Time Machine & Final Cut
The most publicized feature in Mac OS 10.5 Leopard can also be one of the most useful for your Final Cut Studio workfow. This, of course, is Time Machine.
My setup right now consists of two external hard drives. Both are 500GB FireWire 800 drives. One is for capture and all of the extra goodies that come with Final Cut Studio, and the other is for backup via Time Machine.
I previously mentioned how using Final Cut Studio’s Media Manager can be useful while needing to stay mobile. Another option is to use Time Machine to store your current, but not quite active, projects for later while you focus on what needs to get done immediately.
Here’s how it works. When you import your tape go ahead and capture it right to your laptop’s internal drive, instead of your external. I usually keep about 30GB free for this kind of thing, but that sort of flexibility may vary wildly depending on you and your lifestyle.
Once the capture is complete let Time Machine grab it. If it’s something you anticipate working on immediately, go for it. If not, delete it from your internal drive and move on to something else. Time Machine will save it for later, and since it’s always going to be captured under Final Cut Pro Documents > Capture Scratch, you’ll know exactly where to look for it.
I recently did a lot of work for a Web-based promotional company that required juggling five projects simultaneously. Three of which were awaiting final approval, but the other two hadn’t been started. I trashed the first three projects after ensuring a successful backup, and just kept on trucking. When the time came to burn the projects to disks I trashed the current projects, restored the old files, burned the discs, trashed them again, and restored the projects on which I was currently working.
This sort of workflow can take some time to get used to. Deleting your source files is kind of a big no-no in the world of non-linear editing. So it’s not going to be for everybody. Especially if you’re a bit squeamish. But if you find yourself in a pinch, this is a useful technique that’ll keep your workflow moving even when working with limited hard drive space.
great write up. Even though this sounds tricky and risky, it makes sense and seems to be working for you.
Thanks, Jermaine.
It can be risky, yes. Especially if you don’t trust your backup drive (or Time Machine). So far it’s been pretty helpful though. And, honestly, it’s actually kind of a fun way to manage video files.
I’m thinking about buying a time capsule. Would I be able to work in final cut pro if my project was on Time machine. The thing is it’s over 400 GB and to big to go on my hard drive. Would there be any speed problems if it was stored on the time Capsule? Doesn’t matter if you don’t know just an idea would help. Also would I need a wireless card in my mac it currently says my airport is empty?
Cheers
Ed
Hey Ed,
You won’t be able work on the project if it’s only in Time Machine. That is, that you’ve captured everything to your internal drive, let Time Machine grab it, then deleted it from your internal drive. The only thing you can do with your project at that point is restore it.
It’s like putting left-overs in the refrigerator. You can eat it now, or store it for later. Once it’s in the fridge you can leave it there or take it out and eat it. But you can’t eat it while it’s actually in the refrigerator.
Your best bet is to just purchase an external drive and use it exclusively for your project. Time Machine is great to have as a backup for your main system, but can be extremely risky when you’re using it for project management — especially since Time Machine automatically removes older files as the drive fills up.
Using Time Capsule would be pretty much the same story, but you’d have latency issues to deal with too. When you’re editing, you’re going to want the speed a direct connection provides.
And finally, if you bought your Mac in the last three or so years, you probably already have an Airport card installed. Since 2006 (maybe earlier), all new Macs came with wireless connectivity built-in. Check your system’s settings (click the Apple logo at the top left, then About This Mac, then More Info. Look for the section that says “Airport Card” under the Network heading).
That said, Time Capsule seems like it would be a great way to get worry-free backups of your main system. But I wouldn’t use it as the primary storage solution for a Final Cut Pro project.
Jason – could you tell me if this workflow would work…we are a government production dept. and we would like to use a RAID 0 to capture and edit then use time machine to b/u to a RAID 1 drive (guardian Maximus).
thanks!
Thaddeus
If I’m understanding this correctly then yes, I think that would work. The RAID 0 would act like one big hard drive (for editing) and the Time Machine drive would be duplicated as a RAID 1. The things is, I don’t know if you can use a RAID 1 as your Time Machine backup. I imagine your could, but I don’t know for sure.
I bet Apple has some information about it in their Knowledge Base, so you might want to try there. If it works, it would probably be a pretty failsafe system.