H.264

The dramatic improvements in compression and quality, which some tests peg as high as 4 times the objective quality of MPEG-4 Part 2, have ushered in a sea change in what you can do with digital video. It allows for broadcast-quality standard definition video at 1.5Mbps, which translates into something like 12 compressed channels in the bandwidth formerly occupied by one analog broadcast station. You could use H.264 compression to squeeze a high-definition movie onto a regular old DVD, or streaming VHS-quality video across a low-end ADSL connection at 600Kbps.

Supported media formats

You can import and work with the following video, audio, and still-image formats in Final Cut Pro:

Video formats

• Apple Animation codec
• Apple Intermediate codec
• Apple ProRes (all versions)
• AVC-Intra
• AVCHD (including AVCCAM, AVCHD Lite, and NXCAM)
• DV (including DVCAM, DVCPRO, and DVCPRO50)
• DVCPRO HD
• H.264
• HDV
• iFrame
• Motion JPEG (OpenDML only)
• MPEG IMX (D-10)
• Uncompressed 10-bit 4:2:2
• Uncompressed 8-bit 4:2:2
• XDCAM HD/EX/HD422
• QuickTime formats

Audio formats

• AAC
• AIFF
• BWF
• CAF
• MP3
• MP4
• WAV

Still-image formats

• BMP
• GIF
• JPEG
• PNG
• PSD (static and layered)
• RAW
• TGA
• TIFF

Import from iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch

Importing media from iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch is the same as importing it from a file-based camcorder, camera, or device.

Import from iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch

1. Connect your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch to your computer using the Dock Connector to USB cable that came with it. (If another application opens, close it.) Then turn on your device and unlock it.
2. In Final Cut Pro, do one of the following:
   • Choose File > Import from Camera (or press Command-I).
   • Click the Import from Camera button on the left end of the toolbar.
3. 
   The Camera Import window appears, displaying all the media on your device. In this window you can preview the media by either playing it using the playback controls or skimming it by moving the pointer forward or backward over a filmstrip. You can also change which device to import from and change the way the clips appear using the buttons at the bottom-right corner of the window.
   3. Do one of the following
   To import all clips: Click Import All.
   1. • To import only some of the clips: Select each clip you want to import by Command-clicking each thumbnail, or dragging to select a group of clips, and click Import Selected (the Import button changes its name).
      • To import a portion of one clip: Drag inside the clip to select the range that you want, and click Import Selected.
        Tip:  You can also select a clip, press the Space bar to play the clip, and press either I to set a start point or O to set an end point.

        
        

        4. In the window that appears, choose how you want to organize the imported media in your Event Library:
   2. • To add the imported clips to an existing Event: Select “Add to existingEvent,” and choose it from the pop-up menu.
      • To create a new Event: Select “Create new Event” and type a name (for example, “Chris and Kim Wedding”) in the text field; then choose the disk where you want to store the Event from the “Save to” pop-up menu.
      To learn more about Events, see Events and clips overview.
   3. If you want to transcode your media, analyze the video, or analyze the audio, select the relevant checkboxes.
      If you don’t set Final Cut Pro to analyze your media during the import process, you can analyze it later (if necessary)
   4. Click Import.
      Final Cut Pro imports your media in the background. If you selected any options in the previous step, Final Cut Pro transcodes and optimizes the files after the import process is complete. You can view the progress of the background tasks in the 
   5. To begin working with your clips, close the Camera Import window so you can access the Event Browser.

Final Cut Supported Cameras

Final Cut Pro X is designed to work with a wide range of video recording devices, including camcorders, digital still cameras, iPhone, iPad, and iPod. To simplify the process of selecting compatible devices, Apple has tested popular models.


