Re: Editing scenario - Why PIOPs might not be easy

[Jeremy Garchow] "I think we are losing focus here. There's a clip in FCPX. On that clip, everything happens. FCPX does not treat alternate displays as new clips, everything always "attaches" to that one clip."

On the contrary, I think this is the crux of the PIOP argument.

People are expecting FCPX's clips (and clippish objects like favorites) to work like clips in other applications. They do not. They are not clips in the same sense as traditional apps. They are windows into the One True Media. They are not discrete entities of their own.


[Jeremy Garchow] "Why do we need all of this? Why not simply hold on to the ranges you want to with some favorites or keywords that will stick with you as you intended instead of X trying to guess what you want all of the time?"

We don't need it. Some people want it, because now retaining a range that you marked requires one more step than it used to.

Marking IOPs used to be an action that created metadata. Now the same actions that used to mark points simply define a selection, and the metadata must be created in a separate step.

FCPX wouldn't have to guess. It would have to store the PIOPs where the user put them, because PIOPs are a property of clips, not media.


[Jeremy Garchow] "It DOES have them, but it works differently."

It doesn't have them. FCP had PIOPs, FCPX had favorites. They work differently because they are different -- but they can be used to serve the same function.

I think the trouble comes from being different enough that traditional methodologies don't work, but being similar enough to the old metaphors to make users feel like they might.


[Jeremy Garchow] "It works differently as it has to."

It works differently as it is designed to. This behavior is a side effect of Apple's design decisions. It could be different than it is.

I can get by without classic-style PIOPs. I can embrace the F key (and its comedic companion, the U key). Doesn't mean my blood pressure didn't spike every time I relied on muscle-memory and clicked away without pressing F first.

My personal issue with the lack of PIOPs is not that I can't use favorites -- it's that I don't think the NLE should destroy user information (which was potentially time-consuming to create) so hastily.

Maybe this wouldn't be such a big deal if resetting a clip's range were added to the Undo stack, so those errant focus-changing and range-resetting clicks could be undone and the prior range immediately restored?

Walter Soyka
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