FCP X: Working With Proxy Media
[ This article was first published in the July, 2011, issue of
Larry's Final Cut Pro Newsletter. Click here to subscribe. ]
Fiver Löcker asks:
How do I work with proxy media?
Larry replies: This is tricky, because the Help files don’t detail this process. But it is actually very simple.
Proxies are transcoded (converted) copies of your master files. They use ProRes 422 Proxy and are at 1/4 the size of the original. For instance, here the original ProRes 422 file for this Youth Culture clip is 238.3 MB in size.
When it gets transcoded to a Proxy, the size plummets to 19 MB. The quality is not as good, but this can save a lot of space while you are doing the rough cut.
Here’s the overview of working with proxies:
1. Create Proxy media either during import or by transcoding later.
2. Change a preference setting to use Proxy media.
3. When you want to switch back to high-quality media, change the preference setting again.
Here are the details.
1. Assuming you did not create Proxy media when you first imported your clips, select the clip(s) for which you want to create proxies.
2. Select File > Transcode media. Then, in the resulting dialog window, check Proxy media.
3. Depending upon the number and length of the media you selected, this can take some time, use the Background Task window (Cmd+9) to monitor progress.
4. Once proxies are created, go to Final Cut Pro > Preferences > Playback (Cmd+,) and change the playback option to “Use Proxy Media.”
All media that has proxies, will automatically switch and be displayed (top image). Any media that doesn’t have proxies will display the missing media icon (bottom image).
5. To switch back to high-quality images, return to Preferences and change the playback setting to “Use original or optimized media.”
Proxy files are stored in their own folder inside Final Cut Events > [ Event name ] > Transcoded Media > Proxy Media.
If I import my media and tell FCP X to create proxy media, Can I export the final project with the original media?
Yeah! That I wonder as well. If you import and edit as
Proxyfiles (to save discspace) is there a way to import just the parts that you have used in the timeline and export the project as prorez high quality. I’ve searched the web for hours to get an answer to this question. Can somebody please help me?
Peter,
has your question been answered?
>>> If you import and edit as Proxyfiles (to save discspace) is there a way to import just the parts that you have used in the timeline and export the project as prorez high quality.
Thank you,
Frederik
Ty and Peter, you can switch the setting back to Original or optimized and export full quality. Understand that when transcoding to proxy, FCP X *always* wants the original media. If you choose not to import it, it will create an alias that points to wherever the source files reside. So there’s no re-import, Peter, you just need to be certain that the volume containing the source files is available when you switch back to original/optimized media for export.
Larry, is there a convenient way or suggested workflow to temporarily use proxy files? I’m thinking of a laptop, limited disk size situation, where I don’t want (or have room for) two or three copies of the footage. Ideally, I’m looking for a way to duplicate the project and event to a new drive but only bring the proxy files over. My issue isn’t switching the preference, it’s having all media on my primary workstation and going proxy only while mobile. Is there a best workflow to accomplish this?
Tom,
has your question been answered?
>>>My issue isn’t switching the preference, it’s having all media on my primary workstation and going proxy only while mobile. Is there a best workflow to accomplish this?
Thanks,
Frederik
Frederik, the only option I’ve found is manually managing the media.
Create a new Event folder (identical in name to that on your primary drive, in the correct location for events) and copy only the proxy files to the secondary drive. Then move or copy your project (don’t include the render files, which will be the HQ render files) to the secondary drive.
Once you have everything on the secondary drive and are away from the primary volume, you’ll have to switch the preferences to proxy in order to edit. When you’re done, you can move/copy the project back to your primary drive. Switch the preference back and your project will re-render using the HQ files.
This solution sounds solid, Tom. How have you found switching back and forth?
I am currently assistant editor on a doc and have over 10 TB of material (many multicam bits) on my 12TB RAID. Its all optimized media. It would take a whole separate RAID to house all of the proxies. So I could theoretically just copy all the Event directories, over a dozen, to the other drive with only the proxy files. When copying back to the original RAID, would I just copy the .fcpproject files and .fcpevent files to the original 12TB drive directories?
I really wish I was able to move just the proxy media to the other drive and re-link it to the 12TB RAID, but it does not seem like this works. FCPX just states that the files are missing, but once I try to select “Relink Event Files” it doesn’t give the option to relink these proxies.
