FCP 5 report

OK, can anyone post an FCP 5 report now you've been lucky enough to see it in action?

Straight fom the Apple booth at NAB!

FCP 5 has an awsome implementation of multicam editing - up to 128 streams of video for each edit. HDV looks better than you can even imagine. FCP timeline extended to 12 hours for a sequence.

These were the BIG things Apple was touting. Hopefully the Media Manager got matured a bit. Most everything looks the same but some of you who were able to go to the meeting last evening in LA can surely add more to this.

"HDV looks better than you can even imagine."
You should have seen it last night at the meeting one word WOW!
FCP 5 shipping in May. Sound Track Pro is Pretty Dang Cool.
If Paul of Apple reads this I have a question was the HDV footage shot on the Sony HDR Fx1 or the $5k Sony HDV camera? Or neither? Brian mads it sound like it was shot on the FX 1.

Multicam is great! Editing in HDV was fantastic. The little things done show a maturing and professional product, as being able to enlarge the type to read your info in the bins easeier. Too many features to keep up with.

Soundtrack Pro was really amazing. I brought a friend who was in the biz 30 years ago, the recording industry, and he was completly blown away.

Missed the Q & A, I had to get back to San Diego. Overall, this was better than the upgrade from FCP 3 to 4 IMHO.

Kevin

And a P.S.

Really huge thanx to Micheal Horton, Paul of Apple and everyone who put on this great event at a top notch location. The digital projection was cleanest thing I've ever seen!

Kevin

Hi guys...

The HDV shown at last night's demo was shot in San Diego using the Sony FX1.

Thanks for all of the kind words and continued support.

Paul from Apple

I'll be transcribing the Q and A for an article to appear on lafcpug next week or when ever I get my act together. There were some good questions and the article should be very helpful for all of you.

Thanks to everyone who braved the parking problems and made it through the door. And yeah, that theater is amazing. I mean, Soundtrack Pro hooked up to the THX system. Wow.

Thanks Paul, Brian and Alec. Great job.

Mike

Yeah that theater was great! When the Soundtrack Pro guy added more bass... dang.

I would say that SP got the most "oohs" and "aaahs" of the evening, but it's the shiny new app and that's to be expected. FCP5 doesn't have any big changes on the surface (the interface looks the same and all) but I for one appreciate the amount of work done under the hood; the amount of horsepower required for multicam, dynamic RT and native HDV is staggering, but it performed like a champ last night.

It was interesting to see what bugs and interface quirks are still sticking in people's craw, and how that kind of dampened the enthusiasm a bit. Note to the Apple guys: making this app faster and more capable is definitely a good start, but I think you'll really win some hearts and minds next time if you fix a bunch of the small things that keep coming up and making a point of mentioning them. Believe it or not, announcing that (for example) you've linked the scratch disk settings to the project files will bring the same level of applause as any sexy new feature.

JK

[Believe it or not, announcing that (for example) you've linked the scratch disk settings to the project files will bring the same level of applause as any sexy new feature.]

I voted no on this, for the obvious reason that YOUR scratch disks won't be the same as your online facilities' scratch disks, and you just force the system to choke up while everything gets reset. Bad bad idea. Make it an OPTION. if you're working in house, sure. If you know you'r etravelling for finish, NO.

- Loren
Today's FCP HD 4.5 keytip:
Do a virtual Audio Mixdown to lighten playback load with Command-Option-R!

The FCP HD KeyGuide?: your power placemat.
Now available at KeyGuide Central
www.neotrondesign.com

<<It was interesting to see what bugs and interface quirks are still sticking in people's craw, and how that kind of dampened the enthusiasm a bit.>>

It seems like it wouldn't be bad idea if the next time we do a top ten feature request, we also create a "top ten bugs/annoyances/quirks we'd like to see fixed or changed if at all possible" list. With a more succinct title of course.



- Justin Barham -

Good idea, Justin-- that's where half the good stuff comes from and it's the half the team is low-prioritizing.

- Loren
Today's FCP HD 4.5 keytip:
Do a virtual Audio Mixdown to lighten playback load with Command-Option-R!

The FCP HD KeyGuide?: your power placemat.
Now available at KeyGuide Central
www.neotrondesign.com

Sure I see your point. Make it an option, a preference setting, something. I do most of my work on one system so it would be great for me...

But that was just an example of a small feature that people have been asking for since v1. If you were at the theater you heard a decent round of applause for the fact that you can now resize the type in the browser. Small change, big response from the faithful.

Oh, yes, that was one of the top ten last year. I'd be applauding the loudest.

No feature is too small if it enhances user experience. We live with text day in and day out, just as we do tabbed windows. So they're catching up.

- Loren
Today's FCP HD 4.5 keytip:
Do a virtual Audio Mixdown to lighten playback load with Command-Option-R!

The FCP HD KeyGuide?: your power placemat.
Now available at KeyGuide Central
www.neotrondesign.com

If I remember correctly, fcp warns you if the scratch disk is actually missing, so I don't see this as a problem or why there would be any "choking up" when you switch to an online facility or whatever - you just get reminded to reset it. Not having it stay with your proj. file is far more problematic imho. Every time we simply open a different fcp project we have to remember to check and reset the scratch disk. Wish we could have heard from Brian if there's some compelling reason why this has never been fixed. Is it a big deal for some reason I may not be aware of . . . would be nice if it could be fixed really soon.

