Recommended EDL Export Settings?

[peter5992]

Good evening everyone:

What are the recommended settings for exporting an EDL file from Final Cut Pro? There are options like:

• EDL Notes: File names?
• Filters?
• Video Levels?
• Audio Levels?
• Audio Transitions?

This is for a short fillm, and I don't think I even need the EDLs but I want to get some perspective from seasoned dialogue editors.

Thanks!

[Frank Kruse]

Originally Posted by peter5992

Good evening everyone:

What are the recommended settings for exporting an EDL file from Final Cut Pro? There are options like:

• EDL Notes: File names?
• Filters?
• Video Levels?
• Audio Levels?
• Audio Transitions?

This is for a short fillm, and I don't think I even need the EDLs but I want to get some perspective from seasoned dialogue editors.

Thanks!

What do you need the EDL for? Without knowing that's difficult to say. The stuff you posted partly relate to picture EDLs and partly to audio-EDLs.
Do you need both?

I usually ask for these kinds of video edls:

- Wipes as cuts
- fades/transitions as cuts
- no black-edits
- include "from clipname" info
- no effects (levels, filters etc etc. turn everything off)

If necessary I do further cleaning using EdiLoad.

For audio I use more or less the same settings. But I rarely need them. Video is always needed for re-cuts.

Maybe you can clarify what you need them for?

[The Cargo Cult]

what frank said.

also, in FCP you have the option of XML export which has some advantages over EDL.
there's a lot more info in the XML and a lot less for the pic editor to worry about.

you're right to ask for the video EDL now as it's sometimes too late when the last minute recut arrives. if they make your EDL part of the export routine you'll be in a position to act quickly when the inevitable happens.

so send them this:
http://maggot.co.nz/software/letterToEd.shtml

justin

[peter5992]

Thanks Justin and Frank!

To give a bit more background, this is a student short film. I am doing this for a talented filmmaking friend of mine who is a fellow student at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. I'm a sound / music grad student, he is an MPT graduate. We've worked together before and that turned out well, the short film we worked on was nominated for shows and awards etc, and I really liked working with him and his crew and cast.

This time, I thought of raising the bar, and going by the book. Notably, I mean "Dialogue Editing for Motion Pictures" by John Purcell. John Purcell recommends that you should *always* get an EDL. Reading the book though, I think Mr Purcell is talking about feature films, with the potential of changes in scenes etc.

Again, this is only a short film. I have everything else (final cut, omf, hand written audio notes, production audio). The picture is locked.

Thanks again for the feedback!

[mr.armadillo]

Justin: My picture editor used multiple video tracks in her FCP project, and the "only include v1"-checkbox is greyed out. Is this likely to cause trouble with Conformalizer?

[Frank Kruse]

Originally Posted by mr.armadillo

Justin: My picture editor used multiple video tracks in her FCP project, and the "only include v1"-checkbox is greyed out. Is this likely to cause trouble with Conformalizer?

You just need the XML from FCP for conformalizer. Skip the whole EDL-business.

Frank.

[Frank Kruse]

Originally Posted by peter5992

This time, I thought of raising the bar, and going by the book. Notably, I mean "Dialogue Editing for Motion Pictures" by John Purcell. John Purcell recommends that you should *always* get an EDL. Reading the book though, I think Mr Purcell is talking about feature films, with the potential of changes in scenes etc.

If you read again you will find that he's talking about the picture-EDL which helps you ID the shots in a scene vs. the used sound and things like that. This helps to see if the editor used a different sound take to a shot etc. etc.

This is helpful regardless of feature, TV etc.
It's simply a tool when editing production sound.

Having said that, this particular application has become a bit old-fashioned recently because since AVID MC5 you can have the scene/take info automatically burned into the QT which is much more comfortable to work with than abstract TC-lists.

But since you might need the EDL anyway for other things it's good to have it as standard item from editorial.

frank.

[peter5992]

Thanks Frank.

Yes indeed, I read the part about the picture EDL. Not sure I fully understand this - I thought picture just cut picture, and what ends up in the rough cut or final cut, is whatever happens to be in the camera audio with the picture.

But that is not the way it works, apparently.

[Frank Kruse]

Originally Posted by peter5992

Thanks Frank.

Yes indeed, I read the part about the picture EDL. Not sure I fully understand this - I thought picture just cut picture, and what ends up in the rough cut or final cut, is whatever happens to be in the camera audio with the picture.

But that is not the way it works, apparently.

try to cut a film by cutting only the picture and hard curting the audio from the camera. Imagine a line of dialog of one character being cut off just because you cut to the face of the other character for his reactions. not really a good idea. might work when cutting news reports with a voice over but not when cuttig a film.
the edl helps you find shots where the editor used a different sound take against a given shot.

[peter5992]

Originally Posted by Frank Kruse

try to cut a film by cutting only the picture and hard curting the audio from the camera. Imagine a line of dialog of one character being cut off just because you cut to the face of the other character for his reactions. not really a good idea. might work when cutting news reports with a voice over but not when cuttig a film.
the edl helps you find shots where the editor used a different sound take against a given shot.

That makes perfect sense.

Maybe I should take a picture editing course, that would give me a lot more insight into the big picture of what to expect from the picture department etc. Edit short films, export them from Avid / FCP, see how I get that properly into Pro Tools.

Sounds like a good plan for the summer.