Final Cut Pro X: Problems Moving Events
One thing I don’t like about Apple’s iTunes, iPhoto and iMovie is the way they like to take your media and put it where they want to store it. This would be okay if there were easy ways to get around this, but that’s not always the case.
There’s advantages to this monolithic media management; I must admit that my ‘stuff” tends to end up filed all over the place, so maybe having iTunes keep all the music together in one place is a good thing. But when editing video I like to have options about where I put it; particularly when dealing with gigabytes of the stuff. I just don't have a single drive big enough to keep everything in one place.
So I’m not too sure I'm going to like working with the way Final Cut Pro X manages media, particularly Events.
Final Cut Pro X likes to put things in Events. Think of them sort of like bins. Install the app and start it up and it will put the first event in your startup drive.
If you add media to that Event (in this case, I had some video files on an external file) you can choose whether to copy the existing media to the Events folder - or to use pointers to the media - by checking/unchecking the “Copy files to Final Cut Events folder.” Of course, by default it wants to make copies.
I unchecked that.
Then I discovered that I could move the Event to the external drive using a function within Final Cut Pro X. You do this either by dragging the Event in the Event Browser (oddly, it can be a little prickly), or by clicking the Event to select it and choosing Move Event from the File Menu. When using the menu, a simple dialog appears displaying the other drives on your system, letting you choose where to move the Event.
I did that, and then I went to move a second Event and got the message that a background task was running.
You’ve probably guessed by now that rather than simply move the pointers, Final Cut was copying the media itself to the Event on the other drive. That’s particularly ironic as the media was already on that drive!
Now if you’re moving the Event around because you want to copy it to an external drive and send it to someone else, putting all the media together is actually a good thing. But if you’re just managing your projects on your local drives, making copies of the media automatically may NOT be what you want to do.
I wish Final Cut Pro X gave you the choice when you moved the Event.
There’s advantages to this monolithic media management; I must admit that my ‘stuff” tends to end up filed all over the place, so maybe having iTunes keep all the music together in one place is a good thing. But when editing video I like to have options about where I put it; particularly when dealing with gigabytes of the stuff. I just don't have a single drive big enough to keep everything in one place.
So I’m not too sure I'm going to like working with the way Final Cut Pro X manages media, particularly Events.
Final Cut Pro X likes to put things in Events. Think of them sort of like bins. Install the app and start it up and it will put the first event in your startup drive.
Events on two separate drives
If you add media to that Event (in this case, I had some video files on an external file) you can choose whether to copy the existing media to the Events folder - or to use pointers to the media - by checking/unchecking the “Copy files to Final Cut Events folder.” Of course, by default it wants to make copies.
Turning off "Copy files to Final Cut Events folder"
I unchecked that.
Then I discovered that I could move the Event to the external drive using a function within Final Cut Pro X. You do this either by dragging the Event in the Event Browser (oddly, it can be a little prickly), or by clicking the Event to select it and choosing Move Event from the File Menu. When using the menu, a simple dialog appears displaying the other drives on your system, letting you choose where to move the Event.
Moving the Event from one drive to another
I did that, and then I went to move a second Event and got the message that a background task was running.
I opened the Background Tasks window and discovered it was still copying the Event. This puzzled me, because the event had practically nothing in it; just some pointers to those video files.
You’ve probably guessed by now that rather than simply move the pointers, Final Cut was copying the media itself to the Event on the other drive. That’s particularly ironic as the media was already on that drive!
Now if you’re moving the Event around because you want to copy it to an external drive and send it to someone else, putting all the media together is actually a good thing. But if you’re just managing your projects on your local drives, making copies of the media automatically may NOT be what you want to do.
I wish Final Cut Pro X gave you the choice when you moved the Event.
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