User Guide Cancel

Importing XML files from Final Cut Pro 7 and Final Cut Pro X

  1. Adobe Premiere Pro User Guide
  2. Beta releases
    1. Beta Program Overview
    2. Premiere Pro Beta Home
    3. Beta features
      1. Generative extend overview 
      2. Generative extend FAQs
      3. Color management system
  3. Getting started
    1. Get started with Adobe Premiere Pro
    2. What's new in Premiere Pro
    3. Best practices for updating Premiere Pro
    4. Keyboard shortcuts in Premiere Pro
    5. Accessibility in Premiere Pro
    6. Frequently asked questions
    7. Release notes
  4. Hardware and operating system requirements
    1. Hardware recommendations
    2. System requirements
    3. GPU and GPU Driver requirements
    4. GPU Accelerated Rendering & Hardware Encoding/Decoding
  5. Creating projects
    1. Start a new project
    2. Open projects
    3. Move and delete projects
    4. Work with multiple open projects
    5. Work with Project Shortcuts
    6. Backward compatibility of Premiere Pro projects
    7. Open and edit Premiere Rush projects in Premiere Pro
    8. Best Practices: Create your own project templates
  6. Workspaces and workflows
    1. Workspaces
    2. Import and export FAQs
    3. Working with Panels
    4. Windows touch and gesture controls
    5. Use Premiere Pro in a dual-monitor setup
  7. Frame.io
    1. Install and activate Frame.io
    2. Use Frame.io with Premiere Pro and After Effects
    3. Integrate Adobe Workfront and Frame.io
    4. Share for review with Frame.io
    5. Invite collaborators to co-edit a project
    6. Frequently asked questions
  8. Import media
    1. Importing
      1. Transfer files
      2. Importing still images
      3. Importing digital audio
    2. Importing from Avid or Final Cut
      1. Importing AAF project files from Avid Media Composer
      2. Importing XML project files from Final Cut Pro 7 and Final Cut Pro X
    3. File formats
      1. Supported file formats
      2. Support for Blackmagic RAW
    4. Working with timecode
  9. Editing
    1. Edit video
    2. Sequences
      1. Create and change sequences
      2. Set In and Out points in the Source Monitor
      3. Add clips to sequences
      4. Rearrange and move clips
      5. Find, select, and group clips in a sequence
      6. Remove clips from a sequence
      7. Change sequence settings
      8. Edit from sequences loaded into the Source Monitor
      9. Simplify sequences
      10. Rendering and previewing sequences
      11. Working with markers
      12. Add markers to clips
      13. Create markers in Effect Controls panel
      14. Set default marker colors
      15. Find, move, and delete markers
      16. Show or hide markers by color
      17. View marker comments
      18. Copy and paste sequence markers
      19. Sharing markers with After Effects
      20. Source patching and track targeting
      21. Scene edit detection
    3. Cut and trim clips
      1. Split or cut clips
      2. Trim clips
      3. Edit in Trim mode
      4. Perform J cuts and L cuts
      5. Create and play clips
      6. Adjust Trimming and Playback preferences
    4. Video
      1. Synchronizing audio and video with Merge Clips
      2. Render and replace media
      3. Undo, history, and events
      4. Freeze and hold frames
      5. Working with aspect ratios
    5. Audio
      1. Overview of audio in Premiere Pro
      2. Edit audio clips in the Source Monitor
      3. Audio Track Mixer
      4. Adjusting volume levels
      5. Edit, repair, and improve audio using Essential Sound panel
      6. Enhance Speech
      7. Enhance Speech FAQs
      8. Audio Category Tagging
      9. Automatically duck audio
      10. Remix audio
      11. Monitor clip volume and pan using Audio Clip Mixer
      12. Audio balancing and panning
      13. Advanced Audio - Submixes, downmixing, and routing
      14. Audio effects and transitions
      15. Working with audio transitions
      16. Apply effects to audio
      17. Measure audio using the Loudness Radar effect
      18. Recording audio mixes
      19. Editing audio in the timeline
      20. Audio channel mapping in Premiere Pro
      21. Use Adobe Stock audio in Premiere Pro
    6. Text-Based Editing
      1. Text-Based Editing
      2. Text-Based Editing FAQs
    7. Advanced editing
      1. Multi-camera editing workflow
      2. Editing VR
    8. Best Practices
      1. Best Practices: Mix audio faster
      2. Best Practices: Editing efficiently
      3. Editing workflows for feature films
  10. Video Effects and Transitions
    1. Overview of video effects and transitions
    2. Effects
      1. Types of effects in Premiere Pro
      2. Apply and remove effects
      3. Use FX badges
      4. Effect presets
      5. Metadata effect in Premiere Pro
      6. Automatically reframe video for different social media channels
      7. Color correction effects
      8. Effects Manager
      9. Change duration and speed of clips
      10. Adjustment Layers
      11. Stabilize footage
    3. Transitions
      1. Applying transitions in Premiere Pro
      2. Modifying and customizing transitions
      3. Morph Cut
  11. Titles, Graphics, and Captions
    1. Properties panel
