Why Can't I Transcode A Proxy File

I am opening a 6 month old project and it is showing several files are missing. When I switch from optimized to "Proxy" timeline, they reappear - I want to export in high quality. I would usually select these files, "Transcode" and select "optimized" - but this option is greyed out.

So my only option is to export a proxy Timeline - not what I want.

Can anyone suggest anything I am missing here?

You're missing the original files. You can't optimize proxy files; you can only optimize from originals. You have to find those and relinking them before you can export in full quality.

To find the missing files you could try searching in Finder on the filename.

In FCPX if you right-click on the red clip and pick "reveal in Finder" it only shows you the symlink to the missing file, not the expected path to the file.

Likewise if in Finder you do CMD+I on that symlink, it confusingly shows the location of the symlink itself (which you already know -- you clicked on it). It will not show you the target path of the symlink, which is where the linked media file formerly resided. Yet knowing this can often help determine where the missing file is or was. E.g, maybe the missing file was on a hard drive you unplugged and forgot.

To see the path to the missing file you must use the terminal command "ls -l" on the symlink inside the FCPX library. See various on-line resources for use of terminal.

Brief reference: learnpythonthehardway.org/book/appendixa.html
Book: www.takecontrolbooks.com/command-line