Apple Final Cut Pro 7 - Manual (Page 253)

If several people are logging footage on a large project, it is important that they use
similar naming conventions, and that notes are made using consistent descriptions and
shorthand. For example, everyone should use the same abbreviations, such as “CU” for
close-up, “MOS” meaning “without sound,” and so on. It doesn’t matter what conventions
you use, as long as you are consistent.
About Capturing Footage
Final Cut Pro gives you several options for capturing your footage to disk:
• Capture one clip at a time as you log in the Log and Capture window: With this approach
to capturing, you capture small sections of tape, one at a time. If you want to
meticulously define each clip before you capture it, you can set In and Out points and
add any logging information in the Capture window, and then press the Capture Clip
button. Some editors prefer to capture clips one at a time because this method avoids
any pitfalls that may occur with automated capturing. If your tapes have a lot of
unexpected timecode breaks, or if you simply want to capture one or two clips from a
tape, you may want to use this method. You usually do this to precisely control the
capture process and clip settings for each clip. See
“Capturing Clips as You Log.”
• Capture an entire tape, or portions of a tape, in one pass: This capture method is popular
because hard disk space is no longer prohibitively expensive. Instead of setting In and
Out points for each clip that you want to capture, you can simply play your tape and
click the Capture Now button, and the entire tape is captured. After capture, you can
break the clip into smaller subclips and add logging information in the Browser. This
method has advantages such as causing less wear on tapes during capture and allowing
easier navigation through media that is stored on hard disk as opposed to navigating
tape-based footage. For more information, see
“Capturing Entire Tapes.”
• Capture multiple clips at once (batch capture): For large projects with a lot of footage
and limited hard disk capacity, it’s usually most efficient to log all of your clips first, and
then batch capture only the clips you actually want to use in your project. When you
batch capture clips, Final Cut Pro automates the capturing process, cueing each tape
to the In point for each clip and capturing the corresponding media. If you’re capturing
from multiple reels, you need to insert new tapes when Final Cut Pro requests them.
Once you’ve logged your clips or imported a batch list, you can capture multiple clips
in the Browser at once using the Capture Batch button in the Log and Capture window.
For more information, see
“Batch Capturing Clips.”
Are You Ready to Log and Capture?
Before you log and capture your footage, go through the following list to make sure you
are ready for either process.
253 Chapter 15 Overview of Capturing Tape-Based Media