Final Cut Pro X Review for booklet research Pros and Cons on the software

Hello

I am researching Apple’s advance from Final Cut Pro to FCP X and how people have viewed its change. After reviewing the research I will put together a booklet with FCP X’s strengths and weaknesses and present the findings to educational establishments. This will hopefully facilitate them to make an informed decision; either to ride the change with Apple’s new software, stick to the original FCP or move, to a completely different editing software.

so i just want peoples thoughts on the software
what are the weaknesses and strengths of the software?

Thanks for reading and any help would be a big push for the booklet

if you would like to eamil me with anu thoughts please do so @ ainsleyjbewsher@yahoo.co.uk

I view 'the change' as akin to ripping the skeleton and organs out of a body then throwing a sack of skin back at us while feigning it to be prim and proper.

Nothing but a political move IMO. Very distasteful. Disrespectful and counter-productive.

what do you hope to achieve by documenting the "change"

it's a juicy topic, but wont help people make a good decision about the actual software.
the "change" was so catastrophically handled that it drove people away from the product.
it was so dramatic that it stopped people being able to think clearly.


nick

Agree. The social side of the shift was handled abysmally and drove many (almost all the ones I know, anyway) away from the brand.

I think a lot of people would have given it a fair chance if
- it was not called FCP. It is not FCP, it's a completely new product with different functionality, different keysets and different workflows.
- they did not immediately pull support and sales for a product that we had all sunk tens of thousands (for some people, hundreds of thousands) of dollars into over the years
- there was transparent chat about the future of the software
- it wasn't so 'beta' and buggy when it was released.
- it wasn't missing so much of the functionality that many of us used every single day at work

And while they were scrambling to fix the problems, and we honestly couldn't use it for our workflows, many of us started looking elsewhere because we need to stay on top of the future of our businesses.

I personally did try to use it for a while, out of respect for Apple's solid reputation in the sector. Didn't like it at all, was annoyed at how glitchy it was, and, as I said, honestly couldn't use it for a lot of my broadcast work, so I looked at Premiere and Avid. The Premiere CS6 suite won me over within hours, and I haven't bothered looking back, so FCPX might be awesome now, but I've already sunk all my resources and learning time into Adobe, where I'm more than happy.

the Pros, from people who use it, are that is it makes editing a lot faster as certain tasks are rendered invisible, or redundant.

you can throw non-edit friendly media (h264 etc) into the timeline and it will be transcoded in the background.
when it is transcoded, you are now working with thats media, not the non-edit friendly media.

rather than having to open every clip into a viewer to choose shots,
you can "Skim" though collections of clips in the browser (if that's what it is called)

sorting and viewing of clips can be very keyword driven

when editing in the timeline, trimming is supposed to be quicker as you don't have the clashing of clips as you shorten edits that you get in other NLEs.
this is due to the "trackless" nature of the timeline

the "Audition" function lets you easily flip though a series of options on takes, WITHOUT having to re-adjsut timings.
this would be insanely useful for advertising.

speaking of insanely useful, Multicam in X is insanely simple, and has more functionality than any other NLE, in terms of syncing your material.


for the record, i am NOT one of the people who use FCPX,
but am just reporting some of what i have read,


some CONS that i can think of are:

it might not be so good in a multi-user environment.
this is a memory from when FCPX was released, and may have been addressed since then,
(or maybe it never was an issue but FUD made it seem like one)

the trackless nature of the timeline makes handing over to sound editors more complex
it might require porting the audio into FCP legacy, for instance, where you CAN organise in tracks, before making your OMFs

same for preparing for picture online, but again, i haven't used it.


i think this is a good subject for research, and the important aspect of it would be to help people look beyond the initial reaction,
so i think you should ignore that completely as it has nothing to do with the app itself.



nick

I haven't used it very much, although I tried to use it once when they released 10.6 or 10.7 and then gave up.

Pros:

The ease of background transcoding. Footage can be transcoded to either a high quality intermediate format or a low resolution proxy format during import or during editing.

The ease of re-linking between low resolution and high resolution formats. FCP X makes it look really easy.

The magnetic timeline and trackless nature reduces the need for the user to patch tracks, but this is a double edged sword, because it is also quite clunky with clips with multitrack audio. In fact, Apple is looking to hire someone to develop the functionalities for audio mixing within a video editing application. [discussions.apple.com]

Multiple buttons for an edit operation. There is one for edit at end of sequence, one to insert on secondary storyline, and another to insert edit and another to do an overwrite edit.

Search functionality. FCP7 had pretty good search tools. FCPX is even better, both in terms of smart collections and in-timeline searches.



Cons:

Requires 3rd party tools to function properly in a professional environment. Things like OMF/AAF export, managing FCPX events, which really should have been built into a professional application... Well, you need 3rd party tools to handle that.

Cannot zoom properly into event browser. This is simply retarded. Many users have the event browser in list view, which kinds of defeats the purpose of the event browser. This was from my experience trying to use FCP 10.0.6.

Replacing the traditional timeline paradigm. This is a big bold move by Apple. I discussed what some of the other uses of the track based timeline here:

[www.lafcpug.org]

I have heard that it gets bogged down by heavy/more complex projects, which is a bit of a pity, considering that it is a 64 bit platform, although the design in itself is quite a resource hog. But I think Motion was supposed to be the "real time" compositing/motion graphics solution from many years ago. I don't think that Motion has achieve that state of bliss yet.

Non customizable windows. I'm not sure if this has been addressed yet.

Non industry standard. If most professional houses are not using it, most editors will not bother learning it. Many houses here are still stuck on FCP7, although I have done some work on Premiere, and some on Avid.



www.strypesinpost.com

"Cannot zoom properly into event browser. This is simply retarded. Many users have the event browser in list view, which kinds of defeats the purpose of the event browser. This was from my experience trying to use FCP 10.0.6."

Not exactly sure what you mean here. You can zoom into clips in filmstrip, which is a great boon for long takes like interviews, but not into the display in list view. This would be analogous to zooming into the scrubber bar in the viewer. Having never been able to do that in seven versions of legacy FCP is pretty retarded too.

All the best,

Tom

Last time I tried popping an avchd card into the event browser, then I tried zooming in onto an area where my interviewee was, it took me to somewhere else on the card. It could be zooming in to wherever my mouse was, so after a few zoom levels, the zoom would be completely off.


>Having never been able to do that in seven versions of legacy FCP is pretty retarded too.

I agree. This was where I liked Avid's toggle source/record timeline over FCP's viewer/canvas paradigm. In FCP, I would be cutting with 2 timelines open, one for the source footage also called a stringout, and another for my record timeline because of this lack of functionality, also I had more control over a timeline than I had in the source monitor. That was how I kind of saw the Event Browser in FCPX, except for this really basic zooming issue, and also I can't see the temporal relationship between the clips.

But another one of my pet peeves with the Event Browser is that it is not designed for guys who use a Wacom.



www.strypesinpost.com

"In FCP, I would be cutting with 2 timelines open, one for the source footage also called a stringout, and another for my record timeline because of this lack of functionality"

You can open a compound clip in the timeline and switch between timeline items similar to the way you could in 7. You can't have two open timelines on the screen, if that's what you mean, but you can certainly toggle "stringouts."

Not seen this zooming problem in the browser in filmstrip. It seems to go into the selected clip to the playhead or skimmer.

All the best,

Tom

Then it's probably user error on my end.


>You can open a compound clip in the timeline and switch between timeline items similar to the way you could in 7. You can't have two open
>timelines on the screen, if that's what you mean, but you can certainly toggle "stringouts."

Is there also a keyboard shortcut to toggle timelines? That would make it marginally more useful, although I'm not sure if that would be a big help in this regard, since FCPX works very differently and doesn't work with marks the same way it did in the FCP/Avid sense, so you can't mark in/out in a compound clip timeline and copy/paste it into another sequence.



www.strypesinpost.com

Same as 7 I think Cmd-bracket (backward forward) or click the button and select any recently open item from the drop down.

All the best,

Tom

I posted that PremierPro could be the FCP killer about 1year before FCPX was released. Most people here hurled me for it. When i saw the layout the 1st thing i thought was where is the viewer, and why not the entire suite (FCPX Studio). Then it sold for like 299. which was a warning in itself to me.

Not releasing the entire suite told me that they were not serious about the pro community.

I used FCPX on 4 projects and gave up in the middle of the 4th project. I did not want to use FCP7 so i moved the project to premier. PremierPro is actually FCP8. It was very easy to use from v4 on. You can even switch to FCP shortcuts.

While FCPX can handle multiple formats it still does not handle multiple frame rates as well as premier. I have not used an intermediate codec since i have switched to Masters Suite.

The BG rendering in fcpx often causes freezes without provocation. Multi-cam is easier but thats not enough to make a pro happy.