Alex, I’ve had a couple clips where the proxy and optimized sort of got disconnected and I had to replace the edit. But mostly it’s been smooth, switch the preferences and the project re-renders at the new resolution.
I do all my Event organization before going mobile, so I don’t move the event database back. I actually do a move or duplicate project command for the project, and exclude the render files. But yes, you could just move the CurrentVersion.fcpproject file. Just be wary of creating project ID conflicts.
FCP wants everything to be in the Event folder. Relinking is intended to tell FCP X where the originals are when lost, and the related proxies and optimized versions are expected to be in the related event. So right now, there’s no such thing as relinking the proxies.
I’d expect that at some point in the future an update will make this easier, with an option to create a duplicate of an event with proxies only.
Alex, let me rethink that. It’s difficult to move events without all the media. I don’t copy the Event in the Finder because I get an ID conflict if I have both my portable and primary volumes mounted at the same time. What I’ve been doing, and it’s a little clunky, is exporting the Event XML and importing it on my portable volume. That will create your keyword structure and give you a fresh CurrentEvent.fcpevent file with it’s own unique ID, but since the media isn’t on that volume it will be offline.
Then I quit FCP and just copy the Transcoded Media > Proxy Media folder to the proper location on the portable drive inside the Event created by importing the XML.
Yes, Larry, to me the whole point of Proxy is to be able to be mobile and on-the-go. Why doesn’t the documentation make this easy to ONLY copy Proxy media to a local or external smaller drive, and then when back at the RAID in the office, copy back and continue working with full-sized media? The Sharing Projects article helps with this some, but doesn’t delineate between sharing JUST Proxy, or full Optimized versions.
Thanks for any insight.
Chris.
Just copy the proxy folder to your mobile drive and then set preferences to use proxy media an relink the files back to the folder you copied
Gino, I actually haven’t had to relink if the event folder structure is the same. FCP recognizes the event on the mobile drive. I just replicate the event folder and copy just the proxies.
Sorry, I just want to be crystal clear on this point. So if I only check the “proxy” box upon import, then edit in proxy, I will still be able to export as ProRez 422 even though I never checked “optimized media” upon importing?
Thanks!
Great post, very helpful for a FCPX beginner like myself but I do have one question.
If I go ahead and transcode to proxy, when I’m done editing and want to switch back to the original media, does it transcode all of my rushes or just the ones on my timeline?
Thank you very much in advance!
Abed, transcode to proxy just creates the proxy version alongside the original and optimized version. Then you choose to use the proxies for editing as Larry describes above.
When you’re ready to export you just change the playback option back to “Use original or optimized media.” The original media will then be used for export.
What happens to render files?, When change proxy to original media, will reprocess the render? Tanks! great article.
To switch back from proxy to original media in fcpx sounds easy, but if you have got a complex multicam project,
I will try to make a test-project, and then replace either the files in the original folder and replace them with self crated proxy files, or put the original/optimized media into the transcoded/proxy folder and see if fcpx will accept this method.
it takes between 8 up to nearly twenty hours for my 3-Cam 90-minutes-project, to change back again to the original files, this is very unpro
Greetings
Florian
Solved the problem! I cleaned up my events window and put away all old projects to another hard drive and ejected it, except the one I am currently working on, now it works fine.
Hi!
Does anyone know how to change the file format of proxy files? All mine come out in NTSC (and in the wrong aspect ratio) when I would prefer them to be in PAL.
Also, I’ve noticed that my Gaps are in NTSC format as well. Is there a project/event setting I’m missing somewhere where I can choose NTSC/Pal, resolution, widescreen etc. for all future projects?
Cheers
Adam
Gaps will match the project settings. If you’re having problems, create the project, choose custom for the video format, and select PAL.
Hi Larry,
Great forum and answers. Thank you very much for sharing your expertise.
I just started using proxies and I’ve run into this surprise. Retimed clip fine but copy paste it and it shows missing proxy in the pasted clip.
I’ve got video background that looks like the graphics behind a news show multiperson display. It’s very short stock footage but I want to retime it to 1% and cut and paste it to fill up about an hour to fill in the frame over a cropped slide show screen.
I retime the clip, it ends up about 10 minutes and it’s fine. Now I want to cut and paste it a few times to fill out the hour. On paste I get a missing proxy media.
