clips disappearing in timeline

I'm relatively new to fcpx and I'm working in fcpx 10.1. What keeps happening to me is that I am working on a documentary. I'll lay down the music track audio with accompanying video. On top of that I overlay the occasional interview footage which often has dissolves in it to keep the speaker precise (cutting out the "ums" and "ahhs"). I'll move down the timeline, editing away like a happy little puppy, and then I'll go back to watch what I've put together, and entire pieces will be gone. Part of an interview will still be there with the dissolve still connected, by no footage after the dissolve. Gone. Like it was never there. It seems in a 10 minute piece, this has happened, maybe, 10-15 times throughout. Portions that were exactly as I liked them are suddenly altered even though I haven't changed anything in or around that area. Some in the main storyline, but most in the section just above the main storyline. What is causing this? No matter how many times I try and check back, to make sure I keep my timeline simple, it happens. So many hours of hard work just vanishes into thin air. Some pieces remain, others are gone without explanation. Really hoping someone can tell me what I am doing wrong because I'm about to pull my hair out. Thanks in advance.

Hal,

Never heard of this happening before. Can you post a screenshot of your timeline?

- Ronny

Here's a snapshot of part of the timeline. You can see where there is a dissolve that leads to nothing. This has happened seemingly randomly throughout my timeline even though I haven't touched any of these portions since last watching them. If it just happened once, I would assume it was something I did by accident. But since it keeps happening and in more than one place and seemingly at random, I don't know if it's a glitch or just something I'm doing without realizing I'm doing it.

I've also been creating alternate story lines of sequences that, upon returning to them, seem to have dropped one of the sequences while keeping all the rest. In the second attached photo here, you can see a series of short clips that I have running over a small portion of someone's interview. But the last clip that had been in that mini-storyline is missing. What would remove a single clip from a storyline without me actually going in and removing that clip manually? I'm stumped here.

Hi Hal,

I cannot see anything wrong on your timeline and I really see no treason why clips could suddenly disappear in this construction. If this keeps happening I would suggest you refresh your FCPX preferences, this is a good procedure when you encounter unexpected behavior like this.

- Ronny

Thanks, Ronny. Yeah, I'm completely baffled. How do I refresh the preferences and is there any danger to my projects in doing so?

The easiest way to do this is by using a free utility called "Preference Manager". You can download it here:

www.digitalrebellion.com/prefman/

No, there is no danger doing this. In fact it's quite a frequent procedure when troubleshooting unexpected behavior.

- Ronn

Thank you for this. I thought I was the only one with "disappearing clips" problem

grisbiz wrote: Thank you for this. I thought I was the only one with "disappearing clips" problem

Very bizzar. I've never heard of this or experienced it.

As far as I understand it FCPX writes every edit made into a "journal" database so to speak, so I could conceivably see how either a HD problem or a nasty bug could make clips disappear. However, like Ronny said I've never heard of this happening before. There has been over the last couple of years instances when "undo" would stop working which in turn meant that edits were not being saved, but as far as I know that has been resolved, but It could have crept back with a different result.

So a few suggestions:

1- Run some HD diagnosis, startup in recover mode (command R) and run repair disk in disk utility. Also open the console and choose "all messages" and then search for "I/O Error".

2- Make a screen recording while you are working. About a year or so ago I was puzzled by finding an "a" at the end of nearly all my titles. I wrote up bug reports and was even making a screencast to sent to Apple. Then when I reviewed my screencast and saw all the keys I was pressing, I was actually typing "a" to return to the main Selection tool. Thusly it was my fault. (I was using ScreenFlow which allow you to display all the keys you have typed during the capture). If you find it is not something you are doing, you would have something good to post here or send off to Apple.

3-Next time it happens, if you don't do number 2, check and see if "undo" is dimmed in the edit menu.

@halmasonberg - thank you for posting this! I have been looking for a solution as well. I work for a prod company that has several editors, and we are all having this problem! Granted, we work with a lot of graphics, video files, and generators... it seems to happen most often with things that are in a storyline. We can't seem to fix this problem. Some of our projects are "infested" with this problem, while others are perfectly fine. I hope that this gets fixed soon. We have time sensitive material and sometimes don't have enough hours in a day to fix everything that mysteriously disappears!

aerikson09 - have you reported this to Apple as feedback?

Here is an article on submitting good feedback:

www.fcpworks.com/submitting-better-fcpx-feedback-to-apple/

it also happens to me. i really dont know why.
clips in connected storylines disappear, leaving transitions behind.
maybe we're doing some kind of wrong shortchut command while zoomed.
it normally realize it happened when i restart working in the project, so maybe it's something that happens when i close my project.

i'm thinking something. do you guys use wacom tablets? since few people report this trouble, maybe it's a bug with tablets.

I have a wacom tablet, but I don't really use it. It just sits there, while I use my Apple smart mouse. I reported this incident on an Apple forum though about a year ago, and haven't had any responses. So happy that others are experiencing this and it's not just me. I mean, I'm not happy that you're experiencing it, I'm just hoping that if we all chime in, we might come to a solution.

