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April, 2025

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Complex workflow, Need serious advice

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MatRich
Posts: 4789 - Karma: 1,814
alright guys heres the deal.

I shot a little commercial for a university in montreal and now I am at the editing stage. We shot in color and had some after effects in mind.

Basicaly I need to cut everything together with the music and voice overs, add motion tracked words and then convert everything to black and white.

I will be editing on two programs, FCP7 and after effects.

this is the first time I edit on two platforms so how should I go about this? I am thinking edit structure, add effects to individual shots, bring those back in. and then should I bring everything into after effects as one clip and black and white it? what if I want to keep the fonts a different color and not black and white them?

Hope Im not too confusing, thanks in advance guys!
14 years ago
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MatRich
Posts: 4789 - Karma: 1,814
I have also heard of xml's, is this what I need? how do I go about this?
14 years ago
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[evan]
Posts: 5628 - Karma: 117
Two platforms or two programs?

i.e. Windows and OS X
i.e. FCP7 and AE

I'll assume two programs.

You should probably start by creating a raw folder, FCP7 Edited folder, and AE Edited folder. I don't know much about motion tracking, but it sounds like that needs to be done first because the text will have to match it. Also the B&W sounds like it should be first as well so you can use any type of text you want later and not have to worry about re-coloring it. Are FCP7 and AE both compatible in terms of transferable file types?
14 years ago
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MatRich
Posts: 4789 - Karma: 1,814
sorry I get all tech confused sometimes. two programs

Problem with the final cut black and white is that it absolutely blows. the after effects controls are much better
14 years ago
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[evan]
Posts: 5628 - Karma: 117
haha me too

So either use the built in B&W tool in AE or just lower the saturation (my personal prefernce, it allows you to leave some color if you want a nice highlight), then do all your motion effects and what not. Save as a XML file (i think thats what it is, pretty sure it just lets you control some of the things you did in AE in FCP) then do all your cutting or whatever other effects. Then all done :)
14 years ago
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MatRich
Posts: 4789 - Karma: 1,814
Cmon guys i need some editors input here.
14 years ago
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MatRich
Posts: 4789 - Karma: 1,814
c'mon guys! when theres a stupid thread like a noob looking for a camera, your all glad to post and make fun of him but when someone needs serious advice, they cant get any help?
14 years ago
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iLLbiLLy
Posts: 2865 - Karma: 2,631
Well if you say you absolutely have to use after effect to apply the black and white then the only way you can do this is to render out the FC project to a near lossless file and then bring in into after effects.

But this is kinda counter-intuitive as far as proper workflow goes. Typically you would edit all your clips that need AE adjustments before you start building your timeline in FC. You could do the black and white on every clip individually in AE, but that will be a pain if you have a large project.

If i were you, i would build the timeline in FC and then apply a BW track-effect. You should be able to get the desired effect if you also add in some contrast and saturation effects as well.
14 years ago
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MatRich
Posts: 4789 - Karma: 1,814
I cant add the effects on the shots until I know exactly where they go so that cant be done.

Reason why I cant apply the black and white in final cut is because it gives me halo's on colors like red because It doesnt handle the sub pixeling very well in the colors. Because of this, I get blocking in some of my shots. i dont have this problem in ae however since the program is much better at analysing the subpixels I guess.

14 years ago
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iLLbiLLy
Posts: 2865 - Karma: 2,631
well then... build your timeline, then apply the BW in AE to the clips you need and proxy them out
14 years ago
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MANDER
Posts: 4017 - Karma: 2,038
My advice is to say fuck FCP and use Premiere CS5 which has a dynamic linking system with AE so you can edit everything in Premiere, right click the clips that need to be used in AE, dynamic link them to AE to open them up, do your effects, and when you are done, the clip in Premiere has all the effects youve done in AE on it. Then you only need to do one render and your life will be 100 times easier.
14 years ago
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iLLbiLLy
Posts: 2865 - Karma: 2,631
I would have to agree with this as well. Premiere does everything FC can do and now that FCX sucks you might as well go ahead and get used to Premiere
14 years ago
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MatRich
Posts: 4789 - Karma: 1,814
completely changing editing systems for a project that has a short deadline is not a reasonable idea. When I do change Im switching to avid. Im sick of final cut because of the x bullshit and prmiere realy doesnt cut it for me.