I’ve waited for the render of the original clip to finish.
What to do?
-ed
Hi Larry,
I am using FCP 6 and have 4 clips that I have made a multi-cam with.
It seems now the external hard drive is having a problem keeping up or even getting started to view the 4 angles in the viewer, so I am unable to pick the right shot in editing.
My external drive is a 7200 G-Drive 1.5TB
The 4 cameras are Canon HF11
Any advice :-]
Hi,
I recently upgraded to FCPX 10.0.5 and switched to proxies. The Mac had to crank over night but it all seems much better now.
A reboot or 2 helped as well.
I haven’t yet converted back to optimized media to render the project in full quality. I’m sure that will be interesting too.
I upgraded all my projects and events from FCPX10.0 to 10.0.5. In events some clips are missing and it says “proxy missing” while some clips are fine. Does anyone know whats going on here?
That’s not a lot of information to go on. But bhat’s what happens when you have proxies enabled and not every clip has a proxy.
Did you ever import clips without transcoding to proxies? Click on the missing clips and check their file status to see if proxies exist for them. If they don’t, right-click and choose transcode, and create the proxies.
ssues that may affect playback include available memory, disk speed, graphics performance, and processor performance.
You may be able to get better performance by doing the following:
- Use proxy playback by selecting ‘Use proxy media’ in Playback preferences. (Requires proxy media.)
- Optimize your source clip media.
Sunday, 26 August 2012 12:13:29 PM Australian Eastern Standard Time
this is what come up after importing from a GoPro hero 2 HD
Hi all,
What puzzles me is why the entire set of events/projects needs to be proxy or not. Seems that it should be configurable as part of a single item’s properties.
If anyone knows how to subset just some of FCPs items to proxy or not I’d appreciate hearing about it.
This workflow doesn’t make sense to me. What you’d like to be able to do is figure out which clips will have a greater performance impact than others, go through hundreds or thousands of clips to set that subset to use proxy, then when you’re done editing go back through them to set them to full resolution again? That seems very likely to result in final output that includes low res proxy footage.
What happens in FCP X is a standard workflow. In other systems, you’d offline the project, then online for final export, albeit in those systems it’s easier to separate the proxies and take your work on a smaller drive. In X, proxies seem to be there only for performance reasons and you have to jump through hoops to take just the proxies with you.
I don’t see a lot of benefit to being able to proxy a subset. Most productions stick to one or two types of cameras, so if you need to proxy footage typically you’d need to proxy it all anyway. I imagine there’d be a lot of design and development to build this and there’d be very few people who would use it.
Hi Tom,
I see your point about the difficulty of trying to manage the subsets. I’ve got a lot of small projects which only use dozens of clips. It was seeming to me that proxy or not was not set at the project level but at the entire FCP level and that seemed too big. I may not be using proxies for the right reason. I switched it all back to optimized and I’m getting ok performance.
I’m thinking that if it was a useful feature, clips could “know” whether or not they were proxed and provide a status. Then at final render time you could have set a status saying use full res. However that would make the estimate of the final render time very difficult.
I’m only familiar with my own workflows and I don’t have a good way to know what’s best for the industry at large. So I appreciate your comments to help with better insights.
I see what you’re saying. Yes, that’s a change. FCP X greatly simplified proxies. On or off, that’s it. In FCP 7 you would offline a project. I would like to see that changed in future versions with the addition of a true offline where I can make a proxy-only copy of a specific event/project.
It’s not perfect but I’ve been very happy to trade an application level preference for proxies to get rid of the application level setting of scratch disks. I always hated that.
I’m don’t know about the technical issues involved but it seems like having to include logic about a clip’s proxy status and not using the pre-rendered footage could slow down the rendering engine.
Hi friends, I wanna know; Does or its posible that FCPX uses optimized render files for export instead of original media, if there were created and no deleted, to acelerate render without losing quality?
Thanks, and sorry the bad english.
Dino.
Dino:
If you optimize your media, FCP X exports the optimized media. If you simply create proxy files, it will output your original media. And, yes, in most cases, optimized media exports much faster than camera source files.
Larry
I’m really questioning this at the moment, with my own experience. I have imported proxy files (and am in proxy mode to edit) but some of my final rendered output are almost certainly not rendered from original media. It’s noticeably pixelated & artifacty – exactly as seen while editing proxy but not in the original media. It’s only noticeable for some clips (sections of the final output), so it could be a kind of bug.
