"Offline" ingesting XDCam media: possible?

Hello-

I am about to edit a documentary with a ton of raw footage, so I would like to bring into Final Cut 7.0.3 the full cards, but at a lower bitrate, such as Apple Intermediate Codec. Then, after editing and cutting down to a 52 minute piece, I would Online the footage in high quality.
How can this be done?
I have heard of Log and Transfer handling XDCam card media, so I would think this to be the solution. But I am unable to find the needed plugin to get FCP to recognize the card media, while SONY's XDCAM transfer and browser softwares can see and ingest the material. But they can't ingest at lower quality nor can they recapture later only the used footage, correct?

I am running FCP 7.0.3 on Lion OS 10.7.3).

Any help much appreciated!