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“Accepting Reality” from a Former COW Pinnacle Liquid Chrome Forum Moderator
My 3-man 4-seat company and I held on to Fast/Pinnacle/Avid Liquid Chrome as long as we could until about 3 years ago we saw the writing on the wall: Avid was not going to develop a strong competitor to MC.
All of a sudden the Liquid Chrome interface was littered with huge Fischer Price looking “Capture” “Edit” and “Record” buttons a middle-schooler would love. Liquid was going to prosumer-ville.
So, we decided to go with an company that builds the hardware and writes the software AND would surely keep developing their flagship pro app(s).
We bought in with FCP a few years ago, and were thrilled whith FCP Studio 3’s enhancements. Little did we know Apple would do the same thing to FCP.
Having been here before, I completely understand everyone’s disbelief. It’s sad. You believe in a product, defend a product, have great pride in a product… only to have the manufacturer decide to go in an entirely different direction with the product you love.
I’ve delved into FCPX for two days now, so I speak with pretty good authority:
FINAL CUT PRO IS DEAD as a professional application.
Don’t hold your breath, brother. There’s no way the plan is to bring this new application to half the functionality of FCP7.
There are so very many nuances that just aren’t there – and someone who’s not a pro editor (presumably the developers of this incarnation of the app) wouldn’t know about them.
I’m talking about things like the inability to right click and copy/paste effects. Sure, you can go up to the “edit” menu and do it, but doing that the hundreds of times I’d need to in one day slows you down drastically. Not only that, but ALL YOU CAN COPY AND PASTE ARE EFFECTS. Can’t copy and paste transform, crop, distort, etc. Those are some of the things that make a pro editor fall in love with a NLE.
That’s just one example. There are dozens.
With due respect to the toy manufacturer, FCPX is more like it was developed by Fischer Price than Apple.
I think the assumptions by folks that Apple has made a calculated move towards the consumer market are correct. They just haven’t come out and told us in so many words. And they never will.
I shudder to think what the Turner Broadcasting and other mega post houses of the world will do when FCP7 is no longer viable. Sure, they can and will move on to other platforms, but can you imagine FCPX in major serious installations like that? I can’t, and I bet Apple can’t either.
They knew this a few years back when they pulled out of NAB. When they began development on FCPX. When they sold how many ever million IPhones and IPod Touches across the world. Why invest so much in a market where there’s really relatively little return?
Peace,
Banks
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10 Replies
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As I see it, you have to take a look into the future and start developing a game plan as to what your business/workflow will look like in 5 years. What do you see yourself looking towards as far as the tool you will be using? Are you going to switch to AVID/Adobe or hold onto Final Cut Pro 7 for as long as possible?
Also, are you worried about Apple abandoning traditional computing in favor of iOS-based devices? What are you looking at doing to future-proof what you need and for adapting older projects to still be usable down the road?
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[Banks Meador] “Why invest so much in a market where there’s really relatively little return?”
Ask google about youtube….
It’s branding. And when they were dominating the broadcast world, is the market really that small? Is the return really that small?
Companies would murder for that kind of return…which speaks of the arrogance of Apple. If the return isn’t 60-80%, it’s a failure in Apple’s eyes…holy F$#@# have times changed…
I hope I’m wrong. I hope heads will roll and this was not what they wanted to really put out there…
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“There’s no way the plan is to bring this new application to half the functionality of FCP7. ”
What makes you think that?
Jerry
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[Banks Meador] “ALL YOU CAN COPY AND PASTE ARE EFFECTS. Can’t copy and paste transform, crop, distort, etc. “
…whaaaat? Damn. I was considering purchasing FCPX in the hopes that one day Apple will update it with all the lacking features but there are just soooo many things missing I doubt it would speed up my workflow.
This is ridiculous.
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Jerry,
The main reason I feel there is no plan to bring this new application to half the functionality of FCP7 is because SO MANY of the little things are missing from FCPX. It would take something near the scale of a full re-write of much of the software. The sheer scope of the labor it would take to add in the functionality doesn’t seem viable. Make sense?
The copy and paste of transform, distort, crop, etc properties can certainly be addressed (since I used that as a specific example). However there are literally dozens of examples that are just not there (the coarse controls and behavior of dissolves, titling, lack of multiple sequences / storylines per project, etc).
The approach was seems to be that they wanted to help novices keep from “messing up.”
I truly love innovation. If there were simply different ways to do some of these things, I’d be ready to learn – no worries. Different isn’t bad at all.
But compare the capabilities of this editor – even in the foreseeable future – to that of its supposed competitors, Media Composer and Premiere. It has not even half the FUNCTIONALITY (not features, though that’s a strong argument too) of its “peers.”
Banks
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[Banks Meador] “ALL YOU CAN COPY AND PASTE ARE EFFECTS. Can’t copy and paste transform, crop, distort, etc.”
HUGE HUGE issue. Mind boggling that this is missing.
JONATHAN DORTCH
BLACK WOLF CREATIVE -
The software only supports single monitor applications, tapeless media, it is a self contained GUI, Nothing is copy pasteable, hotkeys are limited, no plugins, no codecs, all the apps are sold seperate,
This thing is as far from pro, as imovie. Crap apple, pure crap… Back to Avid or any other program but fcpX… I would rather cut with media 100…
“Oop, I think my render is done!”
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Not sure about your YouTube branding analogy…..billions of people use YouTube, which obviously dwarfs FCP….
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[Ted Levy] “Not sure about your YouTube branding analogy…..billions of people use YouTube, which obviously dwarfs FCP….”
Google has been subsidizing youtube since day one. They lose money on it, but it’s the brand they are after…but it’s a bad analogy, as it’s not accurate to say Apple makes slim margins on a 2m user base and 54% dominance in broadcast….
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One can only wonder how a treasury containing $70billion is cash can skew one’s perspective on customers to woo and customers not to woo.
It reminds me of the pre Dot Bomb era in Silocon Valley (of which I was a active victim), and how much arrogance became a part of the culture. Until the crash…that was a wake up I tell you. I’m not suggesting Apple may crash because of this. But that we may be experiencing what its like to no longer be one of Apple’s favored demographics as we are arrogantly dismissed.
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El Mundo Bueno Studios
Film * Audio
http://www.EMBstudios.com
Emeryville, CA
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