      1. About Properties panel
      2. Edit text
      3. Edit shapes
      4. Edit audio
      5. Edit video
      6. Mask with shape
      7. Create, apply, and redefine text styles
    2. Essential Graphics panel (24.x and earlier) 
      1. Overview of the Essential Graphics panel
      2. Create a title
      3. Linked and Track Styles
      4. Working with style browser
      5. Create a shape
      6. Draw with the Pen tool
      7. Align and distribute objects
      8. Change the appearance of text and shapes
      9. Apply gradients
      10. Add Responsive Design features to your graphics
      11. Speech to Text
      12. Download language packs for transcription
      13. Working with captions
      14. Check spelling and Find and Replace
      15. Export text
      16. Speech to Text FAQs
    3. Motion Graphics panel (24.x and earlier)
      1. Install and use Motion Graphics templates
      2. Replace images or videos in Motion Graphics templates
      3. Use data-driven Motion Graphics templates
    4. Best Practices: Faster graphics workflows
    5. Retiring the Legacy Titler FAQs
    6. Upgrade Legacy titles to Source Graphics
  12. Fonts and emojis
    1. Color fonts
    2. Emojis
  13. Animation and Keyframing
    1. Adding, navigating, and setting keyframes
    2. Animating effects
    3. Use Motion effect to edit and animate clips
    4. Optimize keyframe automation
    5. Moving and copying keyframes
    6. Viewing and adjusting effects and keyframes
  14. Compositing
    1. Compositing, alpha channels, and adjusting clip opacity
    2. Masking and tracking
    3. Blending modes
  15. Color Correction and Grading
    1. Overview: Color workflows in Premiere Pro
    2. Color Settings
    3. Auto Color
    4. Get creative with color using Lumetri looks
    5. Adjust color using RGB and Hue Saturation Curves
    6. Correct and match colors between shots
    7. Using HSL Secondary controls in the Lumetri Color panel
    8. Create vignettes
    9. Looks and LUTs
    10. Lumetri scopes
    11. Display Color Management
    12. Timeline tone mapping
    13. HDR for broadcasters
    14. Enable DirectX HDR support
  16. Exporting media
    1. Export video
    2. Export Preset Manager
    3. Workflow and overview for exporting
    4. Quick export
    5. Exporting for the Web and mobile devices
    6. Export a still image
    7. Exporting projects for other applications
    8. Exporting OMF files for Pro Tools
    9. Export to Panasonic P2 format
    10. Export settings
      1. Export settings reference
      2. Basic Video Settings
      3. Encoding Settings
    11. Best Practices: Export faster
  17. Collaborative editing
    1. Collaboration in Premiere Pro
    2. Get started with collaborative video editing
    3. Create Team Projects
    4. Add and manage media in Team Projects
    5. Invite and manage collaborators
    6. Share and manage changes with collaborators
    7. View auto saves and versions of Team Projects
    8. Manage Team Projects
    9. Linked Team Projects
    10. Frequently asked questions
  18. Long form and Episodic workflows
    1. Long Form and Episodic Workflow Guide
    2. Using Productions
    3. How clips work across projects in a Production
    4. Best Practices: Working with Productions
  19. Working with other Adobe applications
    1. After Effects and Photoshop
    2. Dynamic Link
    3. Audition
    4. Prelude
  20. Organizing and Managing Assets
    1. Working in the Project panel
    2. Organize assets in the Project panel
    3. Playing assets
    4. Search assets
    5. Creative Cloud Libraries
    6. Sync Settings in Premiere Pro
    7. Consolidate, transcode, and archive projects
    8. Managing metadata
    9. Best Practices
      1. Best Practices: Learning from broadcast production
      2. Best Practices: Working with native formats
  21. Improving Performance and Troubleshooting
    1. Set preferences
    2. Reset and restore preferences
    3. Recovery Mode
    4. Working with Proxies
      1. Proxy overview
      2. Ingest and Proxy Workflow
    5. Check if your system is compatible with Premiere Pro
    6. Premiere Pro for Apple silicon
    7. Eliminate flicker
    8. Interlacing and field order
    9. Smart rendering
    10. Control surface support
    11. Best Practices: Working with native formats
    12. Knowledge Base
      1. Known issues
      2. Fixed issues
      3. Fix Premiere Pro crash issues
      4. Unable to migrate settings after updating Premiere Pro
      5. Green and pink video in Premiere Pro or Premiere Rush
      6. How do I manage the Media Cache in Premiere Pro?
      7. Fix errors when rendering or exporting
      8. Troubleshoot issues related to playback and performance in Premiere Pro
  22. Extensions and plugins
    1. Installing plugins and extensions in Premiere Pro
    2. Latest plugins from third-party developers
  23. Video and audio streaming
    1. Secure Reliable Transport (SRT)
  24. Monitoring Assets and Offline Media
    1. Monitoring assets
      1. Using the Source Monitor and Program Monitor
      2. Using the Reference Monitor
    2. Offline media
      1. Working with offline clips
      2. Creating clips for offline editing
      3. Relinking offline media