I will come back here when I finish the experiment – I’ll try switching to optimized media and rendering from there & see if there’s any difference.
Are you switching back to optimized or original before export? If you export while in proxy mode, that’s what you’ll get—the proxies. If you’re switching but still seeing low res output, have you tried deleting your render files and allowing the project to re-render in optimized/original mode?
Yes, looks like you’re right. I wasn’t aware that you got proxy output when rendering while in proxy mode. And interpreting comments above, I still wasn’t aware of that
It’s not the behavior I would expect and I couldn’t find it documented. But that looks to be the case.
Yep, confirmed. I changed to “optimised media” and the video is much, much sharper. Moral of the story, for me, in 10.0.6 at this stage, is NEVER RENDER OUTPUT IN PROXY MODE – you get proxy-grade output.
That’s not correct. What you describe will happen only if you export with the actual settings (meaning what you set in the playing preferences). If you change that to Prores 442 you will get just that.
Edgar, that’s incorrect. That only changes the output format. It will output ProRes 422 but will use the lower res proxy footage in the timeline to do it. Try a very sharp HD shot, output to ProRes 422 using both the Proxy and Optimized playback setting. Both will output a 1920 x 1080 image. The proxy footage, when compared side by side, is visibly degraded.
Ok. Thanks Larry!! Great article.
Greetings =)
Dino.
Larry, you’re so awesome for giving away all this stuff. I’m so tempted to take your courses, but so much information is there for free. I hope you are getting paid somehow. I’ll wallow in your generosity with grateful hopes so.
-David
Hi Sam,
I like Larry’s Sep 2 comment above that proxy media exports faster. That’s an advantage
The huge difference for me was memory. I had 8GB since memory was expensive a few years ago when I bought my Mac Pro. But I was recently able to add 16 Gig for about $230 and it made a huge difference in rendering and eliminated the spinning ball during interactive editing.
Curiously, looking at memory usage it seems that my Mac Pro wants about 12 G all together when using FCP X and other Apps needed during editing like iTunes, Photoshop, iPhoto. So at 8 G there were many slowdowns but using only 12 of the 24 it’s much faster.
Hi, I’m in the process of moving over to FCPX and am wondering why the average Macbook Pro with dedicated graphics used to be able to edit ProRes files off the bat in FCP6 and 7 and now with FCP X we have to go to all this trouble with proxies and duplicated original files? Is FCP X’s graphics engine improved, or in the transformation, gone back about 5 years in terms of the playback of high bitrate files? I’m finding all this proxies business (and the roaring hard drive) a bit of a step into infancy in terms of fast editing.
Can anyone enlighten me about the advantages here?
Cheers, this is a good post.
Sam
Hello Sam,
Believe it or not, I’m editing Canon native h.264 files (5D MKII and/or 7D) in FCP X without any hiccups. I’m on an iMac (2.8GHz Intel Core i7 Quad Core, 8 GB RAM, AMD Radeon HD 6770M 512MB GPU) running Snow Leopard on one partition and Lion on another. When I tried to edit the native h.264 files in FCP X on Snow Leopard I couldn’t do it—had to create proxies; however, when I created the Lion partition and loaded FCP X on it, the difference for me was jaw dropping. In the last 3 months I haven’t created a single proxie. And, I’m even able to create and edit Multicam Clips without optimizing (or creating proxies).
FCP X has sped up my workflow exponentially. I’m a believer.
Oh excellent, thankyou very much + yes I’m still on Snow Leopard..
Well, I’ve different experience. On SL with 6G ram I worked quite ok in FCPx 10.0.4. Now I am on ML with same system, same FCPx, however I can see ‘hiccups’. I’ve MacBook white (2009, 2.13Ghz Core 2 Duo). There’s NO new filesystem in ML. Is still HFS as before (even I want create new on diff HDD offered nothing new).
I think my issue is a) only 2 cpus b) ML is simply putting some background load (alltogether ~10% in idle with FF & Adium).