We use sparse images with a RAID system, opening the sparse images like hard drives to work on projects. Within the sparse image is a raw files folder and the Final Cut X library. Everything is self-contained within each sparse, and we have hundreds of projects that we work on in a season.

At work, our team found out that sometimes random clips are linked to other ones, particularly clips that are storylined or have transitions (they do not and often are not located in the same place - often they're in complete opposite ends of the timeline). We have problems where we'll zoom out and see transitions with nothing else after them. One of my co-workers thinks that sometimes you can delete something, not knowing that it's randomly tied to another clip in the timeline, so to combat this - we've been zooming out of the timeline everytime we delete something to see if it's deleting other clips with it. If so, we hit command + z to undo, and we try again. Sometimes you have to deselect other clips to isolate the one you want to delete.

Today my patience was tried when I went to relink a file, and in doing so, I saw it disappear before my eyes! I was instantly trying to undo it, but nothing worked. When I zoomed out, I saw hours of work gone. At that point I knew it was time to go home, this could not be fixed and now I must re-do almost the entire graphics/generators/image work on Monday.

I could really use some help in figuring out these issues. Our team has a major deadline coming up and we cannot afford to have this happen often. It's weird, because this one project seems to be troublesome, where other projects we open have no issues at all. It's very inconsistent. Here's to hoping we find a pattern.

This sounds very much like something related to your Library storage. Specifically the databases. (see my note above) It's possible that it is related to your sparse disk images. Since you are seeing this so frequently at your shop, and other users not reported this (even at large facilities) it seems like it might have something to do with your config.

Would it be possible for you to work without the sparse disk images and then see if it still happens? Also what is your reason for using sparse disk images? That was widespread pre FCPX 10.1, but I'm not sure the advantage of doing it? Specifically in your case as it doesn't allow for collaborative editing with shared media.

We use sparse images because we are using multiple computers and we don't use Xserve RAID systems, we use other party storage devices. At first, the only way for us to use FCPX was to utilize this system. I understand now there are libraries, but we were still having issues with keeping all the project files self contained, organized, and make sure that multiple people weren't accessing the same project. Our IT department set this system up in conjunction with Small Tree, who we bought the RAIDS from. Honestly, all of it is a little above my paygrade, but 3 years ago we needed a quick fix and they gave it to us. Now, we are utilizing projects among multiple years and trying to keep the same workflow to edit massive amounts of videos in a short amount of time.

There are 2 or 3 other people complaining on this forum about these issues... if they use sparse images, then I'll call it a pattern. I had never heard of sparse images before utilizing Small Tree's workflow, so it may not be the case for the others who have complained on here.

One of the benefits was having all the media related to that project self-contained, almost like a hard drive or a folder. It kept us from having issues with missing media, like a lot of people had at the beginning. Also, unlike other companies, we do NOT want simultaneous edits to be made on these projects. We do not collaborate. Instead, we have different stages/rounds of edits, and we do not want people to interfere with someone else's work. A sparseimage, when open on one person's computer, cannot be opened by anyone else. Therefore, you know someone is using it and it keeps people from overwriting someone else's work.

i dont use sparse images so it's not the case.
just found another complaint:
www.fcp.co/forum/4-final-cut-pro-x-fcpx/...lips-changing-length

Disk Images are the wrong way for y'all to go. Simple External Media strategy would take care of it, without the headaches.

aerikson09 wrote: A sparseimage, when open on one person's computer, cannot be opened by anyone else.

in conjunction with Small Tree, who we bought the RAIDS ...

I think I understand your setup. It sounds like you are accessing your Small Tree RAID over a SMB/AFP or NFS network protocol, and your sparse disk images are on that shared drive. Is that correct?

BTW. The things you are wanting to do with sparse disk images are actually already part of FCP 10.1. You'll get a warning if opening a Library that is already open. And if you use managed media stored in your library (it's what we do in our shop) you'll never have any missing media issues. Especially if your Small Tree RAID is capable of running NFS, I would encourage you to investigate this workflow.

If this is indeed correct, a couple of notes:

1) the combination of the network and accessing the sparse disk images over that network could be contributing to the issue and I believe it is. Take a look at my note above for an explanation: www.fcp.co/forum/4-final-cut-pro-x-fcpx/...ng-in-timeline#47020

Sparse Disk Images over a network have been seen to have less than ideal performance, and the protocol you connect with could be influencing performance and possibly not writing data properly as well. See here:

forums.creativecow.net/thread/335/56461

2) At our shop we saw some significant bugs with Mavricks and accessing NFS shares. Kernal panics, FCPX crashes, etc. Since moving to Yosomite we haven't seen those issues and things are working fine. There are a few notes about NFS issues in recent versions of Mac OS noted on the bottom of this page:

www.bresink.com/osx/NFSManager.html

If would STRONGLY recommend that your IT folks contact Small Tree regarding your sparse image workflow. If you continue to have issues you should consider brining in some FCPX workflow experts. FCPworks.com or www.10dot1.co.uk