Shortcutter | Published: Wednesday, July 28, 2010

In another post, I talked about using SHIFT C to “capture now” and I discussed the scenarios where that was appropriate. I also alluded to the fact that, if you have lots of “takes” or repetitive material where you will only actually need to ingest some of the footage, you might prefer to “log” clips in the capture process and then go back and batch capture them later.  I’d like to expand on that a bit today and discuss the keyboard shortcut workflow (such as it is) for doing this.

Of course you will first invoke the CMD 8 shortcut to open the log & cap window. Note that once that window opens and assuming your deck is recognized (if not, you might want to read this), you are ready to issue JK and L shortcuts without further mousing or clicking. Be sure to select your in and out points with I and O and, once you have marked a clip, you can now simply hit F2 to “log it.”

Hitting F2 Brings up the “Log Clip” window with the “clip name” field already highlighted (nice) in case you want to name it, but the default is the automatically generated name (that you configured in the “Logging” tab of the log & cap window to the right). If you now hit RETURN, you’ll see the clip (with the offline red strike-though mark) appear in your Browser and you’re ready to hit JK and L again to slew tape and, as the shampoo bottle says, repeat the process.

Once you have set up all your offline logged clips, you can use CTRL C to initiate the batch capture process and you can read about that here.

You might be wondering if there’s a shortcut for the “capture clip” button (next to the “capture now” button in lower left corner of the log & cap window) for those cases where you might want to log a clip and then immediately capture it in. I’m sorry to report that there is not, but I don’t see this as a problem really because I think it’s highly preferable, if you are in the “log clip” capture mode, to simply log the clips and batch ‘em in when you’ve worked your way through the whole tape.

Think about it: if you are logging clips and then immediately capping them, you are sitting there waiting for the cap and twiddling your thumbs while waiting to go on to log each content selection. Also, one of the efficiencies of this “log & batch cap” method is that you can go through the tape logging each take and then, once you have reviewed all the material, you can go back and cherry-pick only the clips you really need in the batch capture process (this might be based on your notes or “good” check-offs). Besides, while you do the batch capture, you can go make a snack or play Angry Birds on your iPhone! If you are looking to log and capture each clip, why not just do a “capture now” and do the sorting and reviewing in the browser later (and save wear and tear on your playheads).

UPDATE: Shortcutter friend and FCP doyen, Kevin Monahan (of FCPWorld) left a comment to point out that “you don’t have to type O before F2, just type F2 instead of O and the clip is marked out.” Kevin, I never noticed that and thank you for the future time I will save!  Great catch!

Posted in Intermediate | 3 Comments

Access Log & Capture or Log & Transfer

By Shortcutter | Published: Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Following on with yesterday’s post about using SHIFT C to “capture now,” it’s worthwhile to review the commands for initiating a tape or solid state media capture. Whenever you have to initiate a Log and Capture from a tape deck or attached video camera in FCP, simply hit CMD 8:

Just add SHIFT for Log and Transfer (for use with P2 cards or other non-tape captures):

If you work with lots of different media formats and find yourself going to the “Easy Setup” menu (Final Cut Pro>Easy Setup…), then before you hit CMD 8 or SHIFT CMD 8, you’ll want to hit a quick OPT Q to set up your format:

Here’s another little tip on the “Log and Cap” window: if you want it to open up at 100% size, make sure your Canvas window is set to 100% first. Of course with HD formats, this is impractical, but the bottom line is that the Log and Cap window mimics the Canvas size.

Posted in FCP 101 Stuff | 1 Comment

Make “Capture Now” Just a Little More “Now”

By Shortcutter | Published: Monday, July 26, 2010

If you cap a lot of tapes (and I still do), perhaps, like me, you often simply start the tape rolling and hit “Capture Now” to ingest everything and you sort out the bodies later in the Browser. This is especially useful when capping tapes that are comprised of many clips due to broken timecode.

Capture Now is particularly useful when capping corporate or documentary footage that does not consist of many “takes.” In cases where I have a number of takes (and especially if someone has already specified which takes are the keepers), it can be more useful to work through the tape and log each take then batch capture the needed footage once you’ve worked your way through the whole tape.