MODEL                                          FORMAT                  
Canon EOS 5D Mark II                   H.264

Canon EOS 7D                                 MPEG-4

Canon IXUS 310 HS                        iFrame / H.264

Canon IXY 31S                                iFrame / H.264

Canon PowerShot ELPH 500 HS     iFrame / H.264

Canon PowerShot G12                      H.264

Canon PowerShot SX220 HS            iFrame / H.264

Canon PowerShot SX230 HS            iFrame / H.264

For other models see this link

Importing overview

Importing media into Final Cut Pro is the first step toward making your movie. 

Import still-image clips and video clips from a digital still camera

1. Connect your camera to your computer using the cable that came with the camera, and turn it on.
   If your camera doesn’t appear in the Finder, remove the camera’s memory card and insert it into the card slot on your Mac (if it has one) or into an external card reader.
2. In the Finder, locate the DCIM folder inside the camera folder, and then locate the still-image or video files. The files may be in the DCIM folder, or in a folder one or two levels down. Devices and file structures vary by model and manufacturer.
3. In Final Cut Pro, do one of the following:
   • Choose File > Import and follow the instructions in Import from a hard disk.
   • Drag the files from the Finder into an Event or Timeline in Final Cut Pro. The files will be imported using the import settings you configured in Import preferences. See Import from a hard disk.

After import, you may have separate audio files that you want to use to replace the video’s audio track. To do this, you can automatically synchronize the video and audio clips.

Events & Projects

In Final Cut Pro X, you use Events to collect and organize media. Events are like folders that contain unedited media imported from a camera or some other source.

You use projects to edit and construct movies and share them with your audience. A project is a record of the work you do in the Timeline and the editing decisions you make. When you add a clip from an Event to a particular project, you create a link between the source Event clip and the corresponding project clip (and, by extension, between the Event and the project). However, neither the Event nor the source clip is contained within the project. You can use that Event clip in other projects, and your project can use clips from other Events.

The illustration below shows the relationship between Events and projects: Final Cut Pro X keeps track of the links between project clips and their source Event clips, but projects and Events remain independent.

Media files and clips

After you’ve imported media into Final Cut Pro, clips representing the source media files appear in the Event Browser. A large Event may hold many clips.

Media files are the raw materials you use to create your project. A media file is a video, audio, still-image, or graphics file on your hard disk that contains footage transferred from a camcorder or recording device or originally created on your computer. Media files can contain multiple video and audio components. Because media files—especially video files—tend to be quite large, projects that use a lot of footage require one or more high-capacity hard disks.

Clips represent your media, but they are not the media files themselves. The clips in a project simply point to (link to) the source media files on your hard disk. When you modify a clip, you are not modifying the media file, just the clip’s information in the project. This is known asnondestructive editing, because all of the changes and effects you apply to clips in Final Cut Pro never affect the media itself. Trimmed or deleted pieces of clips are removed from your project only, not from the source clips in your Event Library or from the source media files on your hard disk.

Final Cut Pro Interface

Final Cut Pro Interface

Organize media in the Event Library and Event Browser

All your imported media is available in the Event Library. (An Event is like a folder that contains clips.)

When you select an Event in the Event Library, its clips appear in the Event Browser on the right.

You can reorganize your media however you like at any time, and you can use the Event Library and the Event Browser to manage, rate, sort, and add keywords to your imported media. 

Play back clips and projects in the Viewer

The Viewer is where you play back your video, including clips and projects with up to 4K resolution. You can play back Events, projects, or individual clips in full-screen view or on a second display. 

You can also use onscreen controls, superimposed over the video in the Viewer, to adjust settings for a wide array of effects and transitions.

Edit your project in the Magnetic Timeline

The bottom portion of the Final Cut Pro window contains the Timeline, where you create your movie by adding and arranging clips and making all your edits. The Timeline in Final Cut Pro “magnetically” adjusts clips to fit around clips that you drag into place. If you drag clips out of place, the surrounding clips close up to fill the space.

A Final Cut Pro project holds all of the information for your final movie, including your editing decisions and links to all the source clips and Events.