Re: Should I create proxy & optimized media?

Aosie,

One great thing about the FCP X workflow is you don't really need to decide now. I would just work with the native files and if you find it being a pit pokey in the event or the timeline, then consider creating proxy or optimized. Optimized are full rez and are of course much larger than h264, while the proxy is just about the same data rate as h264.

Proxy works EXACTLY like full sized media with the exception of footage with Alpha channels (currently not supported with Proxy). You can set titles, graphics, etc. all in proxy without a problem. Then switch to your full res at any point you wish. When switching to proxy however you have to make sure all your media is converted to proxy, otherwise it will show offline.

Our shop does a large amount of work with h264 files and we rarely need to transcode. Especially with a single storyline with transitions and one or two layers of titles. One of our assistant editors was having to work on a 2007 iMac with only 4MB of RAM, over the network no less, and the h264 files worked no problem. Occasionally there would be a few clips that had speed changes, etc and were causing slowdowns so we just would optimize those clips (shift F to locate the clip in the browser and the right click to transcode). Once you get into significant compositing or color correction you might find the need to optimized all your used media.

Hit me up with any other questions.

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T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque