Open Final Cut.

SET UP SCRATCH DISK:
Before you do anything you need to choose a scratch disk:
At the top menu, on the far left choose Final Cut > System Settings.
The first tab on your left should be "scratch disks."
Click on the button "Set" and choose a scratch disk, which should be your own external fire wire drive.
Click OK. The window should close.

OPEN A NEW PROJECT:
You have three options:
1) New Project-- which would open an separate Final Cut file.
2) Sequence -- which means a separate editing session within a project. Note that a project can have several sequences.
3) A Bin -- which is basically a folder that can hold sequences. This is good when you have a large project with several sequences that for efficiency may need to be organized as separate edit sessions.

No matter what, you will always need a sequence in order to edit. Once you begin using Final Cut, the application will usually remember the lat project you worked on. If not it should ask you to begin a new project. Do so and then define your sequence.

LAUNCH A SEQUENCE:
At the top menu choose: File > New > Sequence.

You should name your sequence. This will help you keep track of different parts of your project if you end up with more than one sequence.

Your sequence is the file in which you edit your footage. Now you need to bring in your footage.

IMPORT FOOTAGE:
To import footage from actual digital video tape, please check your notes of the in-class lecture of 9/17/10. Also see notes on importing footage from digital tape.

All your actual footage should be on your external hard drive. If you decide to place your footage on the computer's desktop which you use to edit, it is very likely that you computer will crash and you will lose your project.

IMPORT FILES TO PROJECT FILE:
At the top menu, select File > Import > Files. Choose the files that you wish to work with.
Note that these files are only linked, they do not become part of the project. You will edit these files on the timeline (which should automatically appear at the bottom of your Final Cut interface).

Before you import files into Final Cut, make sure to name them properly. Once you name them and link them, you will have to be careful not to change their names. Otherwise, you will have to rename them in either or both Final Cut's Project Bin as well as the external hard drive. The names must always match. Otherwise, you will have offline files appear on the project bin, and you will have to relink them.

EDIT ON THE TIMELINE:
This is the fun part.
If your timeline does not appear at the bottom of the Final Cut interface, make sure to select it by going to the top menu and choose Window > Timeline.
Then, select one file at a time from your project bin and drop it on the timeline at the bottom of Final Cut.
At this point, you should edit your footage on the timeline, the video viewer slug, and the canvas (the last two are windows on the middle and right of your top area).