[b]To edit your H.264 video clips, adding titles/music or effects, FCP could be your good choice. It has the function of direct trimming of H.264 video and audio clips in the timeline and enriching the H.264 videos with color correction, etc. But what if you have some H.264 video files which are unrecognizable by Final Cut Pro? That's a common problem[/b]
H.264 codec needs a lot of processing power to decode, so it is not easy to play and edit H.264 files in FCP or other editing programs. To get around the trouble, a simple workaround is to [b]convert H.264 to ProRes[/b], a native format for Final Cut Pro.
I used [b]Brorsoft Video Converter for Mac[/b] to encode all of my H.264 videos to ProRes for using in Final Cut Pro X or FCP 6/7. Overall, it is one of the best H.264 file converter tool for us. The program comes with several optimized formats for FCP- ProRes 422, ProRes 422 HQ, ProRes 422 Proxy, ProRes 422 LT and ProRse 4444, which enable you to transcode H.264 for editing with FCP directly without any rendering or codec problems. Plus, it also allows you to convert H.264 to DNxHD for Avid Media Composer, Apple InterMediate Codec for iMovie, MPEG-2 for Adobe Premiere Pro, etc with best results. Download it and follow the tutorial below to convert H.264 videos to FCP effortlessly.
[b]Tutorial: Encode H.264 to ProRes for FCP with perfect audio/video sync[/b]
[b]Step 1: Add H.264 files[/b]
Install and launch the H.264 to FCP Converter, and then click “Add Files” button to import your H.264 MP4/MOV/AVI files to the software.
[b]Tip:[/b] If you wanna combine H.264 video clips into one file, you can click the “Merge into one” box.
[b]Step 2: Select output format[/b]
Click the "Format" bar and select Final Cut Pro> Apple PreRes 422(*.mov) as output format. This format is specially designed for FCP, so that you can edit your original H.264 video in Final Cut Pro perfectly.
[b]Step 3: Convert H.264 to ProRes for FCP[/b]
Click the convert button under the preview window, the converter will start encoding H.264 clips to Apple ProRes for importing to Final Cut Pro.