Collapse Multiclip back to individual clips?

[Ben Freedman]

Howdy.

Is it possible in PP, after cutting up a nested multicam sequence, to have the clips revert back to their 'original' single clips (rather than still being a reference to a nested sequence)? Similar to the 'collapse multiclip' command in FCP?

Thanks for any insight!

Best,

Ben

[Adam Gold]

You haven't done anything to the original clips. They've remained unchanged in the original sequence, so just go back to that. You can then nest the original sequence into a new one.

I'm probably misunderstanding your question.

[Ben Freedman]

OK, let me try to paint you a picture.

In my multicam sequence, I've color-corrected one of the cameras. So far so good, but then in a few of the cuts in my final sequence I want to make other color corrections to that clip. I don't want to add another color correction to my already corrected nested sequence. What I'd like to do is, instead, 'collapse' the nested sequence back down to the original clips, so I can then remove or adjust the CC for just those few bits of the final project I want to adjust.

Basically, instead of leaving the nested sequence, I'd like to have the clip reference the actual original clip so I can make direct changes to it, rather than either changing the nested clip, or going back to the multicam sequence and having to make changes there.

Does that make sense?

Best,

Ben

[Brian Parker]

I think I understand what you're saying. Here's how I'd do it:

1) Copy the clips from the nested sequence. Go back out to the master sequence and then delete the nested sequence and paste in the clips you copied.

or

2) If you applied you CC to the nested sequence as a whole, then remove those CC effects. Open the nested sequence and work on the clips individually in there.

or

3) Remove all CC effects from all clips in PPro. Right click on the nested sequence and change it to a dynamic linked AE composition. Then in AE, within that comp each clip is editable as an individual layer, so you can both work on clips individually, and add adjustment layers to whole sections of the timeline to adjust color more generally. Use the Synthetic Aperture effect for most control.

[Ben Freedman]

Hi, Brian...

1) Doesn't work because the clips inside the nested sequence don't get cut. Only the nested sequence itself is cut in the master sequence. Going back into the nested sequence, each track is just one long clip, not cut up like you'd need

2) CC was applied to 1 clip in the nested sequence, not to the nested sequence as a whole. Again, I want to REMOVE the CC from just a few of the CUT portions of the master sequence

3) UGH! Really? This is crazy-complex and time consuming for such a simple little think like removing color correction from just a few of hundreds of cuts in the sequence.

Looks like PP just can't do this I'm guessing... In FCP you can not only collapse your multicam clips back to the original clips, but you can even reverse this process if you want to go back and do more multi-cam editing later. Then again, in FCPX, THERE IS NO MULTICAM!. :-) Talk about jumping from a step ahead to 2 steps behind!

Maybe CS6?

Best,

Ben

[Adam Gold]

Hey Ben--

If you can bear with me a second... I'm still probably not understanding completely, and part of this is probably due to the different terminology between FCP and Premiere. I think you can probably do what you want and it probably isn't that hard. But I may be completely wrong.

Premiere doesn't use terms like collapse and Multiclip so I won't either, because that's what's confusing me. I'm not sure what you mean by collapse because to me, nothing has been expanded to then collapse. So again, bear with me a little.

First you stack your clips and sync them in Sequence 1, yes? Of these clips, if I am understanding, you have CC'd one. Then you created a new sequence, which we'll call Sequence 2, dragged Sequence 1 into it, enabled Multi Cam and then you are off to the races. Have I got this right so far? You've done your Multicam edit in Sequence 2 but now you want to remove some of the CC that pertains to a few of the shots from the one track in Sequence 1 that had the CC.

If it's only a few shots you can do this just by clicking on those shots in Sequence 2 and opening the Effects Control panel in the Source Monitor and selecting the CC effect and disabling it. Or if it is a large section of the original clip that you want to undo the CC, you can go back to Sequence 1, razor the clip at the beginning and end of the part you want to remove the CC from, and disable the effect for that part.

Have I misunderstood once again? Probably.

[Ben Freedman]

Hi, Adam...

What you describe makes perfect sense, except that I don't believe Premiere works that way...

When you say "you can do this just by clicking on those shots in Sequence 2 and opening the Effects Control panel in the Source Monitor and selecting the CC effect and disabling it." ---- that's where it break down.

In Premiere, when you click on those shots as you state, it open up the effects for the whole nested sequence, not just the clip that had the CC applied... There will be no CC on the nested sequence, because the CC was applied to just 1 specific clip inside the nested sequence.

..unless I'm missing something here.

As for going back and cutting up the sequence... yes, that can be done, but then if you make any edits to sequence 2 later, such as changing where a cut happens, that could really mess you up. It's a time-consuming work-around that doesn't really solve the issue.

Make sense?

Best,

Ben

[Adam Gold]

Originally Posted by Ben Freedman

In Premiere, when you click on those shots as you state, it open up the effects for the whole nested sequence, not just the clip that had the CC applied... There will be no CC on the nested sequence, because the CC was applied to just 1 specific clip inside the nested sequence.

Let me check on this and get back to you. I'm opening up an old project now that had heavy CC on one track.

(pause)

Okay, you're right and I am wrong... Effects applied to clips in Sequence 1 do not appear in the Effects Control panel when they are nested in Sequence 2. So you can't undo them there. So you need to step back and consider what you are trying to do.

Are you doing Color Correction or Color Grading? If Color Correction, i.e. WB is off, then doing it to the whole clip in Sequence 1 makes sense as it needs to be uniform and applied to the whole clip. If Color Grading, i.e. it is variable and will vary from shot to shot in the final edit, then it may make more sense to to it in Sequence 2, even though it is a pain in the butt. And of course this is the final step and isn't done until all the cutting is finished.

Now you could do the second method I suggested if large portions of your original clip need different forms of correction, i.e. razor large hunks of the clip and correct some parts but not others. I don't get why changing edit points would be a problem, because either the original clip needs correcting or it doesn't. Grading for mood or effect is another matter and I'm not making an artistic judgment here.

In your case, the simplest method may be going to the shot(s) in question in Sequence 2, re-grading the first one until you get it the way you like, and then doing a simple copy/paste attributes to any other shots in the sequence that you want to look the same way. Anything you do in Sequence 2 will have no effect on Sequence 1. It does not open the entire original Sequence, only the reference to that specific part of it. I just tested this to confirm and it works.

[Ben Freedman]

Hi, Adam...

Sorry to make you work so hard, but I'm doing none of that. I designed that example just to 'paint you a picture' as I said at the beginning. I really just wanted my questions answered about whether PP can collapse a multicam sequence back down to it's original clips, a la FCP...

I'm usually happy to be proven right, but not in this case. I'm bummed... Maybe CS6.

Thanks for your work, and sorry that it didn't end up happily.

Best,

Ben

[Adam Gold]

Okay, sorry, then I guess I'm just not understanding what it is you want to do, because the term collapse just doesn't have any meaning to me in this context. Nothing has been expanded so I just don't get how anything can be collapsed. I just don't get what you are trying to do.

Sorry I couldn't be of any help.

[Ben Freedman]

No worries. It's a very cool feature. Hopefully PP gets it soon...

Best,

Ben