6. File Transfer
"Sock Drawer"
Do you have a sock drawer? Do you know where to go find your socks? You never have to think about it. So we always need to know where we put our files and never have to think about it or lose them.
Lacie Drive
Every machine has a "Lacie drive", which is an external hard drive storage device (Lacie is a brand name), that connects to the back of the iMac. You will be creating a "sock drawer" folder on the Lacie drive with your name and all caps and the year.
Go to finder, then the Lacie drive in the left column, then click file> new folder or hold command + shift and the "N" key.
Example: BRIANPISTONE23-24.
Within that folder you will make sub folders for every project that you work on.
Example: 2023-10-04PortfolioProjectFolder
Video Files
If you are transferring video files, you have two options: Final Cut Pro or Premiere Pro.
Final Cut File Transfer
Final cut pro does the transferring and file management for you within a “library”. Go to file> new> library and name it First name, last name and the year example. BRIANPISTONE23-24. Same as your "sock drawer" folder, but this is different, it's only used in FCPx.
Then create a new "event" in your "library". They are automatically dated and you can rename them to add a description.
Once you have a correctly named event, select it by clicking on it and then hold command and the I key that will import media.
Once you have the SD card connected to the computer, you can select the card in the import media screen and select the clips that you want to import.
Then you click import. Now you have media in your bin and you can watch the tutorials on how to edit an export.
File Selection Techniques
There are some selection techniques and key commands that help.
For instance, if you want to select all, hold the command key and hit the A key.
If you want to select some, click the first file, hold shift and click the last.
If you want to select independent or deselect independent files, hold the command key and click files you want to select or deselect.
Copy= Command + C
Paste= Command+ V
Adobe Premiere File Transfer
If you're using Premiere, use Finder to transfer your video files from the SD card to your "sock drawer" and inside a subfolder.
Create subfolders within your sock drawer. For example, this project might be called 2023-10-03PortfolioFirstProject.
Now you can either open an additional finder window and drag and drop, to do that. Click to Finder, hold command and hit the "N" key.
Navigate to your SD card. Within your SD card you have to find the clips. Most times it's in a DCIM folder. And you can copy and paste them or drag and drop.
At this point, you'll need to understand more about how premiere imports and edits, so you'll want to watch another tutorial for that.
Photo File Transfer- Finder
If you're working on photos, it's a very similar workflow to using Premiere. Make sure you have your sock drawer folder, then make a sub folder with the date and something descriptive about the project.
You can open a new Finder window: Command +"N".
Navigate to your SD card DCIM folder and find the photos you want to copy. You can highlight them using selection methods and copy and paste or drag and drop.
From there you would need to open the files in different photo applications, most likely Lightroom Classic or Photoshop.
Photo File Transfer- Lightroom Classic
The last method for importing photos would be using Lightroom classic directly. Lightroom has its own sorting system for naming folders that happens automatically.
Insert your SD card and open up Lightroom Classic.
Click the import button and make sure to always create a new "collection" while importing, use the date and naming convention discussed earlier.
Cloud Files
There are a few options for accessing files outside of the classroom. Everything discussed so far assumes the files are local on the computer, so only that computer. Video files are very large in file size so trying to upload and download to anything in the cloud isn’t a good option. Best would be to have a portable harddrive, or you can even edit off of an SD card, however, be careful, especially when trying to use the same card in the cameras, it might have issues.
If you need picture files to work on outside of class, there are a few cloud options. Google drive connects with your student ID and password. Also, Adobe creative cloud connects with the same ID and password and works well with photography, Photoshop and Lightroom mobile. Another app that is very useful is Adobe Express.