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Review - Loader for Final Cut Pro

Final Cut Pro’s greatest strength is also its greatest weakness, and that is its open-endedness.  What I mean by that is that Media Composer has a very “rigid” way of working, and importing media means that you take a clip, and upon import, MC converts it to an MXF (or possibly an OMF) file, and once it’s in your system, the external file that it came from is essentially useless.  That’s not the case with Final Cut Pro.  You can import whatever you want, from wherever you want, and if you don’t pay attention, things can get exceptionally disorganized very quickly.  If you don’t stay on top of your media management you (or someone working on the same system as you), could accidentally delete a file that was located somewhere other than your capture scratch, and then you end up having to re-digitize, re-render or re-export the file to get it back again.  What a pain.  What if there was a way to automatically move all your importing media to your project folder, so you don’t have to worry about where it is anymore?  Well say hello to Loader from Digital Heaven.

INSTALLATION

At a size of 12 mb, Loader downloads quick and easy, and you will be up and running in about 10 minutes.  Loader is also offered as a 14 day trail, so feel free to try before you buy.  You can download the free demo at the included link.

WHAT YOU GET & HOW IT WORKS

Let me start out by saying that Loader is not a plug-in.  It is a little tool that sits on the left or right side of your screen waiting for you to give it something to do.  The process is very simple.  On install, Loader divides media into three categories.  Audio, Graphics and Movies.

Each of the three categories has file extensions associated with them (that can be added upon), and once a file is dragged onto Loader, it will look at the file extension, find the appropriate category for it, copy the file from it’s current location into your project folder into either an “Audio”, “Graphics” or “Movies” folder.  Once it’s finished copying the file, it will also import it into Final Cut Pro for you.  It sounds simple and straightforward, and it really is.  Basically, FCP takes care of your digitized Capture Scratches, and Loader takes care of everything else.  If you happen to be working with files who’s extensions don’t fall into any of the preset categories, you can quickly and easily add your own.  Let me show you how easy it is to work with Loader.

What else can I say.  Simple, straight-forward and powerful.  In the end, Loader’s selling point is not on the way it can copy and import media.  It’s selling point is that it is an organizational time saver that will let you rest easy knowing (all) your project’s media is located in one location for not only easy access, but easy archive as well.

PROS

- Fantastic organizational tool
- Virtually no learning curve
- Loader only requires a very slight alteration to your current work flow
- Supports multiple open projects
- I can’t wait for version 3!

CONS

- Loader can’t “move” files, it can only copy them

Digital Heaven is on the right track with Loader, and I can’t wait to see what they add to it in version 3. This is $79 I would spend in a second, because for me, organization is key and Loader keeps you organized, and will work seamlessly into your FCP workflow.  You can purchase Loader, or download the free trial by heading over to http://www.digitalheaven.co.uk .

Kevin P McAuliffe is a Senior Editor at MIJO, in Toronto, Canada.  As always, you can send him an .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or follow him on Twitter @ http://www.twitter.com/kpmcauliffe .

FTC Disclosure: I have not been offered any consideration or compensation from Digital Heaven for the review/editorial of this product(s).

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Many thanks for the review Kevin! We’re glad you’re enjoying using Loader.

I just wanted to mention that one of the new features we introduced in 2.0 was the ability to have Loader move the original file to the trash. If the Command key is held down when you do a drop then the items in that drop will be moved to the trash after importing into FCP.

Posted by Martin Baker  on  08/11  at  02:29 AM

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any idea if Loader is AppleScriptable?  Would be great to have a ‘drop folder’ for Final Cut available over the network, which would then move/copy files out of it onto the media drive, as well as importing it into the current project + subfoldering it correctly.  Apple’s Folder Actions provides a trigger to execute scripts, but would need to point Loader at the file somehow.

Would definitely use this functionality in some of the short-deadline collaborative projects that come up sometimes.

That said, this looks like a really great tool regardless, I’ll definitely be giving it a trial.

Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)  on  08/11  at  06:00 AM

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Loader isn’t scriptable but watch folders is definitely on the possible feature list for v3.

Posted by Martin Baker  on  08/11  at  06:26 AM

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I’ll take a look at this.

Not to take away from the utility of this product, it would be nice if this wasn’t necessary. FCP should really be able to at least offer this kind of service.

Having worked with students learning FCP, I think it’s open structure is probably overall a bad call. It teaches people learning editing that media management doesn’t matter (which obviously couldn’t be further from the truth).

Having something like this to help students manage their projects would be great in an educational environment.

Posted by Charles Angus  on  08/11  at  05:27 PM

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@Martin:

“Loader isn’t scriptable but watch folders is definitely on the possible feature list for v3”

Oh please oh please. I pontificated on this idea a long time ago in a “software from the future” post:

http://www.scottsimmons.tv/blog/2007/05/10/software-from-the-future-watch-folder/

It seems there was some groundwork laid in FCP long ago but I have yet to see a really usable tool that will do this.

Posted by Scott Simmons  on  08/12  at  10:03 AM

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