Is Final Cut X here to stay?

Hi everyone,

From the few articles I've read it seems professional editors are very disappointed with Final Cut X for a variety of reasons. What I've gathered is that it's not really designed for professional editors, but rather more of souped-up version of iMovie for the consumer market.

I have also heard that Final Cut 7 is being phased out so a lot of editors are switching to Avid or Premiere Pro.

I was just curious what you guys feel is the future for Final Cut X? I was also wondering how those of you who did make the switch to Final Cut X are liking it?

I love Final Cut Studio 7 and the easy workflow between all the apps in FCS3. Plus, like a lot of you, I have invested a great deal of money in third party plug ins for FC7 which will not work with Final Cut X.

I do also have the entire CS5.5 Production package and have been working a lot in After Effects. I know that there is now integration between AE and PP now and wondering if I should force myself to switch to Premiere Pro if Final Cut 7 is becoming obsolete?

Thoughts?

Shelley
MacBoo Pro 2015
16 GB Ram
OS X 10.13
Premiere Pro CC

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From the few articles I've read it seems professional editors are very disappointed with Final Cut X f

And some number who were once dead set against it are at least experimenting with it in Broadcast environments. A very small number are using it for broadcast but they include portions of ABC, MLB (national baseball) and some regional (and at least one national) TV spots.

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it's not really designed for professional editors

A truly ill informed comment especially from most of the recent articles (post 10.0.3). It's professional but many don't like the paradigm and it's still missing some critical features.

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I have also heard that Final Cut 7 is being phased out

It's EOL. You'd be surprised how many are still using it waiting for the smoke to clear because a lot of money is at stake especially given the "wait 'till 2013" status of the MacPro replacement.

I'm using FCPX exclusively now but I'm small fry. There's many big guns out there using it (although still a very small minority overall).

I'm not sure if it's worth even starting a thread. You can read what's already been posted. Older stuff is much less valid since features and stability have improved steadily but most significantly since 10.0.3.

You have to take measure of your workflow, your expenses, and judge how far and fast Apple is moving forward with it. If you're not aware of that, than all we can do is start a long list of links already posted on the web, not knowing what you've read.

There are numerous perspectives, depending on what you read. The most common one that even the most ardent fan would agree to is that is us still a work in progress. Other common theories include Apple's shift in their primary core market as a company. Professionals (the server and the creative market) no longer form the bulk of Apple's customers. One could put more weight on Apple releasing a feature for Compressor to run on machines without monitors over the fact that WWDC announcements contained no other pro releases other than the 15" MBP and the Pro line has been reduced to 1 machine- the 15" MBP. The silent update to the MacPro involves updating to 2 year old processors and an even older graphics card. This brought about a very minor speed bump and little to convince any pro user to stick to the big iron. Most people are hanging their hopes on a comment Tim Cook left in an email to a random customer that the next Mac Pro will be "great". The current update is described as "half assed" by Gizmodo. That's how bad it is.

Truth is they still do not yet have a good working model for what they are trying to replace, namely tracks and project asset management, and FCP X is designed as a massive resource hog, which may be detrimental to projects with a lot of media. Take a look at Motion. How far has Apple come towards accomplishing real time motion graphics? Most people I know of use it for the templates, and little in the way of doing high end graphics. FCP X has no feasible way of sending a cut to the audio house. Some folks will point to stems, which are flattened audio files containing your roles, so if you layer two speakers or music tracks and sfx, the audio house gets those as flattened QT tracks. Brings you back 10 years to when we used to dump out split tracks on digital beta for the audio mix.

There are quite a lot of pro users seriously looking at Premiere Pro and Avid MC. I have been on Premiere the past week and I must say that they have come quite a long way in developing Premiere as an editing tool since CS5.5, which used to be good mainly for showrooms. The fancy pony tricks are still there, but HUGE improvements in the editing tools this time around and the workflow isn't all that different from legacy FCP. In fact there are workflows in Premiere that trumps FCP 7, and also puts it in a class of it's own.



www.strypesinpost.com

Its here to stay Shelly. In fact if you live in LA you can get the latest on it directly from Apple themselves at the next lafcpug meet, June 27. Also you might want to read this article from Oliver Peters who from the beginning did not like FCP X but now is warming up to it the more he actually works with it. [digitalfilms.wordpress.com]

All about next lafcpug meet is here

[www.lafcpug.org]

There is still a long ways to go with X but it is making progress. Despite FCP being killed, you still got a good year or more to use it. So decisions do not need to be made now.

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

FCP 7 is already obsolete and has been for a few years. That being said we're cutting a broadcast pilot with it in the next few weeks because the client demanded we cut in that application. I would prefer CS6 but that's what they want, that's what they get.

FCP X is selling very well for Apple, but that doesn't matter, it's basically a loss leader. It'll be around as long as Apple wants it around. For the time being they say they're in it for the long haul. Broadcast shows like "Leverage" on TNT are starting to use it in production.

Myself, I look at it as the ultimate plug-in for our shop. What it does, it does extremely well like multicam but I'm not going to build my facility around it like I did with FCP 7 for the past 11 years.

We are currently editing broadcast projects in CS6, we have Avid Symphony and MC6 installed and will be installing Smoke 2013. If X matures to the point where I feel we can use it reliably in broadcast and long form production, I'll consider it, but it's just another tool in the toolbox.

Bottom line, pick the NLE you want to work with, your clients are comfortable with and go.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media
biscardicreative.com

>So decisions do not need to be made now.

I would disagree. Since the quad core G5 and eventually the REDOne was released, many of us have been looking forward to the days of 64 bit computing, when long form projects won't crash half as much, when we can finally get the machines to actually start working. Many of us waited for that release in FCP 7, then some more, then X was released, which didn't have OMF exports unless you get a $500 plugin. And now it doesn't even have OMF exports at all. You need to get yout edit back into FCP 7 via a 3rd party plugin, which can't do much titles (because the XML SDK was something like only 3 pages), and all that just to get an OMF out to the audio house.

The Adobe Creative Cloud is on offer at something as ridiculously low as $20 bucks a month, you get the full suite and there is even a free 30 day demo. All you need is a decent machine. I can be cutting a short scene with RED, 5D, Arri on my laptop. Ever seen raw playback off a portable bus powered USB 2 drive? It's awesome. You can even cut in Bali. Going on the creative cloud now is a no brainer today, especially if you don't want to invest the farm and all. There is nothing to lose, and you get the new ever amazing after effects cs6. Comes with variable mask feathering and global caching amongst other cool features.

At the end of the day, they are just tools. So take your pick.



www.strypesinpost.com

Nah, unless you own a post shop like Walter and cant see building your shop around this one tool, then sticking with what you know for what you have always done seems logical. But while you are sticking to it, I'd be looking. Now if Mountain Lion breaks FCP then ya got a big problem. Bottom line is, and especially if you live in LA and want to compete, know them all. Chances are you might have to use all them them sooner or later.

Michael Horton
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What I'm seeing is that there are advantages in getting into the Adobe tools now- it's much faster on some projects and the workflow is pretty similar. Little to lose and it doesn't cost that much. Also, it probably hooks right into your existing setup. It gives you an added option.



www.strypesinpost.com

I agree with learning PP CS6 sooner rather than later. The more time you spend messing with it now, the less like a fumbling ditz you'll be when someone wants you to do a real project on it in the future. And it's very much like FCP 7, but better in many respects. Still some hitches in the workflow for me, but nothing like the weird learning curve and workarounds (IMHO) for FCPX.

But it does depend on your local market. In my district PP is becoming the go-to application. I've had exactly two calls for people who want training on FCPX since it was released, neither from broadcast level. Everyone else is looking for Premiere and After effects. But if people in your world are going Avid, or Smoke, or FCPX, then you probably need to follow that market.

craig seeman Wrote:
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> And some number who were once dead set against it
> are at least experimenting with it in Broadcast
> environments. A very small number are using it for
> broadcast but they include portions of ABC, MLB
> (national baseball) and some regional (and at
> least one national) TV spots.

The things you find on Twitter. Seems someone is using this in the NBA as well.



The Tweet
[twitter.com]

Thanks everyone.

I actually have PP CS5 installed and started playing around with it today.

It seems similar enough to FC and being familiar with After Effects, I don't think it will be that painful to learn, if need be.

I appreciate all the feedback.

I'm still bummed they're phasing out FC, but I guess I gotta roll with the changes.

Shelley

Shelley
MacBoo Pro 2015
16 GB Ram
OS X 10.13
Premiere Pro CC

I would suggest looking at CS6. Some of the biggest features in there for me are the new trim tools which is much better than in FCP, the hover scrub function, and also the real time function is just amazing. You can do things you can't do in FCP 7 such as swap edits with a whole group of clips, kinda like the magnetic timeline in FCP X but a lot less intrusive. Also, it is a lot less mouse clickety than earlier versions. After Effects is also much faster with global caching and it also now has the variable feather mask.



www.strypesinpost.com

Plus no transcoding. Not 'background' transcoding, just drop it in the timeline right from the card and start work. And almost no rendering for me, so far.

In terms of learning "both" FCP and PP...

The AVCHD drop onto timeline has me excited, because using Toast - or FCP 7 - to create .movs from AVCHD is extra time and HDD media management. Also, FCP 7 made a mess of mine.

What about the other end of the pipeline - making .mpeg 2 files as I now do in Compressor? (For DVD authoring.)

Still do Compressor? Or is there a better PP/CS6 option?

I'm going to sign up for the $20/month subscription.

Independent photographer, film maker and Producer. In the wonderful UK.

Adobe Media Encoder and Encore. Both are in Production Premium and Creative Cloud. I havent done DVDs yet, but exporting from Premiere is a lot more streamlined, so you just add to queue in AME, and encode away. And that process is multithreaded, so it's fast. Depending on what you're doing, you probably won't have to render, and there is also no need to export a QT movie. Even scrolling titles play fine in my laptop without rendering.



www.strypesinpost.com

I've just started at a post house where they are waiting for new storage and are currently running a bunch of iMacs off two NAS Drobos with PPCS6. Yesterday I was cutting right from drag-and-dropped cards and it only started to really slow down when everyone was on the Drobos and I was trying to play 50f footage conformed to 25f in the 2 hour timeline backwards.

Really, I didn't think you could even cut off Drobos. And I still didn't have to render for normal playback.