Notice not one person here has mentioned Motion as a plus. lol

It has been about 2years since i have used FCPX but only 3 months since i have used FCP7. Most production houses that use FCP are using version 6 or 7 and not X. Many have completely switched to Adobe creative suite or Avid. Both of these are MUCH better tools than FCPX. FCPX is slightly better than Vegas.

FCPX is a bad memory now. If you are writing a book call it "FCPX 4 Pros - A Reason To Say Goodbye".

It is not a bad suite for students and people learning how to edit. As an educational tool its probably a jewel.

""" What you do with what you have, is more important than what you could do, with what you don't have."

> > > Knowledge + Action = Wisdom - J. Corbett 1992 """"

Some of the other functionality that was very annoying, in my opinion

- no way to export a part of a timeline without having to duplicate the entire timeline and delete what you didn't want to export, or go through a second application.

- in - out markers were not retained on clips

- the lack of two up windows (now fixed, I believe?) You can't make shot to shot comparisons with one window

- the fact that the 'background' processes only happened when you weren't actually working. This is not 'background' - it's 'idle' time

- fx were really hokey and unstable, resetting frequently

- the flat out killing off of DVDSP, Color, Final Cut Server, and Soundtrack.

- the skimmer. Understand that other people liked it. I really hated it.

- the lack of tracks, as others have mentioned. In broadcast you need audio to be where people want you to put it

- No broadcast tape options

If these things have all improved (not the apps restored, obviously) then I'm sure it's a much more useful program now. I have no idea if they have though.

1 and 2 are wrong. After not working with a viewer for a while, I hardly ever open the event viewer. So glad to be rid of tracks. Love the skimmer. Have looked at tape in a few years. Or DVD for that matter.

All the best,

Tom

As I said, they were things that annoyed me, which was the way it functioned on release. After all the screaming things apparently got changed for the better, if they don't work that way now.

I still have to deliver on tape for several television stations, and deliver specific audio on specific tracks. If you don't work in broadcast, this is probably different, but large facilities move very slowly.

> - the lack of tracks, as others have mentioned. In broadcast you need audio to be where people want you to put it

FCPX works with roles, so you need to tag roles to clips before you edit them into the timeline. It's like how we allocate tracks, but in FCPX, you assign roles. And this roles this plays a huge part when you try to export AAF via X2Pro. This emphasis on organising media could result in some pretty nasty project handovers. And already I know a lot of editors do not bother with organising their media in FCP7. So FCP X could be a lot worse in this regard. Apple still needs to find a solution to The Messy Editor™.

>- in - out markers were not retained on clips

Yea, this was addressed in 10.0.6 I think. With "persistent in/out" being the feature.


I'm mixed on the skimmer. It's a great way to preview clips, but for precise in/outs you want to use JKL. I know FCPX does it, but Premiere lets you open the clip in the source monitor. I wish Premiere could let you zoom in on a clip in the Event Browser the way you can in FCP X, but that's another discussion. Also, the skimmer is not Wacom friendly. That may afflict a generation of editors with RSI/carpal tunnel syndrome. Sure, you can turn off skimming, but FCPX isn't designed to work without skimming.

The event monitor... It is crucial to some degree. I was cutting a narrative/drama piece on Avid when FCP X was released, and I remember noticing how I paid attention to eyeline and continuity on the Avid source and record monitors before I edited a shot into the timeline. I don't use the source/record monitor the same way in FCP, because it wasn't really designed the way it was in Avid. And back then, FCPX didn't have the Event Monitor.


>- the flat out killing off of DVDSP, Color, Final Cut Server, and Soundtrack.

I hate the culling of Apple Color especially. The Color FX room is quite a unique offering in the software. And the color correction tools in FCPX is not a replacement for Apple Color. I guess one can say that the DaVinci Resolve replaces Color.


My fundamental concern with the reliance on 3rd party tools and plugins, is (1) trying to open up a project 3 years later, with all these 3rd party apps, plugins and what not, and not knowing what will break; (2) working at a production house with an FCP X machine, but not having the necessary plugins installed in the machine. I liked FCS because it came with a wide array of tools.

Where editing speed is concerned, I'm very fast in Premiere. Even faster than I ever was in FCP, because of the Avid-esque edit tools like ripple to playhead, A/B sides, extend edit, etc... And much of the operations are VERY keyboard driven. Eg. select nearest edit point as ripple out, trim, play around playhead (loop), trim... Not sure how much faster I can ever edit.



www.strypesinpost.com