What should be seamless videos in FCP timeline, are not seamless

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Level 1

4 points

What should be seamless videos in FCP timeline, are not seamless

I recently recorded video and audio for a community Christmas concert. The video files on my camera are limited to 4GB. When I added them to the library and inserted into the timeline, for some reason they are not seamless. They are off by a frame or 2 (shooting at 30 fps). I have been using this same computer, same configuration for over 10 years. I tried this in iMovies as well and found the same issue. I then used Adobe Premiere Elements and the issue did not happen. I also tried it with Davinci Resolve and it did not happen. FCP is my preferred editing app. But I can't seem to find out why after all these years, the files are not seamless in the app(s). Yes I have an older iMac and FCP is an older version and cannot be updated because of the age of my hardware. But without having changed anything in the camera settings or in the app settings, and now what should be seamless isn't seamless, and only with Mac legacy apps? I did remove and reinstall FCP (from Time Machine). That did not fix the issue. Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

iMac 27″, macOS 11.7

Posted on Dec 18, 2025 12:26 PM

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Answer 1

Meg The Dog

Level 6

13,796 points

Dec 18, 2025 4:12 PM in response to Deepstar48

Deepstar48 wrote:

I recently recorded video and audio for a community Christmas concert. The video files on my camera are limited to 4GB.

What camera? What are the properties of the source files?

Is the audio and video recorded by the same device, or are they captured separately?

When I added them to the library and inserted into the timeline, for some reason they are not seamless.

How do you import them into FCP? Via the import function, or by dragging from the source card into the timeline?

What does "not seamless" mean? You see a disruption at the point where one 4GB file ends and another begins?

Something else?

They are off by a frame or 2 (shooting at 30 fps).

What is off? The audio sync? The clip duration? Are you confident the project you are working in has the exact same frame rate as your source material?

I have an older iMac and FCP is an older version and cannot be updated because of the age of my hardware.

Exactly what hardware and what version of FCP?

MtD

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Answer 2

Deepstar48 Author

Level 1

4 points

Dec 18, 2025 7:15 PM in response to Meg The Dog

Camera: Panasonic GH4, 3840*2160, 93.9Mb/s @ 29.970 fps, MPEG-4

I have a separate audio recorder. But the (not) seamless files in question are direct from the camera. It is both the audio and the video that are not seamless, when the 2 clips are put back to back in the timeline. And the audio portion I can see there is a "step" in between the 2 clips that is not natural.

I use the import function to import direct from the SDHC card.

Yes, I see a disruption at the point where one 4GB file ends and another begins (what seems like 1 or 2 frames missing in between).

What I mean by "off" is not being seamless. They are "off" because they are not seamless. The audio within each clip matches the video. It is only that gap in between the 2 clips that is an issue (for me).

I am using a late 2014 iMac, 27" 5K retina display with 4GHz Quad Core Intel Core i7 processor, running Big Sur 11.7.10, 32 GB 1600MHz DDR3 ram, and FCP is version 10.5.4.

I have not double checked the frame rate of the project and the source material. I haven't made any changes since the last videos I edited (to the camera or to FCP) and I have never encountered this issue before. I will go back and confirm those settings though, to be thorough.

Thank you for taking the time to engage with my issue. I appreciate you.

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Answer 3

Dec 19, 2025 3:49 AM in response to Deepstar48

Hi (bonjour),

Did you try to open two adjacent clips from finder in QuickTime Player to check if there is missing frames in between
Do you edit in drop frame or non drop frame time code?

Michel B.

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