The "NEW" Final Cut Studio: Helpful Links FAQs and other Goodies

Kevin Monahan posted this link to a PDF white paper that pretty much tells you all about FCS 3

[images.apple.com]

Other helpful links

What's new:
[www.apple.com]

19 movies for you to watch from Ripple Training:
[www.rippletraining.com]

FCS User Manuals (now available as downloadable PDFs)
[documentation.apple.com]

FCS Pro Res White Paper July 09
[images.apple.com]

What's new in Final Cut Server 1.5
[www.apple.com]

10 things I love about FCP 7 by Steve Martin
[www.kenstone.net]

Shane Ross found these:

HELP LIBRARY: Comprehensive documentation for Apple?s professional applications.
[documentation.apple.com]

Final Cut Studio Workflows
The Final Cut Studio Workflows document has been designed to summarize the overall post-production process and show how the various applications in Final Cut Studio fit into it. This manual also explains how the applications in Final Cut Studio work together, letting you send projects and media from one environment to another to perform specialized tasks.
[documentation.apple.com]

Walter Murch and Francis Coppola talk Final Cut Studio and Tetro
[www.apple.com]

Pro Level Training DVDs from macprovideo.com
[www.macprovideo.com]

New Books & Free Tutorials from Peachpit
[www.peachpit.com]

3 Hours of free Final Cut Studio tutorials from Lynda.com
[files.lynda.com]

Free Video Tutorials from ZioPro
[www.zoom-in.com]

Free FCP7 Tips and Tutorials from Alex Gollner and Editing Organazized
[alex4d.wordpress.com]

Download FREE Final Cut Pro Alpha transitions, Color looks, and Compressor droplets at no additional charge.
[www.apple.com]

Red Giant plug-ins FCS09 Compatibility Chart
[www.redgiantsoftware.com]

Mike James Critical look at what is missing from the NEW Final Cut Studio
[blogs.digitalmediaonlineinc.com]
Note: Some third party tools already address some of the omissions Mike mentions.

Mike Curtis reviews for Macworld
[provideocoalition.com]

Scott Simmons "kicks the tires" on FCP 7 and finds the "good and bad and ugly."
[provideocoalition.com]


There are a gazillion Apple Support Knowledge Base docs released as part of the FCS3 release, but unfortunately I subscribe to them via RSS and cant find a URL where all of them are. You can subscribe via RSS by going here:
[rss.support.apple.com]

FAQ

Q. Do I really need an Intel Mac to install this?
A. Yes, you do. No one has found a way around it. Yet. However if you do a "Get Info" on each of the apps you will find that it says Universal on all of them. See here:
[www.lafcpug.org]

Q. Can I upgrade from any previous version of Final Cut Studio?
A. Yes. You can purchase the FCS upgrade for $299.00 and install that if and only if you have a legitimate copy of Final Cut Studio, Final Cut Production Suite or any previous version of Final Cut Pro installed on your Mac.

Q. Can I buy the upgrade if I have an NFR or Academic Version of Final Cut?
A. Nope. You now need to purchase the full retail version for $999.00. Congratulations.

Q. How come the Price for the Full Retail version of FCS went DOWN $300.00 and the Academic Price went UP $200.00?
A. We don't know. But the numbers suggest that if you are a Student thinking about purchasing FCS for the first time you might be better off buying the full retail version for $999.00 rather than trying to save $100.00 for the Academic version. You can't upgrade from an Academic version. You can from the retail version.

Q. Does a paper manual ship with the NEW Final Cut Studio?
A. Nope. Be proud that no trees died for the NEW Final Cut Studio.

Q. Is FCP 7 backwards compatible with FCP 6?
A. No. You can export a FCP 7 file via XML version 4 and open that in FCP 6. Works just fine.

Q. How come it took 2 years for this?
A. Because that's how long it took.

Q. Is it worth it upgrading to the NEW Final Cut Studio?
A. For just $299.00?! Are you kidding me?

Q. I really need some of these new features. Should I upgrade now?
A. Not if you are in the middle of a project. If you are the conservative sort wait a few months and keep reading what everyone else is saying and THEN upgrade. If you live on the edge then by all means upgrade. Then post on this forum and tell us all about what wonderful and painful things you find.

Q. I hear the official name of the NEW Final Cut Studio is just "Final Cut Studio." Won't that be confusing?
A. Yes it will.


Please add to this thread links to any helpful web sites on FCS3 including reviews/opinions from end users.

Michael Horton
-------------------

This list is by no means complete. I just compared the FCP tech specs on v6.0 and v7.0.

Editing and Timeline


- Multi colored markers for sequences and clips

- Ripple sequence markers

- Matchframe for master clips, subclips, and subclip parent clips

- Multi-Touch gesture support

- Color-coded, drag-and-drop reorder of tabs in the Timeline

- Close Other Tabs shortcut in Timeline and Browser

- The Close Gap command now operates on the gap at the cursor location

- Join All Through Edits command lets you clean up the sequence in a single step

- If you?re working with multiple sequences, you can get started faster by holding down
the Option and Shift keys when you open Final Cut Pro

- Retain markers on multiclips when you switch angles and add marker notes to make
multicam projects more efficient

- Reveal Affiliate Clips feature to automatically select every instance of a clip in a
sequence, so you can apply a color correction or efficiently move or delete all
instances in a single step

- Export a tab-delimited Markers list to track marker information in a spreadsheet or
database

Effects

- Alpha Channel Matte Transitions

- Global Transitions adds effects between In and Out points

- Direct access and modify Motion templates

- Change Speed interface with speed ramping presets

- Copy and paste motion and effect attributes to multiple clips

- Safe Area Display for positioning titles and effects for SD inside HD frame


Tools

- Large Timecode Viewer with additional display for metadata
- iChat Theater preview for real-time collaboration

Audio

- You can now use Audio Gain (Adjust) buttons on a selected audio keyframe or the two
keyframes surrounding the playhead

Application

- Digital Cinema Desktop for full-screen, real-time SD, HD, and 2K preview playback on
main screen or an attached Apple Cinema or LED Cinema Display

- SD, HD, and 2K monitor full-screen playback with Apple-certified third-party PCI card
or device

- User preferences that can be moved from system to system

Film

- Drag and drop files to create new or add into existing Cinema Tools databases

- Import RED media and DPX image sequences directly into Cinema Tools

- Create change lists from 2 XML exports from Final Cut Pro

- Use Cinema Tools databases for relinking of EDLs with 2K and 4K media in Color

- Support for 35mm 3-perf, 35mm 4-perf, and 16mm-20 and mixed film formats

Supported Formats and I/O

- Apple ProRes family, New versions of the Apple ProRes codec let you edit faster and at
higher quality across a wide variety of workflows. The family now includes ProRes 422
(Proxy), ProRes 422 (LT) and ProRes 4444, in addition to the original ProRes 422 and
ProRes 422 (HQ)

- DVCPRO HD (P2), XDCAM EX, AVC-Intra, AVCHD, RED (with additional software from
RED) import through Log and Transfer with automatic logging, custom naming,
browse, mark, and background ingest

- Easy Export supports presets for background export to Apple TV, MobileMe, iPhone,
iPod, YouTube, DVD, Blu-ray disc

- Apple-designed menus for DVD and animated menus for Blu-ray discs

- Native AVC-Intra playback for both AVC-Intra 100 and AVC-Intra 50 at 1080p
24/25/30, 1080i 50/60, 720p 24/25/30/50/6Native AVC-Intra playback for both
AVC-Intra 100 and AVC-Intra 50 at 1080p 24/25/30, 1080i 50/60, 720p
24/25/30/50/60

- Panasonic P2 playback support at 1080p 24/25/30, 1080i 50/60, and 720p 24/24N/
25/25N/30/50/60/VFR from P2 cards

- Automatic Transfer ingests file-based media with custom clip naming

- Improved automatic naming makes it easier to identify clips that span multiple cards

- Sort clips to show only the ones that require re-ingest

- Closed captioning preserved for capture and output to tape

- XML Version 5 also supports AUX timecode, which is used for sound sync and audio
editing.

Media Management

- Reveal Clip or Project in Finder

- Background rendering, compressing, and transcoding to multiple formats with Easy Export

- Send to Compressor integration

- Choose to matchframe to the subclip or to the original clip.

- Matchframing now works with freeze frames as well as nested sequences, which are
treated like a true master clip

- Final Cut Pro now uses the Spotlight engine to speed up media searches
- Media Manager optimized to improve media trimming, especially for clips with speed
changes, multicam clips, and anamorphic media.

"Never underestimate a kick to the nuts"
Bas Rutten

[- The Close Gap command now operates on the gap at the cursor location ]

When did it not?

[- Copy and paste motion and effect attributes to multiple clips]

Also not new!

[- Global Transitions adds effects between In and Out points ]

NEW! Along with Marker enhancements, this is huge. Finally, a way to apply multiple dissolves to a range, rather than that weird Drag-Clips-Overwrite-with-Transition technique.

[- Large Timecode Viewer with additional display for metadata ]

Literally huge. I wonder if this includes larger larger Frame views for storyboard editing oon thse 23" and 30" monitors?

- Loren
Today's FCP keytip:

Nudge a Canvas layer by subpixel with Command-Option-Arrows !

Final Cut Studio 2 KeyGuide? Power Pack.
Now available at KeyGuide Central.
www.neotrondesign.com

The FCP7 documentation system isn't great, but there is a way of reducing many of your clicks. When you first go to a section with disclosure arrows, they default to being closed:



This means you have to click each blue arrow, or the words next to each arrow, to see what is hidden:



To have a version of your documentation that defaults to all the information being visible, you need to change the source HTML of the files.

The short version of the instructions is to rename all instances of "TaskContentBox" to "TaskContentBox-open" in all the .html files in the help system.



Here's how to do it using Bare Bones Software's free TextWrangler utility.

1. Create a copy of the documentation built into FCP7: Control-click the Final Cut Pro application, choose ?Show Package Contents? from the shortcut menu
2. In the new window that shows the content of FCP, navigate to ?Contents:Resources:English.lproj?
3. Create a copy of the ?finalcutpro_help? folder by dragging it elsewhere on your Mac, outside the Final Cut Pro window
4. Download and install ?Textwrangler? from the Bear Bones website.
5. Start ?TextWrangler? and choose ?Find?? from the ?Search? menu
6. In the ?Multi-File Search? section, click the ?Other?? button and navigate to where you created the copy of the FCP help system, navigate inside to ?en/finalcutpro? and 'Choose' the ?usermanual? folder
7. Search for ?TaskContentBox? (including the quote marks)
8. Replace With ?TaskContentBox-open? (again including the quote marks)
9. Click ?Replace All?
10. Make sure the confirmation dialogue looks like this:

i.e. Don?t Confirm Saves
11. After a short while 698 of your help files will have been modified.
12. Quit out of TextWrangler
13. Go to the top level of the ?finalcutpro_help? folder and open the ?index.html? folder in Safari. Whichever section you go to in the help system will default to all the information being visible.


@alex4d

___________________________________________________
Alexandre Gollner,
Editor, Zone 2-North West, London

alex4d on twitter, facebook, .wordpress.com + .com

Quote

- XML Version 5 also supports AUX timecode, which is used for sound sync and audio
editing.

AUX TCs were supported by any version of XML. The good news is that FCP7 does handle it in a different way. All former version of XML aware FCPs did overwrite TC information given in an XML by the values which it found in the movie. So if there was no or a different Source, AUX 1 or AUX 2 TC any values from the XML were deleted and replaced by the movie values.
This is still the same somehow. BUT if you're sure that there is no Source TC or AUX TC 1 or 2 (which is true for most native captured/transfered media with AUX TC 1 - except RED as they do have two unflagged TCs) FCP will accept the TC information from the XML. With some RED media you may have to use AUX TC 2.
Anyway this is one of the coolest features and it took quite a while to convince Apple to implement*. As multi cam and double sound gets more and more popular this makes sync way easier and allows to automate sync (if you you about XML).

