Final Cut Pro 7: Text in FCP replaced by text in file

Scripting Forums AppleScript | Mac OS X
#1

After seeing tutorials on use of services (http://pixelcorps.cachefly.net/mbkv_235_540p_h264.mov + parts 2-4), I was hoping FCP could use services; of course it couldn’t.

I’m trying to get headline texts from a text file into the headline text FCP project. In the project there are three text fields, gotten from a headline template.

Every day we export the headline texts to an UTF-8 encoded file from ENPS. It has the following format:

Head1: Headline one
Head2: Text of headline 2
Head3: The final headline

Getting the strings out of the file is a simple shell script problem I can solve myself.

However, in the template I would like to leave the labels from the text file (“Head1”, “Head2” and “Head3”). My goal was to select the text and do a text service which would replace the selected text.

Now I find that isn’t possible (at least from a cursory trial just now), therefore I have to turn to this forum.

From what I gather in some posts Apple Script can’t understand the returns from FCP, but simple cut and paste using the clipboard would suffice, I believe.

A few tests with AppleScript Editor showed me that the focus I had in FCP seems to be lost when running a script from inside ASE, thus making it seemingly impossible to copy the currently selected text.

Have anyone tried to do something similar (http://macscripter.net/viewtopic.php?id=27625, I don’t understand where to look for the XML file; is it the project file? If so, it might be a trivial task fit for automator…).

Best regards,
Paul K Egell-Johnsen
Graphics Artist/News Producer
Oddasat http://nrk.no/sami

#2

The save as XML feature of Final Cut is the thing for me. After creating a template of the supers I saved the Sequence as an XML file.

Then in automator I opened a shell script which replaces the text in the XML with the text from the list of supers and saves it in a project folder, and finally I copy all the XML-files into the proper working project for positioning.

I hope someone, somewhere find this solution usable.

Now I’m curious of what kind of other data driven solutions I can make for Final Cut based on simple text files :slight_smile: