Moving Forward

Ok - so I think it has been established by many that FCP-X is not a professional tool that will let us continue to work the right way.
So my question is: (poll) - what are you looking at?

1) Stay with Final Cut X and just work around its issues?

2) Move to Avid?

3) Move to Adobe Premiere Pro?

4) Move to a different Editing System?

5) Don't know yet



Please share your thoughts, but provide a clear answer (one of the ones above)

thanks - I think this will help me and others figure out the next step. Right now I am really not sure of what I am going to do. I have three editing stations that are booked solid and cannot afford much downtime.

Sticking with FCP7 for now and upgrading to whatever best fits my needs next year (probably Avid). But I do like the After Effects integration in Premiere Pro so I will use that for certain projects too.

My software:
Pro Maintenance Tools - Tools to keep Final Cut Studio, Final Cut Pro X, Avid Media Composer and Adobe Premiere Pro running smoothly and fix problems when they arise
Pro Media Tools - Edit QuickTime chapters and metadata, detect gamma shifts, edit markers, watch renders and more
More tools...

I am feeling more of an opportunity to learn both and be more marketable. I don't know how realistic that is though.

I asked this earlier, here's my current take.

For the first time ever, I opened Premiere Pro and threw some HDSLR footage of my baby into it. I am heartened by how similar Premiere is to FCP 7, but better for h.264 footage because it doesn't have to render. On the downside, the interface feels more dated/slightly clumsier than FCP7... but most important of all, I realized that I own no plugins for it. So I may end up just doing the transcode, space-eating ProRes dance with FCP7. But I'm definitely planning to learn more Premiere...

I know Avid already, but I'm definitely brushing up on it. I don't think the current version is hugely better than FCP7, so I won't transfer my personal workflow into it. But there is NO QUESTION in my mind that my workplace (a big 3 network) will go back to Avid, so I need to get sharp again.

Again, the biggest problem is plugins. It'll take a small fortune to replicate my set of FCP filters, so I really need to be SURE when I make the decision what to switch to.

I'm regarding this software as Final Cut Express 5 & am expecting by this time next year there will be a pro version. I think Apple can get the egg off its face by rebranding the software as Express 5. They can then state that they are re-releasing FCP 7 as the official Pro version & state that anyone who purchase Express 5 while it was labeled FCP X can if they wish get a full refund. Then they can suggest that people buy Express 5 as it is the foundation that FCP X
will be built on. They can say users of Express 5 will get a full credit towards FCP X, which will include all the pro features one could possibly desire, in the near future.

If they had stated this in the ist place they could have avoided all the uncertainty & suffering they have caused. If they wanted to appear as really nice guys, they could say that anyone who bought the program while it was mistakenly labeled FCP X would get a free version of the real FCP X of when it ships in the near future.

FCS 3 still works as well for me today as it did a week ago. I'll give FCPX some time to get to where is needs to be. I think Apple is making a bold move to refine the editorial tools we use on a daily basis and my be onto something here. Frankly I wouldn't have released it without capture card integration, multicam and backward project compatibility, hopefully those features are coming very soon.

All of the incessant whining and drama aside this is a first release. I can't think of a project that I've ever done that was finished with the first cut. I'll give Apple some time to see if they prove their new concept and Apple usually does. If this blows up in their face then I can always jump ship later.

Until then all I'm hearing is a lot of drama and I suspect a good deal of it from Avid and Adobe fans who are stirring the pot. As my Mamma always said, patience is a virtue.

Joe Brown: Patience is a virtue, but what do you do while you wait? - Right now I do not see myself doing any system updates or even upgrade to Lion since FCP will most provably have bugs running on Lion. All this means that my FCS3 system will be "old" within just a few months (five months or less)

The thing is that THEY HAVE to stop dumbing stuff down. Automatic should be optional. One of THE MAIN DIFFERENCE between pro equipment and consumer equipment is that in Pro you can manually do things.

Joe Brown Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> As my Mamma always
> said, patience is a virtue.

Final Cut Pro 7 was already behind the competition in a lot of ways (32-bit, no multithreading, everything needed to be transcoded, etc). We've been waiting a long time for modern features.

My software:
Pro Maintenance Tools - Tools to keep Final Cut Studio, Final Cut Pro X, Avid Media Composer and Adobe Premiere Pro running smoothly and fix problems when they arise
Pro Media Tools - Edit QuickTime chapters and metadata, detect gamma shifts, edit markers, watch renders and more
More tools...

Well.... after many years of being an FCP editor (since version 1), I sadly downloaded a free 30 day version of Avid 5.5. I still have high hopes for what FCP can bring in the future, but sitting and hoping does not do anything to my deadlines and project list. Being as up to speed as possible with Avid when my beloved FCP stations start collapsing is all I can do. - I see it as an opportunity to learn a new software and explore new artistic abilities.

I still like FCP, and I will continue to learn FCP-X, but for now, it will NOT be base of my three systems. -

I agree with Jon on this. Although I have always advocated transcoding h.264 and mpeg 2 formats in FCP 7, those really are formats that can work real time in read only mode (eg. AvcIntra in FCP 7). Computers are definitely fast enough these days. They weren't 3-4 years ago, but times have changed. I understand that you don't want to do that with the RED camera, as the debayering is taxing on the processors unless you have hardware enabled acceleration (aka red rocket or GPU based acceleration).



www.strypesinpost.com

We are currently testing Adobe Premiere Pro CS 5.5 with the new AJA CS 5.5 9.0.1 plug-ins. Transition to PPro is almost seamless from FCP. I've posted two videos showing the transition process so far in my blog on my website. All the playback issues that I heard regarding the AJA Kona and earlier plug-ins seem to be gone. External monitor and audio are in perfect sync with the Program window.

What we're finding so far is Premiere Pro allows us to retain the FCP 7 workflow only in a MUCH more efficient manner. Today I was editing with MXF files pulled right off a P2 card, throwing filters and transitions on them in the timeline. No background rendering, no transcoding period. Just editing with the raw media. That's just one example but I can already see how PPro will improve our efficiency yet still play nicely with all our media and workflow.

We will be installing an evaluation copy of Avid Media Composer tomorrow. No support for the AJA Kona boards (yet) but we're going to check it out to see what it has to offer today.

Autodesk has been kind enough to provide us with an evaluation of Smoke as well. Not sure if we really need it, but honestly have never had the chance to check it out. Might be a nice complement to the Davinci Resolve workstation.

I'm documenting what I call the "Transitioning" series on my blog as we explore and test out all the apps and various setups.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media
biscardicreative.com

I'm learning FCPX voraciously. I think it will be the pro app it promises to be by this time next year.
FCS2009 will work for a bit longer until some Lion update breaks it. By then I'll be able to make a decision. I was an Avid editor for 10 years and I think I can get the basics in PremierePro in a week. A big part of what makes the FC ecosystem valuable is the third party support so that's going to be a big measure for me. FCPX has lots of power within it's limited feature set. We may know what Apple's doing with that in 4 to 6 months when the first major update happens.