This leads to the next point

Quote

Q. Is FCP 7 backwards compatible with FCP 6?
A. No. You can export a FCP 7 file via XML version 4 and open that in FCP 6. Works just fine.

Most of the things will work fine, but I haven't tried how TC will behave. So be careful with that.

Alex
very cool tip to make life a bit easier!

Regards
Andreas

*) just as an pro for Apple: they do listen.

Undocumented key modifiers for adjusting speed segments on Speed indicator tickbar:

The FCP 7 Manual explains that Shift-dragging a speed keyframe you've set on the SI tickbar drags all trailing speed keyframes in the direction of your adjustment.

Shift-Command-dragging restricts the speed adjustment to the left of the speed keyframe you're adjusting. Clip speed on the speed segment to the right of that keyframe remains unchanged.

Option-drag a speed keyframe you've set on the SI tickbar and you can use the 2-up display as you slip clip frames under this speed keyframe while its Timeline location remains the same.

(Actually, I'll bet Steve Martin covers these in his excellent tutorials...so, OK, I wrote 'em down...8^)

Thanks Lisa. Yes, Steve did cover them.

What he didn't say though is what happens when you do a speed change without rippling the sequence? If you do slomo does the shot get truncated from the end? Which I'm assuming it does?
What happens when you speed up a shot? Will it pull frames from the media file outside of the clip? Outside of a subclip? Will it still go to the full media file and add frames in? What happens if there aren't enough frames in media file?

FCP7?s Timecode Viewer is straightforward when playing the sequence in the Canvas, it displays the timecode and the name of the sequence playing.

There are more options when you are looking at footage in the Viewer if you Control- or Right- click the timecode:



You can choose whether to show timecode with frames (useful when clients insist on changing edits by the frame ? if they can?t see how many frames you?ve moved the edit, they have to review the edit on it?s own merit). You can also show AUX 1 and or AUX 2 timecode.

In this case, AUX 1 is running at 50 fps, and AUX 2 represents the audio sync timecode.

You can also show selected fields from the browser by Control- or Right- clicking the clip name:



To change the size of the text, drag the divider between the timecode and the text.

In fact more than you would ever want to see unless you have that new Apple 54" monitor.

...from the 'be thankful for small mercies' department:

The largest size of icon is too small, but at least they now have the correct aspect ratio. Clips and stills now display correctly.

TIP: If your browser is in a separate monitor, set it to a lower resolution to make the icons larger

@alex4d

Quote
Most of the things will work fine, but I haven't tried how TC will behave. So be careful with that.

I can ammend that Andreas if you can find out if indeed TC will behave OK.

Michael Horton
-------------------

These are great Alex. You need to put all these wonderful mini tutorials you are doing for us in one place. lafcpug will be happy to publish. Course these really should be on your blog first.

Michael Horton
-------------------

Quote

... if you can find out if indeed TC will behave OK.

I checked that.
As supposed TCs or Reels created by an XML for version 7 will work fine as long as they 'fill a gap' - but it's only internal FCP metadata, which is cool enough.
Exporting those projects/bins/sequences/? to a XML version lower than 5 will still keep this TC info (as said, it had always been there).
But importing the XML into any other version of FCP will kill this info as it's always 'file above XML'.

Regards
Andreas

I do have 2 custom app's which apply an aux TC to any QT movie even using a FCP XML. Maybe I make them public, but probably not for free.

Some workflow tools for FCP [www.spherico.com]
TitleExchange -- juggle titles within FCS, FCPX and many other apps.
[www.spherico.com]

Following on from my post on how to make all the content visible within the help system, I've found a way of combining the 3,500+ html and image files into a single manual:



First you need to follow my earlier instructions of how to make all the hidden text visible (see a few posts back), then use Apple's Pages application (from iWork) to combine all the html files together.