Learn how to import projects, selected clips, or selected sequences exported from Final Cut Pro (FCP) 7 and Final Cut Pro (FCP) X

Migrate from Final Cut Pro X

Final Cut Pro X exports a .fcpxml file, which Premiere Pro does not recognize.

To bring in an FCP X file into Premiere Pro, you need a converter tool that converts the .fcpxml file generated from Final Cut Pro X into a standard .xml file that Premiere Pro can import.

Adobe recommends using the XtoCC tool for this conversion.

High-level overview of the process:

  1. Export the FCP X project as an XML file. For more information, see the Final Cut Pro documentation.

  2. Convert the XML file into something Premiere Pro can read using the XtoCC tool. For more information, see the XtoCC documentation.

  3. In Premiere Pro, select File > Import. Browse to the XML file, and click Open.

    Not all elements of a Final Cut Pro X project get imported into Premiere Pro. 

    Here is a quick summary of what gets translated and what does not.

    For a complete list of supported and unsupported elements, see the XtoCC documentation.

    Elements

    What gets translated

    What does not get translated

    Clips

    • Event clips: A bin named after the event is created containing all the master clips, and bins named for each keyword, favorite or rejected range are created containing subclips representing these ranges. The keyword’s Notes are added to the subclip’s Log Note field.
    • Gap clips: Gap clips become empty spaces in the track.
    • Compound clips: Compound clips become sequences, and compound clips in a project become nested sequences.
    • Synchronized clips: Synchronized clips are translated into merged clips.

    Multicam clips become collapsed clips containing the active angle(s)

    Project

    For projects, video clips and stills in the primary storyline become clips in track V1.Audio clips in the primary storyline become clips in tracks A1. Connected clips and clips in secondary storylines are added to higher numbered video and audio tracks.

    If there are video clips connected directly below the primary storyline these become track V1 below primary storyline clips in track V2, while lower video clips become disabled clips in higher numbered video tracks.

     

    Timecode

    The starting timecode of the project and its settings are maintained.

     

    Markers

    • Unfinished to-do markers become red markers
    • Completed to-do markers become green markers
    • Chapter markers become yellow markers

     

    Audio

    • Audio volume and pan and their keyframes on a whole clip are added to all audio tracks.
    • Fade in and fade out handles are recreated using audio level keyframes. 
    • Audio volume and pan and their keyframes on individual audio components are added to their appropriate audio tracks.

     

    Effects and transitions

    • Cross Dissolve, Zoom, Flash, Lens Flare, Black Hole, Flip, Page Curl, Ripple, Swing, Cube, Doorway, Squares, Star, Band, Center, Checker, Clock, Gradient, Inset, Letter X and Wipe transitions are substituted with equivalents
    • Other transitions become Cross Dissolve
    • Audio transitions become Cross Fades

    • Custom settings are not translated — transitions apply with default settings
    • Transition settings

    Blend modes

    Subtract, Darken, Multiply, Add, Lighten, Screen, Overlay, Soft Light, Hard Light and
    Difference blend modes become their equivalent composite modes

    Other blend modes are not supported

    Text

     

    Titles become Text titles containing the original text. Some titles with complex builds may have the text out of order in the Text title.

    Speed

    Constant speed changes are preserved.

