Best methods for working with co-editor off site

i'm working on a documentary right now, and i want the producer for the project to work with me on it. i want him to be able to see my edits and maybe make suggestions and look at the footage as well to get ideas on what should go where.

my idea was that he purchase FCPX as well on his computer and that way i can give him the Library in fcpx and we'd both have it.

but what i use to do in FCP6 (when i used it) and i wanted to have a producer or coworker have the same project on their computer, i'd put it there, and then send them up updated PROJECTTITLE.fcp and have them replace their old one with the new one. open it, and all my new edits would be visible to them since they had all the footage already on their computer.

is there any way to do this now with FCPX that would be just as easy? That way I don't have to send him the whole Library bundle (which would be impossible for me considering the file size)

One way is be sure your Libraries and Events and Projects are set up the same, then use XML files exchanges.

Another way is to do above, but be sure all media is external, then you can just copy the Project to a new "transfer Library", zip that up, and email it to each other, or use something like DropBox.

even though i love xml i wouldn't recommend it in this case.
even apple says in the developer documentation that xml is not a replacement for the full library.

clean up your library and it will be small enough to send it around.

-andreas

is there anything other than the XML file i can send?

Again, with FCP 6 I use to be able to just send the .fcp file, which is usually like 40kb large.

I don't think i can 'clean up' my library, because it is a documentary we've been working on for the last 3 years and we have about 700GB's of footage. That's not something i can send over the internet to him. I was planning on just loading that footage onto his hard drive one night, and then be able to send him some sort of updated project file that i can easily attach in an email.

is that not possible anymore?

You don't send the whole library just the project. Copy the project to a new library and send the library.

Both libraries, yours and the producer's, should use external media. Consolidate the libraries to move the media to a folder with the same name on both systems. Simply use the transfer library to move the project copy.

Another way is to create proxy media with "leave files in place" checked and send a drive with a copy of that library. It's a good way to be sure that everything made it into one place.

All the proxy files will be in the 'transcoded media' folder inside the library and the original media will be symlinks. As long as your editing partner is editing in proxy mode you will be able to easily send a library with a single project via email.

Working on mixed format projects like docs really benefit from the proxy workflow. If it's impractical to render all those clips, you have all the other solid options on this thread.

BenB wrote: Another way is to do above, but be sure all media is external, then you can just copy the Project to a new "transfer Library", zip that up, and email it to each other, or use something like DropBox.

these are all excellent ways of sharing this with my co-editor. thanks so much!

I had another idea, but i thought i'd run it by everyone to see if it seems like a good idea.

If i keep the media stored outside the Library, and gave my editor the footage to store on his computer, and me mine, and then actually save the Library (that would be fairly small in size since it does not contain the footage) in a dropbox folder, and have the desktop version of dropbox installed on both our computers, we should constantly have an updated version of the Library every time we open it.

Does this seem like a good idea as well? or is this a disaster of an idea that might fall apart pretty quick?

Possible disaster, if for no other reason than the nature of Dropbox recently (hacked and sometimes slow). I've been using the Transfer Library method with another producer and an editing intern for the last few weeks and it's fine. Seems like a little extra work but I'd imagine future updates will make it cleaner.

Great idea but I'm afraid that won't work, for two reasons.

1. Only one editor can access a Library at a time. Two or more editors working simultaneously on the same physical Library is not possible.

2. Even if your media are stored locally FCPX constantly writes to and reads from the Library. FCPX writes all render files to the Library, it reads thumbnail caches and audio waveform caches from the Library, it stores temp file inside the Library, it writes to and reads from the database in the Library... Doing all this over an internet connection is way too slow.

- Ronny