I am considering 10.0.6 as it should support background GPU rendering http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4589
I’m trying to edit a 5 camera shoot in FCPX – -got it all in sync (using Plural Eyes 3) – -but playback is sluggish-
made proxy media, switched playback preferences to “play proxy media” —
but not happening.
all the files are in the FC Events / Transcoded Meda folder – -but somehow the projects are not reading them
I assume I am missing something small — anyone got an idea?
thanks,
steve
HI Steve,
How much memory do you have. I upgraded from 8 Gig to 24 Gig and it made all the difference. No more sluggish.
If I wanted my original media OFF my laptop, would a USB 3 SSD be fast enough for FCP to read from or would I need a thunderbolt external? I am using 1080i hd footage.
Hi Richard,
I’ve found those kind of questions really hard to answer. I’ve found USB 3 to be incredibly fast in some circumstances and showing no improvements in others. It depends on the processing before and after the communications channel.
Unfortunately, sometimes you just need to guess. The more money you can risk the better. So try and find some secondary reason that you’d like USB 3 or Thunderbolt and let that weigh in against the cost. I’m thinking that either would help.
Research and compare the top speeds on the USB 3 and Thunderbolt on the hardware you’re considering or even better if the manufacturer gives a overall speed number for reading and writing.
Hello Larry! I LOVE your articles! Thank you for speaking in terminology that a beginner like me can understand I really appreciate it! I am having an issue that I hope you can help me with.
I have almost 3TB of raw footage. I have it copied onto a few different external drives, to be safe. I am editing a full length movie on a 27″ iMac. I have spread out the projects onto many hard drives so my computer will stop slowing down. So, on my main working drive, I created proxy media within the Event folder, and it took almost 7 full days of processing but it’s finally done. Whew!
NOW, I want to take that proxy media and put in on a smaller drive and take it with me out of the house so I can work on smaller sections of the movie on my laptop while I’m away from home.
I copied all the proxy media onto a smaller disk, named the event the same same, but only copied the proxy media, and when I try to open the project, it prompts me to import media into the event. It is not reading the media. BUT, if I try to re-import it, it asks me if I want to create proxy media…. you see my dilemma? Its already proxy. So it I re-import it from the raw footage on the other, main disk, then I have another 7 days lost. Is that my only option? I feel like there’s a simpler way, I’m just not experienced enough to figure it out on my own right now!
So to be clear: I have all the proxy media copied onto a 2 TB disk. I want to be able to copy different projects onto that disk (or another if I have to) so I can work on them during lunches at my day job. Do I have to lug around my main 8TB disk which houses the original and transcoded proxies?
Any help would be so appreciated! Thank you!
Stacey, I never have this problem. Are you sure you’re correctly replicating the directory structure of the event?
Hi. I’m trying to make the shift from 7 to X.
Really interesting stuff here that has cleared up a couple of issues but I have another question. I’m on a Macbook Pro for mobility and have been creating proxy files under the impression that that would allow me to use smaller drives on the road (500 Gig Passbooks). All fine so far, though I now realize I’ve been working with the original media thanks to info above. I’ve been aware that I’ve been creating original media on the drives and been getting progressively more worried about space issues.
If I set the preferences to proxy and delete the original files, will I be able to re-import/re-encode them when I’m back in the office? Kinda crucial as far as I’m concerned.
Any help greatly appreciated. ( Sorry for for such a noob question:) )
Ian
Hi Ian,
By no means do you want to delete the original files—do not delete your originals! That being said, FCPX will allow you to re-link to the original media imported into your “Event”, but it must be the original media, or exact copies of the original media.
Now, when you say “!’m aware that I’ve been creating original media on the drives”, do you mean that you’re adding “optimized media” to the footage/media that was already there when you began the project? In other words, there’s a setting for creating optimized media upon import—is that what you’re doing?
Let us know and we’ll go from there.
Hello,
Great read and thanks for the info.
I just wanted to clarify, which is the best setting; importing the video with both boxes UN checked, importing it as optimized media, or importing as proxy media?
Cheers!
i m already use final cut studio, right now i m using fcp 10, audio content and motion content occupied more space how to remove the contents…….pls help me……
Virumandi:
What content do you want to remove? When you are done with a Project, you can remove its folder from the Final Cut Projects folder. When you are done with an Event, you can remove its folder from the Final Cut Events folder.
Whether you copy these folders to a separate hard drive or trash them depends upon whether you want to delete or retain your project files.
Larry