Apple Final Cut Pro 7 - Manual (Page 30)

30 Chapter 1 A First Look at Final Cut Pro
Understanding the Relationship Between Clips and Media Files
An important first stage in creating a project is transferring your video to your
computer. Final Cut Pro provides a variety of ways to get media into your computer.
The method you use depends on the media type. You’ll learn more about capturing
and transferring video in the next chapter.
After you’ve captured or transferred your media into a project, clip icons representing
the media files appear in the project’s tab of the Browser window. A large project may
hold many clips. For complicated projects, you can create a system of bins to hold and
organize clips. You can name and organize the bins to suit your work style.
When you capture or transfer clips, the corresponding media files are stored on your
computer hard disk. You can specify where you want the media files stored. Because
video and audio media files are often large, you’ll want to plan where your files will reside.
An important point to remember is that the media files from your camcorder or other
sources are not stored in a project. The clips in a project merely point to the media files
stored elsewhere on your hard disk. When you modify a clip, you are not modifying
the media file, just the clip’s information in the project. You work with and edit clips in
Final Cut Pro, but the underlying media files are unchanged on your hard disk.