Instructions are on my blog. If you haven't paid for iWork and your free 30-trial is up, there is an extended method that uses TextEdit as well.

@alex4d

___________________________________________________
Alexandre Gollner,
Editor, Zone 2-North West, London

alex4d on twitter, facebook, .wordpress.com + .com

VERY COOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Andreas

If you find Apple's Help Viewer too slow, using your favourite browser will be quicker - although I haven't worked out how to make search work (yet).

If you have installed Final Cut Studio, paste the following addresses into your browser for quick access, bookmark them if you like:

Final Cut Pro
file:///Applications/Final%20Cut%20Pro.app/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/finalcutpro_help/index.html

Compressor
file:///Applications/Compressor.app/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/compressor_help/index.html

Cinema Tools
file:///Applications/Cinema%20Tools.app/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/cinematools_help/en/cinematools/usermanual/index.html

Motion
file:///Applications/Motion.app/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/motion_help/index.html

Soundtrack Pro
file:///Applications/Soundtrack%20Pro.app/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/soundtrackpro_help/en/soundtrackpro/usermanual/index.html

Soundtrack Pro Effects Reference
file:///Applications/Soundtrack%20Pro.app/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/soundtrackpro_help/en/soundtrackpro/effectsreference/index.html

DVD Studio Pro
file:///Applications/DVD%20Studio%20Pro.app/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/dvdstudiopro_help/en/dvdstudiopro/usermanual/index.html

Color
file:///Applications/Color.app/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/color_help/en/color/usermanual/index.html


@alex4d

thanks for your share

logiciel emailing

Is it me, or did the colors in FCP 7 change slightly? The difference between a selected window or tab is now more pronounced.

"Never underestimate a kick to the nuts"
Bas Rutten

Not sure about the luma level differences between selected and not selected windows, you might be right there; but what is certainly new is that the active tab in a window is highlighted, which it never used to be.

The contrast between tabs has been increased: selected ones are brighter, unselected ones are darker.

There is less stylisation to the tabs in 7 - hopefully preparing for the day when we have a scalable UI. The tab shape might have been implemented using bitmaps up to v6. Possibily v7's UI is drawn using resolution-independent lines and curves...

Browser tabs:


Viewer tabs:


Alex

___________________________________________________
Alexandre Gollner,
Editor, Zone 2-North West, London

alex4d on twitter, facebook, .wordpress.com & .com

I'm still waiting for FCP to remember which drive a project was assigned to. I would die happy.
Steve

steve-sharksdelight

After upgrading to FCP 7.0.1 via the latest ProApps update, some people have reported clunky playback in Digital Cinema Desktop Preview.


Mattew Brodet posted a fix: at Creative Cow

In "Library" folder on the Macintosh HD drive go into the "Quicktime" folder.
Delete the "DesktopVideoout.component" file.
Replace that file with the same file from Final Cut Pro 7.0.
Be sure to be logged in as a administrator.


Here's how to get that file from your Final Cut Studio install disk:

Load up your Final Cut Studio Install disk,
or if you've made a disk image (good idea) access that.

Inside that, notice that the "Instal Final Cut Studio" package is actually an Alias,
so right-click on that and "Show Original"

You'll be taken to a folder called "Installer" inside of which is another folder called "Packages"

Inside the Packages folder locate the VideoOutSupport.pkg,
right-click on it, and "Show Package Contents"

Inside the Contents folder, locate the Archive.paz.gz file.
Drag it to the desktop, and double click on it to un-zip it.

This will create a folder called "Library"
Open it, go to the QuickTime folder inside it,
and there you will find the file "DesktopVideoout.component"

Put this file in Macintosh HD > Library >QuickTime,
replacing the similarly named file there.


Digital Cinema Desktop Preview should now work.


cheers,
nick