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FCPX: How to know which clips have been used in the timeline?
Final Cut Pro X has a nice way to help you figure out which clips (or part of a clip) have already been used in your timeline. It is more a workflow than a trick and goes like this:
- Favorite the clip (or clip part) you want to use in your timeline by pressing the F key with the desired section selected. A green line will appear at the top of the thumbnail.
- Append the sequence to your timeline.
- In the event browser, filter the view by favorites and you will see the list of everything you used so far.
As a rule of thumb, always take the habit of selecting clips you want to use as favorite and discard sections you dont want to use as Rejected (backspace). These filters take a few hours to get used to but provide an incredible productivity gain.
Edit: SafeSolvent also suggested to use the Timeline Index which has a search box and display the clips in their order of appearance if you dont need to look at the clip.
chief astronomer at planet5D LLC
Mitch "planetMitch" Aunger is the creator and mastermind behind planet5D.com — which covers every aspect of HDSLR cameras (and a whole lot of other cameras as well). A lover of photography since his early days, he graduated to selling stock photos to make a little bit of spare cash. It wasn’t much, but it allowed him to upgrade to better cameras as well as computers, and it wasn’t taking money away from feeding his family.
He loves the stories that the still image can tell. In the summer of 2008, he read a story written by Arnold Kim called “I Quit My Job” — Arn is the owner of macrumors.com. He started macrumors in 2000 as a hobby, and by 2008 he was making more money with the site than he was on his day job, so he quit. The surprise to the story is that he was a doctor making more than six figures! Right then and there, planetMitch dreamed about doing the same thing.
September 2008 rolled around, and Canon announced this new version of the incredible 5D — the Canon EOS 5D Mark II. It was the first Canon DSLR to shoot full HD video and the earth moved! (It really was a huge deal in the photography world.) planetMitch knew if there was ever a chance to ride a wave of something he was really passionate about, this was it — and the blog at planet5D.com was born. It is now one of the most popular HDSLR blogs on the planet, and he is making a full-time living from blogging. He couldn’t be happier!
He loves the stories that the still image can tell. In the summer of 2008, he read a story written by Arnold Kim called “I Quit My Job” — Arn is the owner of macrumors.com. He started macrumors in 2000 as a hobby, and by 2008 he was making more money with the site than he was on his day job, so he quit. The surprise to the story is that he was a doctor making more than six figures! Right then and there, planetMitch dreamed about doing the same thing.
September 2008 rolled around, and Canon announced this new version of the incredible 5D — the Canon EOS 5D Mark II. It was the first Canon DSLR to shoot full HD video and the earth moved! (It really was a huge deal in the photography world.) planetMitch knew if there was ever a chance to ride a wave of something he was really passionate about, this was it — and the blog at planet5D.com was born. It is now one of the most popular HDSLR blogs on the planet, and he is making a full-time living from blogging. He couldn’t be happier!
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is it just me, or is this not completely accurate?
filtering by favourite will display all clips marked as favourite, not just the ones used in the timeline like the article says.
though, i does appear that the clips used display the video track (v1) to which they are associated, thus displaying which ones are in use. i think?
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LikeDislikeIt was more of a workflow tip. The idea (badly explained) is to fav clips you use. So the fav view will show them. It worked well for my two recent small projects but I think I will have to figure out something better once I get over 50 files…
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LikeDislikeThis is not a real and good solution, like the LABELS on the FCP7. In fast editing process we put videos on timeline, use, reuse in fast way. In some cases we delete clips, and need to REMARK. This is far way from de ideal. What i need is select all the clips USED and put a MARKER ou LABEL, to automatic show on the view what clips we are using on the timeline.
I can’t understand apple editors mind.
Bad. Very Bad.
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LikeDislikeI agree. I loved how premier cs5 marked which clips i used…and then once previewing the clip it would show exactly which part of the clip i used. is everyone here saying that fcpx does NOT have this feature. That makes absolutely no sense! F at least shows what clips i’ve used….but i need to know exactly what i used out of each clip.ds
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LikeDislikeOK I figured it out. So once I’ve set my in and out marks in a clip….BEFORE i drag it into the time line….when you hit F it will mark just that section in the clip…not the entire clip. Works like a charm. I knew there had to be a way. thanks for getting me on the right track with the favorite function.
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LikeDislikeApple is ridiculous. This is a basic function to any workflow. In CS6 it’s is perfect. FCPX is a inteligent software for keyword, but dont use this inteligence to simple show the files used!! I got more than 1.000 clips on my project and this is a nightmare to find the used clips!!! Come on apple LISTEN US!
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LikeDislikeSorry new to FCP x – this is a major problem with many small clips. – Imovie easily showed what clip or part thereof had been used ! – Cant believe this simple but essential item is missing in FCPX … Am i missing something ?
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LikeDislikeThe way I do it is to select all the clips in the Timeline Index and apply a tag to all of them, which means I can either find clips I’ve used in the timeline, or if in the event browser I filter it by “No Ratings or Keywords”, I can make sure I don’t use any footage I have put in the timeline previously.
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