FCPX frustrations

[machenryr]

I'm totally new to FCP. I've been video recording my band in a recording studio. The audio is great. I have four cameras on each of the musicians. I've got the videos to sync with multicam. GREAT! But in the process of experimenting, I have these random switch angles and also trying to get the audio to be the only one playing audio. I've looked at several tutorials, but they say THIS and I do THAT, but it doesn't work out the way it does in the tutorials.

1 - How do I delete ALL the angle switches? When I go to do it again, I'll hit 1 for angle 1 and it either doesn't do that to it does but then switches to the next angle I had done previously. All I need to do it to DELETE all previous angle moves. Am I using the right terminology?

2 - How do I detach audio? I tried at first to juggle the three options to the top left of Video/Audio, Video only, Audio only for the clips. But sometimes I hit video only and it won't move from video/audio, or it reverts to something else. I have a feeling it's connected with the angle switching. Then after watching a video I saw DETACH AUDIO from clips! Eureka! But all of them are detached.

3 - I have started all over a few times, deleting the multicam or event and importing the media all over again. But it's still not working right. I'm not even sure how to go back to multicam as a single file on the timeline. I can go from multicam to the timeline and double click to split the clips , but how do I get back for editing with the blade?

Sorry, but I've been in a nightmare for days - since Tuesday and it's now Sunday. I'm just not getting it. Many concepts are familiar since I'm a musicians and have an audio studio and have had one for many, many, many years. I think I'm close to groking it, but the actions are following.

 

[joema2]

...I have four cameras on each of the musicians. I've got the videos to sync with multicam.

1 - How do I delete ALL the angle switches?

In a multicam clip on the timeline, an angle switch is shown by a dotted line on the video lane. That is called a "through edit". You can delete that by selecting it so both edges are yellow and pressing delete.

For a bunch of through edits or angle switches you can select the entire clip and do Trim>Join Clips.

In general before doing anything I suggest right-clicking on the project icon in the Event Browser and select "Duplicate Project as Snapshot". That will give you an easy fallback if something goes wrong.

2 - How do I detach audio?...

In general the goal with FCPX is don't detach audio unless absolutely unavoidable. A properly formed multicam clip has all audio tracks embedded and these will retain sync -- provided you don't detach them.

The separate audio tracks can be seen in the Audio Inspector at upper right. CMD+4 toggles the Inspector on/off, select the Audio tab to see the waveforms.

For a multicam clip in the timeline, if you want to individually adjust or mute per-channel volume levels, you can do Clip>Show Audio Components. Then when you're doing you can collapse them.

...I tried at first to juggle the three options to the top left of Video/Audio, Video only, Audio only for the clips. But sometimes I hit video only and it won't move from video/audio, or it reverts to something else...

There is a specific procedure required to prep material for multicam sync. If this is not followed things won't work well.

Here is one procedure:

Before creating and syncing a multicam clip, the data must be prepped by labeling within FCPX each batch of files (both audio and video) from each camera or recorder. If this is not done the multicam clip will often not work correctly. Procedure:

1. Import all clips
2. In Event Browser at top right, select List View icon, or use OPT+CMD+2 to toggle between list view and filmstrip view.
3. In Event Browser, click on clip name column heading to sort by name. All the clips from each camera should be grouped together.
4. Select a group of clips from one camera/recorder (Click on 1st, go to last and Shift-click).
5. In Inspector at upper right, click on Info button. If Inspector pane is not on, turn it on with Window>Show Inspector
6. At bottom of Inspector Pane, click the drop-down box and select "General". This shows more details.
7. In the Inspector Pane, enter a camera or angle name. When you press Enter it will add that camera/angle name to all the clips you have selected in a single step.
8. Repeat step 4 and 7 for each camera/recorder.
9. To create MC clip: In Event Browser, select all clips from the cameras & recorders for a particular multicam interview, take or shooting event.
10. Right-click on the selected group and select "New Multicam Clip", then set checkbox "use audio for synchronization"
11. Double-click the MC clip to open it, toggle on Angle Viewer with SHFT+CMD+7 and verify synchronization. Switch the audio to the main source and disable camera audio. You can disable camera audio by clicking off the speaker icon at the left of the MC timeline. You can select what audio sources you want enabled by selecting or de-selecting that component in the audio inspector. This is normally only needed for multi-channel sources. To do this, click on the audio lane in the MC clip, enable Inspector with CMD+4, then select the speaker icon at the top right. This shows the audio properties for that item, which you can skim, enable, disable or adjust volume on.

12. If you forgot to add certain clips, you can add and sync them to an existing MC clip. You don't need to delete and re-create the MC clip with the forgotten clips. This assumes you have continuous audio on one track.

(a) Open MC clip by double-clicking on it.

(b) Drag the new clip from the Event Browser into the proper angle of the MC timeline.

(c) At left of the timeline select the audio and video components and de-select those for all other angles. This defines the audio-only angle as the "monitoring angle".

(d) Select the new clip you just dragged in, then to the left of that angle click the disclosure arrow next to the angle name. Select "Sync selection to monitoring angle". It will analyze the audio on that clip vs the main audio, then automatically move the clip left and right to sync them.

13. Close MC clip and skim it in the Event Browser with the Angle Viewer enabled. At the upper left of the Angle Viewer you'll see icons for A/V edit, video-only edit, and audio-only edit. These have two separate functions: (a) When editing a timeline they do the requested edit type, and (b) When skimming in the Event Browser they select the default monitoring angle or audio source. If it's not already selected (audio angle box will be green if so), make sure the default audio monitoring angle is set to your high quality audio by selecting the audio-only edit icon, then clicking on the audio angle of the Angle Viewer.

See also MacBreak Studio #259 "Multicam Audio Editing in FCPX":

The below tutorials are older but I think most of it still applies:

MacBreak Studio #153 "Multicam Editing Sync and Prep":

MacBreak Studio #154 "Multicam Editing":

For a more elaborate workflow including batch renaming, see this video. It is on an older version before the new Library format, but it mostly still applies:

 

[machenryr]

WOW!!!! Thank you! I will apply these later this evening or afternoon.