OT: Adobe Products + FCP

Aloha People,

Been reading a lot of the threads filled with great input and feedback.

Question: What would you consider MUST HAVES in the Adobe Family to go hand in hand with FCP?

Reason: I have a full time job and video editing etc are just side jobs, I am also a divorced single parent of a 7 year old that I have 50% custody of so my time learning new programs need to be streamlined to the basics for now. Oh, and I do mostly event/corporate videos.

I just ordered FCS2, and some of Ripple's training, and was also thinking of expanding to some Adobe Products. Unlike FC, DVD Studio, Color, Motion and Live Type, I know what these programs are primarliy for. I know Photoshop, After Effects, and Illustrator are high on the list, but are there any others in your opinions?

Thanks in advance,
-Darren

> Question: What would you consider MUST HAVES in the Adobe Family to go hand in hand with
> FCP?

Bare minimum, to me, is Photoshop. Because if you're doing corporate stuff, you might have to receive still files and you have to have some way of manipulating them, adding text, changing Image Modes, adding alpha channels etc.


www.derekmok.com

I agree. Get Photoshop under your belt. It's not very hard to learn, it will give you a good grounding for other applications later, and it's extremely handy.

Photoshop's the only one i have and use.

i did some tutorials that came with it way back when, and got the hang of it.
get some images you like to look at - kids, family, loved ones - and play around.

i also use to to create end credit rollers

nick

i use illustrator + after effects for pretty much all basic titles. you just cant beat that combo for quality and individual character control!

illustrator, photoshop and after effects are in as much use in my daily workflow as is anything in the fcp suite.

premiere is just getting back from a long mac hiatus and i still havent heard much buzz about encore and soundbooth... so i wouldnt be on a big tearing rush to buy them

if i were going to rank them in order of importance to an average video professional, id say:
1. photoshop
2. after effects
3. illustrator

(however in my workflow that order is flipped)

IMHO, After Effects / Photoshop / Illustrator is a package...not one without the other. I would purchase these individually & I would not purchase the "Creative Suite Production Pro" because there's no need for Premiere unless you want ANOTHER NLE on your box that you will never use, no need for Flash (never use it) / Encore (have DVD Studio Pro) / Soundbooth (have Sountrack Pro).

...that's just me

Joey

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

Thanks People,

This helps out a lot!

grafixjoe Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I would
> purchase these individually & I would not purchase
> the "Creative Suite Production Pro" because
> there's no need for Premiere unless you want
> ANOTHER NLE on your box that you will never use,
> no need for Flash (never use it) / Encore (have
> DVD Studio Pro) / Soundbooth (have Sountrack
> Pro).
>
> ...that's just me
>
> Joey


I hear ya, but I just realized that the Creative Suite is cheaper than those 3 products seperately .... jeez

yeah, thats how they get ya! just kidding.

actually biting the bullet and buying the suite once, gets you very reasonable upgrades for the forseable future.

and as a side note, it will definitely not hurt you to have premiere, encore and soundbooth. and i personally use flash a couple times a month. so it paid for itself in like 2 uses...

in fact im looking forward to giving encore the chance to displace dvdstudio pro - which by the way is in my opinion [comparatively] the most convoluted, cobbled together piece of garbage ever made...

Quote

Darren: Creative Suite is cheaper than those 3 products seperately

True. I had forgotten that I've been upgrading these 3 programs (AE / PS / ILL) since version 3. Don't need the rest...especially don't need (or like) Flash as I don't touch web animations - I farm that stuff out to a few colleagues that I know are good at it (networking is KING, Darren... remember that).

As a divorced single parent of a 7 year old, and a newbie to Adobe applications, you will have your hands more than full with these 3 programs...believe me. Drop on by if you need help...just tack an "OT:" on the front of your posts

Good Luck, Darren.

Joey

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

Thanks again guys for all the input.... and understanding in my situation.

Joey, I believe you! I'll make sure to budget my time extra wisely. My dream is to have my daughter working with me in this field when she gets older. For now though, she has to be more important

My daughter and I in 2004
[ia341237.us.archive.org]

Awesome picture, man. She's beautiful

I would love for my kids to do what I do. My 9 year old boy is already a whiz on the computer (I gave him my old Dual 1 Ghz). When all's said & done... it's all about the kids

Good Luck, man!

Joey

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

grafixjoe Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Awesome picture, man. She's beautiful

Thanks. She is a true joy to parent.

Okay, so I purchased the Creative Suite

*passes out*


> Drop on by if you need help...just tack an "OT:" on the front of your posts

I'll post if I have any questions, but I already bookmarked your post in this thread [www.lafcpug.org], so I'll explore there first before posting

Flash can be handy for sure. Never bothered getting my head around Illustrator, though I should. Photoshop since version 3. I remember how exciting layers were - was the version 6?

I find the updates now more performance than tools. Haven't yet spent much time with CS3, but the new toolkit layout was annoying, but was OK after 20 minutes.

And it certainly flies under Intel compared to CS2. Dog.