Wish we could have had a much longer Q & A at the meeting and more demo time on fcp 5. I gladly would have traded more fcp time vs. the lengthy array of glitz and glamour clips at the beginning - a few minutes would have been more than sufficient to strut the stuff. The best of the evening was the SoundTrack Pro demo which not only showed a great app. but included a good demo which made it worth our time and gave good info for users. Something comparable with fcp 5 would have been great.

Michael, when you do your write-up could you include the info re: what was used to max out the system - what was the whole configuration for the demos of fcp 5? I don't think those details were mentioned and it would be helpful to know how it all runs on Apple's minimum or maybe moderate recommended configuration so we can judge how much we might need to add to get any extra performance.

[fcp warns you if the scratch disk is actually missing, so I don't see this as a problem or why there would be any "choking up" when you switch to an online facility or whatever - you just get reminded to reset it.]

And of course FCP is designed to make you do more work, right?

Just make it an OPTION.

- Loren
Today's FCP HD 4.5 keytip:
Do a virtual Audio Mixdown to lighten playback load with Command-Option-R!

The FCP HD KeyGuide?: your power placemat.
Now available at KeyGuide Central
www.neotrondesign.com

chris2 wrote:

> Wish we could have had a much longer Q & A at the meeting and
> more demo time on fcp 5. I gladly would have traded more fcp
> time vs. the lengthy array of glitz and glamour clips at the
> beginning - a few minutes would have been more than sufficient
> to strut the stuff.

Only so much time in the evening and if we had gone over that would have meant another $500.00 bill to ME. So being the cheap dude I am, we had to stay to schedule.
>
> Michael, when you do your write-up could you include the info
> re: what was used to max out the system - what was the whole
> configuration for the demos of fcp 5? I don't think those
> details were mentioned and it would be helpful to know how it
> all runs on Apple's minimum or maybe moderate recommended
> configuration so we can judge how much we might need to add to
> get any extra performance.

I dont know what the system was to be honest. Even though I helped set it up. Know it was a brand new Dual 2.7. Dont know how much Ram. An Xraid, and really sore knees from taping down fiber cable from stage to booth.

With dynamic RT should play nice with most systems.

Mike
>

"very time we simply open a different fcp project we have to remember to check and reset the scratch disk. Wish we could have heard from Brian if there's some compelling reason why this has never been fixed"

that behaviour is written in very deep within the preferences.
it would need a lot of digging to get there.
that doesnt mean it wont happen.
it;s just that the lsat few versions have had a lot more things to contend with.
and i dont mean bells and whistles, either:
fcp3 had to deal with OSX,
fcp4 had to move away from OS9,
FCP5 has QT7.
maybe next time?

nick

Sooo...about FCP 5

? The Multi Cam is very good and very flexible. Even better than I could imagine before.

? Does native HDV over FireWire, lossless, to an HDV codec timeline, but it still can?t use the camera as a viewing device, from the timeline to an HDTV. This is the part nobody talks about. You HAVE to have a full blown HD card in your tower to view real interlace HDV video back out to an HDTV. You might as well capture to a vastly superior DVCPRO HD or uncompressed timeline if your gonna have a card.

? More real time effects on the G5s, even on UN-compressed HD footage. Wow.

? huge timelines open quickly without the ?waiting for video to update?.

? FCP and QT can capture more than two tracks of audio at the same time. QT files can have many audio tracks in one single file.

? clean-clean scaling of video. No shimmering when scaling or animating the video frame.

? They say they vastly improved the accuracy and solidness of Edit To Tape tool.

? can make the font in the timeline and Browser larger.

? Media Manager only improved a little bit: speed changed clips get managed properly.

? Supposedly a very high-end format converter in Compressor. Think PAL to NTSC or HD to SD.

? Soundtrack Pro is much much more than the old Soundtrack app. Probably under-priced, I think. Its like a hybrid of Soundtrack, Logic, Sound Soap Pro, and Peak. And it has non-destructive effects that are in layers. And its got high end compressor plug-ins for dynamic compression and limiter. Oh and it shows video-out to monitor while doing the sound mix. Oh, and many many loops and sound FX.

So, it doesn?t make you thin and rich, but its a pretty good upgrade. If you don?t do multi-cam shoots or use HDV or have long timelines or need to capture and output more than 2 tracks of audio, or want more real time FX, then you don?t HAVE to upgrade.

Oh, and there isn?t much HD-anything happening on a G4. Some, but not much. The recent HD cards, the real-time FX, the viewing of H264 files, even hosting a 4 person video conference on iChat -- all of it needs a big G5. Sigh.

-Christopher

[? huge timelines open quickly without the ?waiting for video to update?.]

How's practical editing in these huge timelines? Any lag after trimming? Beachball? "Updating video display" dialogs?

- Loren

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Its funny you should mention that. Andrew Balis MADE them do that. Now im not sure if it was the kind of trim that traditionally makes the beach ball, I think it was a ripple edit, but it worked without delay.

Im sure its not perfect, but just much, much better.

-Christopher