Appendix 1

The Filmmaker’s Guide to Final Cut Pro Workfl ow
Tools MIDI track. A MIDI track is not sound, but rather a set of instructions to send to a sample
player. These tracks then need to be recorded as sound into a sound track before the mix is exported.
However, as MIDI they are extremely editable. You can change the attack, even change the sample
played. A piano becomes a saxophone. Figure 7.8 shows the Pro Tools MIDI tracks.
Figure 7.8 The dashes in MIDI tracks represent keystrokes on a keyboard or drum pad. The MIDI
plays samples from a sample player. In this example a Pro Tools MIDI track had been created and
contains music in MIDI form. The dark grey dashes represent keystrokes. The speed and pressure of
the keystroke is also recorded and editable. The samples played by the keystroke can be any sampled
sound, a musical instrument or a footstep
While MIDI is most often used for music, it can be used for some effects. Footsteps, for example,
can be sampled and recorded in sync with the picture. Let your fi ngers do the walking. MIDI has
been used for guns, hits of all kinds, and weird effects. Effects samples are available in many sound
effects libraries.
Some sounds can be edited in a form of MIDI. Using MelodyneUno, music can be “converted” into
a form of MIDI where the pitch and timing of the music can be edited. This can take an off-pitch
vocalist, something that happens when actors are required to play singers, and put them right on pitch
and rhythm. If there was a real-time version of this, Karaoke might be tolerable.
The Temp Dub
A temp dub is usually performed. This is a good attempt to mix the tracks without any real attention
to detail, the goal here being to check that all the sounds are here and the show is mixable.
Historically, the temp dub or temp dubs were necessary because the scores of tracks could only be
heard on a mixing stage. The sound editors had never heard more than two or three tracks at a time
until the temp dub. Only then could decisions be made as to what really worked and what did not.
This is why often several temp dubs would be made.
With modern digital audio workstations, it is possible to hear all of the tracks as they are being edited.
Even if several people are working in several locations, everyone can be working on the same project
fi les via Internet or changes can be FTP’d or even sneaker networked via portable drive.
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