Safari Decided to Reset All My Open Windows to Empty Start Pages

 Lovely Apple. I always have Safari Windows open from previous sessions, that reminds me that I have to go and read, or do something about each one.

Today Safari decided to reset all my open windows to empty Start Pages. In the process I lost all my train of thoughts, all the things I was in the process of doing are now lost. Thank you Apple.

I had started Bookmarking a bunch of these pages, knowing that they had accumulated badly, but I wasn't done yet with all of them.

So now I have to peruse through my History and try to salvage what I can. Again, thank you Apple.

RED Raw Files Become Black In Final Cut Pro

 Often when opening an old library, FCP doesn't read or recognize RED raw files properly, and displays black clips instead. Audio plays fine, but there is no image. The RED plugin is properly installed, and the clips are online.

A way to force FCP to read these files properly is to hold Option+Command at launch which will reset FCP preferences. Then as it rebuilds previews and all, magically the RED clips images re-appear.

I wish there was another way to force FCP to read RED files without having to erase the prefs. If it exists I have not find it.

EDIT: Another way :)

 Today I had yet another case of black Red footage in FCP. Going to the clip Settings, even though clicking on Modify RED Raw Settings and changing the values does nothing to help, I noticed a message from FCP saying something like "Cannot modify .RMD file, make sure it is not used by another application", or something like that.

So I thought about permissions. I went and set the entire media drive to Ignore Ownership on this Volume / Apply to enclose items.

Lo and behold, after restarting FCP normally (without resetting preferences), it fixed the problem, R3D files are back to normal.

EDIT: This darned "bug" is still creeping out :/

Again today the R3D files are black, what a pain. This happens on spanned clips by the way. In any case, today the simple solution was to restart FCP. That's it.

Final Cut 10.6.5 Share h264 Video + Audio Settings, Result Is Audio Only ?! It's A🪳

 Final Cut Pro 10.6.5, Monterey 12.6.1 on Mac M1 continues to give me a hard time. Today I'm exporting (Share) a h264 preset, two projects at once.

The first Project exports correctly. The second one does not, I get a notice: Share has failed.

Resulting in a QT file for the second Project has no video in it, only audio... What is going on???

Upon restarting FCP, the Export / Share goes through no problem.

Epic Games Launcher 14.4.1 On Mac M1, Unreal Engine Tab Is Slow, And Buggy 🐛🪲

 Why is Epic Games Laucher soooo sticky and buggy on Mac?

Each time I go browse for an asset, click on the asset to see the details, and if I click the back button, or if I go browse again, this is what I get:

Epic Games Launcher is STUCK, endlessly spinning

Not good Epic Games! The only way to get out of the endless spiral is to click on the Library, or on the Store Tab, and then click on the Unreal Engine tab again to force reload... It's terrible and slows down operations. Please fix this.

It's really annoying that any filtering is lost when you go browse a different category. I'd like to set my filtering to UE 5.1 and MacOs once and keep that selection always, no matter where I go browse.

Also please update the free content so that more is available for UE 5.1. I mean what's the point of touting the last shiny 5.1 version if there is little content for it?

Final Cut Pro 10.6.5 Corrupted Library / Project

 FCP has been pissing me off all day today 😡. After having a problem earlier with a Project Snapshot that I could not move, nor delete; FCP refused to Share on export and nothing happened...

I had to create a brand new Library, import my cuts / Projects, and all Media, while omitting the f$%ck@#p 🤬 Snapshot of course. And here goes a couple of hours.

Then I had to restart the computer because FCP still didn't want to export anything 😤.

Finally after restart it's behaving normally again. It's exporting, and the exported files look good. Pffui!.. 🥵

Final Cut Pro 10.6.5 The Operation Couldn't Be Completed. Invalid Argument. Error Message

 FCP 10.6.5 is giving me a hard time. I've created a Snapshot of a Project. I want to move the Snapshot from the Event it resides currently, into another Event.

FCP does not comply and gives me this error message:

The Operation Couldn't Be Completed. Invalid Argument.

Workaround: Duplicate the current Snapshot, then the new Snapshot can be moved to the other Event without problem.

Only... I cannot delete the original! FCP is being stubborn and I can't move this Snapshot to the trash. Something is rotten.

Pixelmator Pro 3.2 "Lumière"

 Pixelmator Pro is out with version 3.2. It adds video editing capabilities, integration with Apple Motion, and more! Very, very cool!

Now is the time to buy this great piece of software if you haven't already for a mere $19.99 (50% off.) Current users like me get to update for free!

Pixelmator Pro 3.2

Released on December 6, 2022

Pixelmator Pro 3.2 introduces some incredible new ways to create designs with full support for video layers, adds support for popular video formats, includes all-new video and social media templates, brings major improvements to Motion document support, and more.

New Features

With full support for video layers, you can now edit videos and create stunning video designs with all the same tools you use to edit images.

Use the new on-canvas controls to easily control video playback, set video start and end frames, select poster frames, and more.

Work with a number of popular video formats, including MP4, QuickTime Movie, and even moving image formats such as animated GIFs and PNGs.

Quickly create eye-catching designs with cinematic social media story templates and 4K movie title templates.

Video Layers Support

Video layers in Pixelmator Pro work just like any other layers — you can mask or crop them, add effects, change colors, and more.

Find useful information about video length in the video layer description.

Work with videos with transparency, compressed using HEVC or Apple ProRes 4444 codecs.

Import Live Photos from the Photos browser and edit them as photos or videos.

Use quick video editing settings in the video layer shortcut menu, and the menu bar, or use handy, on-canvas controls.

Easily start and stop video playback, mute, and unmute audio.

You can also press the Space bar on your keyboard to play all layers, or Option + Space to play only the selected layers.

With additional video editing settings, adjust the length of the video, scrub through individual frames, or select a poster frame.

For compositions with multiple video layers, use Advanced Settings to delay, loop videos, or choose the behavior of the first and last video frames.

Use playback delay to specify when each of the videos in a composition will start to play.

Keep your videos playing on repeat with Loop or Bounce effects.

Enjoy top video playback performance and a smooth, real-time video editing experience, powered by AVFoundation.

On devices with Apple silicon, harness the power of M1 and M2 chips to edit and export videos of up to 8K resolution.

Optimize videos for export with options for adjusting video size, quality, and frame rate.

When exporting to QuickTime Movie format, make the most of additional video compression formats, including HEVC and Apple ProRes.

Enjoy automatic video color management thanks to ColorSync integration.

Use Quick Export to quickly export videos to MP4 file format.

Export original, unedited videos from Pixelmator Pro by choosing Format > Video > Export Unmodified Video.

Automate video import, editing, and export with AppleScript and Shortcuts apps.

Motion Support Improvements

Enjoy support for video layers and many other improvements when exporting to Motion.

Motion projects will now keep the custom fonts included in Pixelmator Pro documents.

Basic vector clipping masks are now supported.

Color adjustments and effects layers are now supported.

Grain, Vignette, Black and White, and Gradient Map adjustments and effects will now be replaced with equivalent filters in Motion.

RAW layers will now open as bitmap layers in Motion.

To emulate nondestructive gradient and color fills from Pixelmator Pro, shapes will be used in Motion instead.

Fill and Gradient Fill styles now open as Fill filters in Motion.

Positioning of layers with complex transforms has been improved.

Other Improvements and Fixes

You can now show or hide layer handles by choosing View > Layer and Selection Handles from the View menu.

Arabic texts would sometimes be displayed incorrectly. Fixed.

In some situations, Pixelmator Pro would stop responding when upscaling images using Super Resolution. Fixed.