Well, this is not an earth-shattering or jaw-dropping shortcut by any means, but if you can remember to hit SHIFT C immediately after hitting L to play, you will get the capture process underway a couple of seconds faster than if you have to reach your hand out and mouse over to the “Now” button on the log and cap interface.

In cases where you don’t have much leader to work with and the camera person started shooting useful footage right out of the gate (sometimes due to “run and gun” necessity and sometimes due to a negligent failure to lay down a bars and tone leader), this might save you a few frames.

Note that, in this scenario, I like to use the following settings in my User Preferences (OPT Q):

  • Abort capture on dropped frames checked on
  • On timecode break: “Make New Clip”

So the overall workflow is:  CMD 8 (to initiate Log & Cap), L (to start play), SHIFT C (to “capture now”) and finally: go make a sammich! After all, when not ingest a meal while your workstation is ingesting that tape?

Posted in Intermediate | 1 Comment

Toggle Range Check

By Shortcutter | Published: Friday, July 23, 2010

When you’re finishing an edit it’s important to make sure that your luminance levels are “legal.” This ensures that your brightest whites won’t be “hot” and cause problems in a broadcast scenario (and that really applies to any video that might be shown on a consumer TV even if it’s not being broadcast per se).

Most of you will be familiar with the luminance range check overlay icon and its associated zebra stripes that can be turned on in the Viewer or Canvas (View>Range Check>Excess Luma) and I assume you are using it in your color correction workflow. For me, that workflow involves using the scopes and working through the timeline hand-correcting color balance and luma levels (and also a quick check of chroma levels which don’t often pose a problem). Once I’ve done the big stuff, I also often apply a broadcast safe clamp (Effects>Video Filters>Color Correction>Broadcast Safe) to be sure there are not hot spots I missed.

Well, toggling the Luma Range Check on and off is easy when you use the CTRL Z shortcut and I think this one’s well worth burning into your long term memory (more on that in a moment):

Anytime you deal with overlays in the Viewer or Canvas (as opposed to “clip overlays“), things can get a bit confusing or crowded and for that reason, I highly recommend you review my post on managing overlays in the Viewer and Canvas as a companion to learning the CTRL Z shortcut. In that article, I recommend leaving “title safe” on and memorizing the CTRL OPT W (toggle Viewer & Canvas overlays) and OPT Z (toggle timecode overlay) commands to tame overlays. Once you have those down pat, it’s now easy to add in CTRL Z for toggling luma, right? And while we’re tying these up into neat, easy-to-remember groups, it’s worth noting that the command for toggling clip overlays is CMD OPT W, so there’s a certain elegance in the fact that Viewer and Canvas overlays toggle with CTRL OPT W.

Although this command is classed as an “intermediate” level shortcut, anyone who has mastered all of the various overlay commands discussed above is truly an FCP Ninja.

Posted in Intermediate | 3 Comments

A Nearly Archaic Shortcut?

By Shortcutter | Published: Thursday, July 22, 2010

Post production guru, commentator and all-around nice guy Philip Hodgetts recently declared in his excellent blog that “tape is dead” (or, more accurately, he said “deadish” but he promised that it was getting deader all the time). Although I have lots of work that still comes in on tape (I get DVCAM and HDV from corporate clients all the time), I kind of agree with him that the end of the tape era is clearly visible on the horizon.

Likewise I find that I very rarely edit to tape these days (unless in certain broadcast workflows) and even more rarely print to tape (which is the quick and dirty tape output method that does not read the timecode on a blacked tape). I used to do quick prints to tape with timecode burn on VHS all the time for client review. I’d run a VHS, go to the client’s office and we’d review. Nowadays, I upload quicktime movies or flash movies and review them on my website or on Vimeo.

Given this evolution, I think today’s shortcut for “print to tape” is something very few of us will use much even though, back in the day, CTRL M was one of my first memorized shortcuts:

Hit this and the “Print to Tape” dialogue box pops up which allows you to add all kinds of bells and whistles like a countdown leader, closed captioning, etc. If (and that’s a big “if”), printing to tape is a part of your workflow–and I realize there may be some clients who still like a tape–this gets you going quickly.

