FCP 10.1 - transcoding

thebaz

just started using FCP 10.1 - when I imported 10 video clips from a Nikon 7100 , I selected transcoding to optimised - it quadrupled my disk space :eek: , do i need to transcode at all -?
or can I transcode to Proxy without any major quality issues. Or do i need to transcode at all ? -
or would editing be too slow on my iMac 2010 ,
or are there potential quality issues when i export project later , or issues when I colourize or add effects later on ?

Thanks,
B.

cascales

It quadrupled your data because the original files from the Nikon 7100 are h.264/mp4 files, am I right? This means they are "compressed" and should not be used while editing (the computer has to do two different tasks if so: "decompressing" them and editing them).

A new feature included in FCPX is that you can work with h.264 files without transcoding them, it will do it for you in the background while you work. With an iMac from 2010 you should have no problem at all to do so.

Proxy transcoded files are perfectly fine to edit with. You can work with the original files, but in my opinion, you'll be much more happy editing with proxy files without so many background tasks running at the same time.

You can get some help also from the FCPX user manual and other editing forums on the internet to learn a little bit more about transcoding and editing/exporting workflow so you can work confidently

thebaz

cascales wrote: »

It quadrupled your data because the original files from the Nikon 7100 are h.264/mp4 files, am I right?

Proxy transcoded files are perfectly fine to edit with. You can work with the original files, but in my opinion, you'll be much more happy editing with proxy files without so many background tasks running at the same time.

thanks - yes they are H.264 MOV files - I have now just stated editing without transcoding , just using the native files - seams to be ok - really can't see any benefit to transcoding , apart from eating up space - unless i hit performance issues further down the line.