    Keyframed speed changes are converted to a constant speed change that maintains the duration of the original clip and uses the average speed of the clip.

Import XML project files from Final Cut Pro 7

You can import entire projects, selected clips, or selected sequences that you export from Final Cut Pro as XML files. In Premiere Pro, bins and clips have the same hierarchies and names that they have in the Final Cut Pro source projects. Also, Premiere Pro retains the sequence markers, sequence settings, track layout, locked tracks, and sequence timecode start points of Final Cut Pro source projects. Premiere Pro imports text from the Final Cut Pro Text generators into Premiere Pro titles.

Note:

You cannot import native Final Cut Pro project files, only XML files exported from Final Cut Pro. You can export Final Cut Pro XML files from Premiere Pro. The effects that are translated from Premiere Pro are the same as those that are imported from a Final Cut Pro XML f ile.

For a list of items in Premiere Pro that are translated from a Final Cut Pro XML file, see Final Cut Pro clip data, Final Cut Pro effects and transitions, Final Cut Pro composite modes, and Final Cut Pro Multiclips. Also, see the PDF, Appendix D: Working with Final Cut Pro from the Editor's Guide to Premiere Pro by Richard Harrington, Robbie Carman, and Jeff Greenberg for more information.

Import an XML file from Final CutPro

  1. Export an XML file from Final Cut Pro. For more information, see Final Cut Pro Help.
  2. In Final Cut Pro, close the source project.
  3. In Premiere Pro, select File >Import.
  4. Browse to the XML file, and click Open.

Learn the simple XML workflow for exporting projects from Final Cut Pro and importing them into Premiere Pro in this video tutorial.

Final Cut Pro clip data

Clip data in the Description, Scene, ShotTake, and LogNote fields in Final Cut Pro appear in the clip metadata fields with the same names in Premiere Pro.

Final Cut Pro effects and transitions

Premiere Pro retains the basic motion and opacity effects, and motion and opacity keyframes, from Final Cut Pro source projects. Additionally, Premiere Pro converts some Final Cut Pro effects and transitions according to the following tables:

Table 1. Conversion of Final Cut Pro video effects

Final Cut Pro effect

Premiere Pro effect

Crop

Crop

Eight-Point Garbage Matte

Eight-Point Garbage Matte

Four-Point Garbage Matte

Four-Point Garbage Matte

Gaussian Blur (provided the channel selection in Final Cut Pro is Alpha+RGB.)

Gaussian Blur

Luma Key

Luma Key

Three-Way Color Corrector

Three-Way Color Corrector

Table 2. Conversion of Final Cut Pro video transitions

Final Cut Pro transition

Premiere Pro transition

Dip To White

Dip To White

Dip to [color]

Dip To Black

Edge Wipe transitions

Wipe, with the wipe direction rounded to the closest of the eight Premiere Pro supported directions.

Other video transitions

Cross Dissolve

Table 3. Conversion of Final Cut Pro audio effects

Final Cut Pro audio effect

Premiere Pro audio effect

Audio level values and keyframes

Audio clip volume values and keyframes

Audio pan values and keyframes

Track pan values and keyframes

Low Pass Filter

Lowpass

High Pass Filter

Highpass

Band Pass Filter

Bandpass

Table 4. Conversion of Final Cut Pro audio transitions

Final Cut Pro audio transition

Premiere Pro audio transition

Cross Fade (0 dB)

Constant Gain

Cross Fade (+3 dB)

Constant Power

Other transitions

Constant Power

 

Final Cut Pro composite modes

Premiere Pro retains the basic motion and opacity effects, and motion and opacity keyframes, from Final Cut Pro source projects. Premiere Pro converts Final Cut Pro composite modes according to the following table:

Final Cut Pro mode

Premiere Pro mode

Normal

Normal

Add

Linear Dodge (Add)

Subtract

Not supported

Difference

Difference

Multiply

Multiply

Screen

Screen

Overlay

Overlay

Hard Light

Hard Light

Soft Light

Soft Light

Darken

Darken

Lighten

Lighten

Travel Matte Alpha

Not supported

Travel Matte Luma

Not supported

Final Cut Pro Multiclips

Premiere Pro converts uncollapsed Final Cut Pro Multiclips, with as many as four inputs, to Multi-camera sequences. Premiere Pro converts collapsed Multiclips to individual clips.

Note:

Premiere Pro issues a warning when you try to import a Multiclip with more than four inputs.

 Adobe

Get help faster and easier

New user?