I edit a lot of interviews and just read an article in Videography (May 2008) about ScriptSync. At the end of the article it mentions that this is not only good for scripted programs but also for documentaries where you are working from transcribed interviews. It even gave clear step-by-step instructions on how to use it.

It only took me a few minutes to try it out and I was amazed. I can click on any line of an interview transcript and instantly be watching it.

I got the demo version of Final Draft as suggested in the article because it has a "save as Avid Scriptsync" feature, so I exported my Word file as rtf, then opened in Final Draft, then saved out of Final Draft. After that it's all downhill, just open the transcript as a New Script, select all and drag the clip into it. Then select Scriptsync and it does the rest. These inteviews are 20 to 30 minutes and anywhere I click, it goes there.

Try that with FCP!

rfmeredith:

I edit a lot of interviews and just read an article in Videography (May 2008) about ScriptSync

I hope to start implementing this too. I think it would improve the documentary workflow very much.

Question... many times, we have interviewees that are old, foreign, etc, and are difficult to understand. Are you able to "custom-link" shot to script where scriptsync can't do it, or makes mistakes?

I just started using it but yes, you can link a clip or subclip to a section of script very easily.

I have some interiews with pretty heavy southern accents and the scriptsync just zipped right through them with no mistakes.

 I won't be able to repeat all the comments the first time I showed this to people at my shop without getting seriously moderated for language, but yes, ScriptSync is pretty amazing.  We used it on voice over for a project and saved hours.  How about some more languages Avid?  People are using Avids here in darkest Africa, you know.  Make this available in a couple of African languages any you'll kill fcp in my part of the world...

I've known of ScriptSync for a number of years (at least two now)  but I was never able to experiment with it until this past weekend. 

Here are some tips:  (from Steve Audette)

1. Open your transcript in Word
2. Set the View to "Normal"
3. Set the "Style" (under Format) to "Normal"
4. Drag the right margin from 6.5 to about 3
5. Save As a txt with line breaks

One of the quick tricks I've noted:

when you click on your line it automatically sets the In point.  So what I do is click the line in the transcript that contains the end of the interview bite, play it to the end point and Mark Out.  Then I can quickly click on the start of the bite and my In point is auto set.  Add it to the sequence and before you know it you've got an assembly sequence together. 

another Steve Audette special.  ScriptSync is also good for "dialogue replacement"... let's say the inflection is wrong on a word that you want to end the statement with.  You can do a search in the script (CTRL/CMD+F) for the word and punctuation you want.  If the person said it, you can grab that bit of audio and replace the original to make it sound more natural.  If they didn't say that exact word, then maybe they said another word that rhymes with it that you can splice in...

That's what I've been doing to create subclips. Then I realized (but haven't tried it yet) that since script sync puts a node at the beginning of each line, if you have already gone through written transcripts and decided where you want a clip to begin, you can put a line break there... then scriptsync will automaticaly put your in point on the word you want. Might be a time-saver in some cases, but obviously you'll be tweaking all the edits anyway.

That's a good tip...

On this particular project, the producer went through and placed numbers in brackets (ie, [1], [2], etc) to indicate the bites they wanted.  So I just searched [1] and it took me right to the section they wanted to use.