thanks for trying to help me out guys, its not exactly what I needed but at least you guys tried. Im dissapointed to see that a lot of qualified people on ns wernt able to help me out or even try.
14 years ago
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iLLbiLLy
Posts: 2865 - Karma: 2,631
haha I don't understand what your looking for. There really is no perfect solution for what your are trying to do. Your gonna either have to bite the bullet and do tedious work or compromise and use the FC blank and white filter. If you need eheath to tell you this before you accept it then idk what to say.
14 years ago
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MatRich
Posts: 4789 - Karma: 1,814
Guess you didnt read, its not a question of putting it black and white. Thats easy. I need to have tracking on those shots and apply text to that tracking which would be in color.
14 years ago
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Galin
Posts: 2342 - Karma: 3,940
I don't fully understand what your end goal is, but if it's something relatively short like a 30sec spot then I'd say just work exclusively in AE. That or bring in the clips into AE that you need to track, track them and drop your text in, then make the video clip invisible in the timeline and export. Import that tracked text clip into FCP and drop her into the timeline matching it up real nice like.

I'm not sure I entirely get your grudge against black and white in FCP, but if you really must use AE for black and white, which adds another step or two, then import the clips, color/grade them, export in lossless, import back into FCP and bingo bango you're ready to go.

If I'm off the mark with this advice, feel free to shoot me more info in regards to the shoot, how much editing your doing, and the end goal and I'll see what I can do.

If you're planning on doing a lot of AE -> NLE work then I do recommend that you look into Premiere. The dynamic linking saves me so much time and effort when working within the suite.
14 years ago
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MatRich
Posts: 4789 - Karma: 1,814
Thanks for the tips galin. My grudge against fcp for black and white is based on two things. 1 i cant edit the tones like i would with photoshop for example. I need to add contrast where i want it and not just globaly desaturate. The second ( and most important) is that it actualy doesnt give me the same smooth result. I will have to post pictures tommorow.

My main issue is realy about having color text (tracked) over black and white.

Only way right now that i see it possible is editing all structure and then exporting clip per clip lossless, re stucturing it all in after effects and add the effects to every clip and render out. You can see how retardedly time consuming this is.
14 years ago
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MatRich
Posts: 4789 - Karma: 1,814
I guess what bugs me out a bit about the final cut black and white is that it doesnt let me control the image as much. for some reason if I do anything to the contrast or levels, it just starts to creat blocks on me. I think I might just settle for the final cut B and W because its not a very realistic workflow.

only thing I wonder is if black and white will affect motion tracking since that could be a problem.

I might also look into a black and white plugin for final cut
14 years ago
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eheath
Posts: 61937 - Karma: 126,480
I still don't fucking understand what you're trying to do. Just make it black and white, add your motion graphics and export it?
14 years ago
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Galin
Posts: 2342 - Karma: 3,940
I second the motion as I don't fully understand what you're trying to do. Edit the whole piece in FCP, export, import into AE, grade, track + add titles, export. Yes?
14 years ago
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Static
Posts: 8588 - Karma: 4,099
don't waste so much time thinking about how you're going to do something, just start working on it. Any path you choose is going to have obstacles. And working through the process will make you a better editor than simply following tutorials anytime you think of an effect.

Personally...... I'd arrange everything in fcp first for timing, then either take it all, or go chunk by chunk back and fourth between ae(only if you're doing complex motion tracking you might as well just stay in FCP if it's gonna only be a couple keyframes of movement).... Also(this is really important to maintaining your sanity) don't stress on little bullshit things, like red edges glowing or whatever, do what you can. You can't please everyone, clients are gonna have crazy feedback you never even saw commin'(another reason to leave pricing open ended).
14 years ago
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