Although I am in the process of covering each and every shortcut found in FCP for this blog and I rerun them (after all, this is really just a sort of glorified daily flashcard site), I think this may be the only appearance of this shortcut and, if Phil’s plea is heard, maybe FCP won’t be dealing with tape much longer. Makes me feel old!

Posted in FCP 101 Stuff | 1 Comment

A Set of Shortcuts Designed Only For Use By Robots

By Shortcutter | Published: Wednesday, July 21, 2010

OK, here’s an interesting group of shortcuts that allows you to play clips forward or backward in various speeds. If you hit CTRL F7, your clip plays normally. Hit CTRL F8 through CTRL F12 and your clip plays faster and faster with each successive CTRL F-key. That’s 6 forward speeds. Hit CTRL F6 and you go backwards at normal speed and similarly, you can go faster and faster backwards by using the lower CTRL F-key down through CTRL F2 (note that’s only 5 backwards speeds):

Now why on earth would anyone use these obscure and awkward shortcuts? Especially given the much easier functionality of the wondrous JK and L shortcuts (and the way that, if you tap J or L successively, you step through all available playback speeds). Who cares about these seemingly useless CTRL F shortcuts?

Well, robots do. That is to say, 3rd party devices like the Contour Shuttle Pro or other similar alternate input or control devices. These shortcuts are not really meant to be used by humans, but they provide a great way to program keys on such devices and, since these are standardized shortcuts that come stock with FCP, you can count on them to be present on any system into which you plug your 3rd party device (although you may need to download a driver for some of these helpers).

Now if you’ve read my general shortcuts rant, you know that I am generally not into the use of these devices, but I suppose there are always exceptions (like highly specialized dedicated workflow scenarios or for folks who might have some kind of difficulty accessing the JK and L keys comfortably). I generally oppose dependency on these kinds of devices because you will need to tote them around with you all the time and I submit that, once you get used to JK and L, these devices aren’t any better. The choice is yours but, if you do elect to use these devices, note that this set of shortcuts provide a great way to program the device easily.

NOTE: there is a similar set of “device oriented” shortcuts available for use with the 3-way color corrector and you can read all about it here.

Posted in Customization, Intermediate | Leave a comment

Match Frame: The Perfect Keyboard Shortcut

By Shortcutter | Published: Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Here’s one of the greats:  the Match Frame functionality. Let’s say you have a clip on the timeline and you want to quickly pull up the source clip from which it was taken in the Viewer. Perhaps you want to use another clip that you know is in the  same piece of footage or you want to look for another take and since there are hundred of clips in the Browser, you just want a quick way to pull up this particular piece of source. With the timeline as the active window (it has “focus”), simply position the playhead over the clip and hit F:

The source will open in the window and it will even have the in and out-points marked (even if you had later reset or them or set new ones). How cool is that? And mind you, this is very different from opening that clip in the timeline up into the Viewer (which gives you the little sprocket graphics along the playback indicator) because you are in the source clip now and can find a new in and out and bring that down to the timeline as a new shot–if you’d opened the timeline clip in the Viewer, you could not change the in or out without modifying your timeline clip.

Note that if you want to open the raw source clip in the Viewer (without the in and out points marked), you can hit OPT CMD F

Note that you can then hit SHIFT F to cause that source clip to be highlighted in the Browser so you can see exactly where it is.

And if it was nested in a bin, that all opens up for you as well.  Pretty neat.

And that’s not all!  If you hit F while the Viewer is active, the playhead will jump to the same frame if it is in use in the timeline! Not sure if you used that cutaway shot of the guy nodding and clapping yet? Just put your playhead on the shot in the Viewer and hit F.  If it’s not in the timline, you’ll get an error sound and if it is, you jump right to it. Pure awesomeness.

Note that if the clip you are match framing is not on video track 1, you will need to select it prior to hitting F, but that’s no biggie.

There’s a nice tip as to how to use this in a practical situation after the jump…

Read More »

Posted in Intermediate | 1 Comment