Looking For Workflow Opinion

I'm currently starting a project that is comprised of three videos. Though they are separate subjects they are all part of the whole and use some common elements. My question: Is it best to start them as separate Library's and just copy materials between if necessary (they will be 'packages') or is it best to use one Library and separate events/Projects.

Thanks,

Richard

At the end of the day, it all depends on what works for you.

For me personally, I edit several TV shows. Each has its own Folder in the Finder. Each season for a show has its own Library. Each episode has its own Event.

In that same manner, I'd say make one Library for the film. Give each of the three segments its own Event. Use Collections (keyframe, smart) and Folders inside the Event to organize them from there.

Maybe you can try searching all over the web for "FCPX in episodic programming". There must be hundreds of shops using FCPX to do tens of thousands of shows.

You're really only going to know after the first season if whatever you tried was good idea or not. How comfortable are you with the various methods you've described? Do you have time to experiment a bit?

Just my opinion: I am NOT comfortable with external media, that is, stashing media in external folders, preferring instead letting FCPX manage it in libraries for me. So I have separate libraries for each program in a series off 12, 10-minute shows. There are elements that are common among them and those get copied over and over. But 90% of the content is unique to each episode.
However, these are historical in nature so there is a huge amount of content (stills, scanned documents, 16mm film transfers, archival video clips, interviews, &c) that is organized externally. That stuff gets imported into episode libraries as needed. One item may be used in several shows so it's duplicated many times.
The several Motion projects (opens, interstitials, supers, various effects sequences) are handled separately, externally from the libraries, and rendered movies out of Motion are imported as needed. Again, they get duplicated several times.
I've got the space and our IT people back it up.
When this project is finished in a few months we will be upgrading our systems to FCPX 10.3+ and then we'll see what we need to change in how we approach our next episodic projects.

Hope you get better advice and will come back to the forum to tell us about your workflow ad how your three projects went. Best of luck.

If your libraries are all on the same drive, when an item is copied from one to the other, a link is copied, not the whole file.

There's be nothing wrong with giving each season of a show its own Library, make each Event an episode. I have one editor working for me who does that. Just depends on what you're most comfortable with.

When we have the occasional production that requires 2 or more editors to collaborate on, external media is almost a must do.

Hi Richard
Not sure where Ben and others are getting the idea that your question relates to 3 seasons?? Just wanting to create 3 projects using same source material is much simpler than entire seasons with multiple episodes.
Given the ability of FCPX to organize and search an entire library, I would most likely just create 1 Library and place the media on an external drive, then create 3 events/projects.
Using a single Library will simplify creating things like Smart Collections, keywords, Titles etc…. Meta data is your friend, here.
A single Library is also faster when switching between events/projects.
If you do decide at a later date you need separate Libraries, you can always create them later.
The beauty of FCPX is how powerful and flexible it is. Different editors develop their own workflows.
Have fun!

Hope this Helps, Greg

I never said I thought he was doing 3 seasons, just sharing what we do, to give ideas.

Thanks for all the well thought out replies! I think I'm going to go with one library and multiple events., Especially now that I've discovered if I keep them all on the same HD they'll just be using links to common material instead of copying. Also add to that having a single source with all meta-data for the whole project included.

Thanks again and have a great holiday,

Richard