Strange behavior trying to mark portions of AVI file in FCP viewer

[Sonicjay]

I've got some footage I'm trying to use that was shot on a small solid state camera that records to SD card in MJPEG format, saved as AVI (the codec lists as Motion JPEG with Huffman Tables). I can drop the files in FCP fine; when I add them to the timeline, FCP wants to render them, but they behave fine in that regard.

The problem that I'm having, is when I mark a section in the viewer to add to the timeline, it ignores my selection area and throws a totally random chunk of video out of elsewhere in the clip onto the timeline. Saving the project, closing FCP, re-opening, etc doesn't change it. I'm going to try dumping the whole clip in the timeline, rendering the footage, then go from there, possibly nesting the sequence and cutting that way, but pre-rendered behavior is maddening, and making this take longer than it should. Any ideas?

 

[LethalWolfe]

Transcode the footage into something more FCP friendly. As you've seen, just because it opens in FCP doesn't mean it will work properly in FCP.


Lethal

 

[Sonicjay]

Transcode the footage into something more FCP friendly. As you've seen, just because it opens in FCP doesn't mean it will work properly in FCP.


Lethal

I suppose. I was hoping to not have to do that, but I guess I'll need to. If I dump the clip in the timeline, render it, and edit in the timeline it works fine, but what a hassle. Well, I'll give that a shot.

 

[LethalWolfe]

Depending how long it takes to render the clip it might just be faster to re-encode than to keep re-rending the clip as you work on it.


Lethal

 

[Sonicjay]

Depending how long it takes to render the clip it might just be faster to re-encode than to keep re-rending the clip as you work on it.


Lethal

Actually, if I just drop the whole clip in the timeline, render it, and start cutting, it just does the initial render and doesn't need to re-render as I cut. I just have the annoying issue of trying to edit in the viewer and have my selections transfer to the timeline properly, versus editing in the timeline, which I'd rather not do.

As a workaround, I just tried dropping the clips in a sequence, rendering it, then dragging that sequence into the Viewer, and making my selections from the rendered sequence and adding them to the timeline, and that works fine.

 

[LethalWolfe]

As a workaround, I just tried dropping the clips in a sequence, rendering it, then dragging that sequence into the Viewer, and making my selections from the rendered sequence and adding them to the timeline, and that works fine.

That makes since the Viewer is referencing the render file and not the source file.


Lethal