Apple Final Cut Pro 7 - Manual (Page 817)

• Frames: Shows an absolute frame count instead of hours, minutes, seconds, and frames.
This option is available for any frame rate.
• Feet + Frames: Displays a film feet and frames counter using the default film standard
assigned in the Project Properties. To change the current film standard in your project,
choose Edit > Project Properties and select an option from the Default Film Standard
pop-up menu.
Final Cut Pro can display a clip’s timecode in several different display formats without
modifying the timecode itself. For example, for animators, an absolute frame counter
(simply called frames in Final Cut Pro), can be more helpful than SMPTE timecode. It is
simple to change the timecode display in the Viewer, Canvas, Browser, or Timeline to
show an absolute frame count instead of hours, minutes, seconds, and frames. You can
switch back to a normal timecode display at any time.
If you aren’t using NTSC footage, there is no option for drop frame timecode display
because only 30 fps timecode has a drop frame mode. PAL (25 fps) footage and 60 fps
high definition footage only have a non-drop frame display mode. Non-drop frame simply
means that the timecode counter counts at a consistent rate without dropping any
numbers from the count. You can think of “non-drop frame” to mean “normal” timecode
display. In most cases, you only have the option to display your timecode as non-drop
frame (normal timecode count) or frames (an absolute frame counter).
To change the timecode display format
µ
Control-click a timecode field in the Viewer, Canvas, Timeline, or Browser, then choose
one of the available timecode display options from the shortcut menu.
Important: Changing the timecode display of a clip does not modify the actual timecode
track in the media file.
Here is how to determine the type of timecode used in Final Cut Pro:
• Non-drop frame timecode has a colon (:) between the seconds and frames fields, and
no numbers are dropped from the counter.
01:16:59:29, 01:17:00:00
• Drop frame timecode has a semicolon (;) between the seconds and frames fields, and
two timecode numbers are skipped from the frames counter each minute (except every
tenth minute).
01:16:59;29, 01:17:00;02
A clip’s timecode comes directly from its media files. To set sequence timecode, you can
use the Drop Frame checkbox in the Timeline Options pane of Sequence Settings. For
more information, see
“Changing Timeline Display Options.”
817 Chapter 51 Working with Timecode