Copy and Paste.

[ryan brown]

I've been an FCP user for a long time now, and I still don't understand the "copy" and "paste" attributes. It seems to have a mind of it's own.

I copy a clip from one sequence, paste it in another, and it just paste's to whatever track it feels like!? I know that's what the "toggle select" box is for... but it rarely goes there. If I click the toggle off, then on again, it goes there, but what the heck??

Or if I just mouse click on track 1, for instance, it seems it'll go there when I paste about half the time. Other time's it just goes to track 1, or 2, or 3..., at what seems to be complete randomness.

Is there a method to the madness here, or what?

Not a big deal or anything, but it's a nuisance, and it's aroused my curiosity for age's now.

Maybe it's something simple that I just haven't grasped yet?

eh... whatever.

-brown

 

[bbalser]

There is a method most folks don't bother reading about.

Let's go over this super quickly. Open a Seqeunce in your Timeline window. Double click a clip to open it in the Viewer. Once opened in the viewer, look at the Patch Tabs in your Timeline. What ever tracks they are attched to is where that clip is going to automatically paste to by default. You can change this by moving the tabs.

For example, I open a clip from the Timeline or Browser into the Viewer. The Patch tabs are on V1, A1, A2. But I have audio on tracks 1 & 2 I don't want to over write. So I move the Patch Tabs from A1, A2 to A3, A4. Then when I hit F10, or the Overwrite button, or drag it from the Viewer to the Overlay Menu in the Canvas to so an overwrite edit, it will go to the tracks I have selected with the Patch Tabs.

There's also more controls with the Select buttons, too. Once you learn it, it's a great tool, but not one that is very obvious without reading the manuals about it.

BTW, copy and paste of a clip is a very different operation from Paste Attributes. I assume you're not talking about the actual Paste Attributes function.