AppleInsider says NEW FCP at next week’s NAB Supermeet.

[Stephen Smith]

There has been a long discussion about it in the FCP forum.

https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/8/1127471

Stephen Smith
Utah Video Productions

Check out my Motion Training DVD

Check out my Motion Tutorials

[Mark Suszko]

“I am happy as a little girl“-Dieter

This has been a long time coming, and the pressure is really on to deliver a solid response to Premiere’s unarguably powerful product.

The expectations from the FCP community are going to be brutally high. Do they make a 5-wolf-moon shirt? That’s what it might take.

[Stephen Smith]

[Mark]

This has been a long time coming, and the pressure is really on

Yep…there has been some rumored features that if they don’t included them they will be in big trouble.

Stephen Smith
Utah Video Productions

Check out my Motion Training DVD

Check out my Motion Tutorials

[Bill Davis]

Ok, now THATs funny! (I’ll have to consider changing my idiom list top choice from “more cowbell” to “more wolf-moons!”)

As to the release, I’m NOT in the apple inner circle, NOT under non-disclosure and literally know nothing more than anyone else – but I have been talking to a lot of friends high up in the FCP community and my sense is that this is NOT going to be a simple re-tinkering of the existing interface, but rather a whole new approach to editing. I think the I/O improvements via Thunderbold – plus the Apple concept of CORE technologies giving programs fundamental building blocks that can shuffle data WICKED FAST – means that whatever they do, it might be a WHOLE lot more efficient, than just stringing bunches of reference clips along a timeline.

That kind of excites me AND scares me at the same time.

I’ve met a good number of folks on the FCP team casually including the product manager and the cheif architect (tho I certainly don’t know them well enough to have ever asked them things that are not public knowledge) – and my sense is that they’re very smart people who work really hard at building great software. The issue is whether the direction they went this time is truly a “re-invention” of the base concepts/interface of editing – or just building more whiz-bang into the existing interface.

We’ll all know in a week!

“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Conner

[Scott Sheriff]

It’s all fun and games until someone gets a skinned knee and goes home crying.

If a new version comes out, I wonder how many legacy users will be left in the dust? Or how many running on very minimal systems won’t be able to upgrade?
Just changing over to SL caused a six month (or more) disruption for many. And SL also made some software and legacy devices boat anchors, due to driver and other issues. Snow Leopard was a very minimal OS change, but yet there were a ton of folks that either were trying to downgrade back to Leopard, or just not going to, or couldn’t install it. If the jump to SL was too much for some, I wonder if a completely revamped FCS is in their future? On the same subject, a new version is almost certain to require the OS to be at least SL. So all those 40 dollar an hour guys still running G5’s are going to face a cold hard reality if they want to keep up. The non-Intel machines are going to be doorstops.
New FCP=New OS=New system.

If a new version comes out, I wonder how buggy it will be? And for how long?
Is the object of being an editor to make money editing, or be an unpaid Apple beta tester?
There are always things that users will wish a piece of gear could do. I’m not sure if FCP is so lacking, that the loss of productivity if a new version turns out to be buggy is going to be worth it. And even if it is fairly stable there are costs in both time and money to upgrade. There will be drivers and plugins that won’t work, and for some (see above) it will mean buying more memory, a new GPU or even a new system. For others it will be a some downtime and the cost of the software. And for everyone the time (productivity) lost learning a new app, if there are major UI or operational changes. Will the new changes offset all this?

If a new version comes out, no one knows what the ‘new’ FCS UI or general layout is going to be. With the proliferation of GoPro, Flip and other cameras like that, it is just as possible that FCP could end up being more ‘consumer friendly’ than going more towards supporting professionals. Think the market is crowded now?
On the other hand, it could go completely the other way leaning more towards the professional users, adding support for larger frame sizes or cine cams. Although this seems unlikely since the ratio of 5DII’s vs Genesis seems to favor the 5DII.
Or maybe the UI will combine all the elements of FCS into FCP? For those that don’t have an interest in mographs, or making DVD’s will having more non-editing stuff in the UI make you happy?

I admit I’m a professional cynic, and not inclined to act like a giddy school girl on prom night because Apple (or anyone else) has a new toy to buy.
In the last year the rumor mill has ranged from Apple is dumping FCP to a new version that will blow away the competition is coming out.
In all this fan boy rumor mongering the one thing I have found lacking is an objective look at what a completely revamped FCP would mean in a business sense to the users. I don’t really see much street cred in what platform I use to edit. How many of you care what brand of tool your mechanic buys?
The curious thing about this desire for a new FCS is that there are so many current users that can’t use Motion, DVDSP (I know Shane thinks DVD’s are on life support but there still seems to be a call for them out here in fly-over country), Color, STP and don’t even know FC beyond the basics. A look at any weeks postings in the various forums will confirm that. IMO those hours spent cruising mac rumor forums, and blogging about “what if” might be better spent learning what you currently have.
So I’m not one of those pining for a new version. What I have works well and is stable.
Curious about a new version? Yes. If a new version offers a benefit for me that offsets the cost in both time and money then it would make sense to upgrade. It is a tool, nothing more. It is not magic, nor will it do my editing for me.

So I guess my long winded point is be careful what you wish for. And if your one of those that spends hours wishing for a new FCS version, I’m not really trying to throw salt in your game. Just putting what that means into perspective. Or at least as much as possible with something that hasn’t even been announced yet. Who knows, maybe the big announcement is something other than a new version?

One thing is certain. If a new FCS version comes out, the train wreck coming from those that will just jump in and start changing their systems without doing proper research is sure to generate some LULZ.

I guess we will find out soon enough.

Scott Sheriff
Director
https://www.sstdigitalmedia.com

I have a system, it has stuff in it, and stuff hooked to it. I have a camera, it can record stuff. I read the manuals, and know how to use this stuff and lots of other stuff too.
You should be suitably impressed…

[Bill Davis]

Scott,

I understand your angst, and share some of it. But consider this.

Today’s editing interface is largely a digital implementation of the same editing workflow that was forced by the 3 deck A/B roll conventions of editing in the 1960s. Source deck? Rec deck? We all loved that as traditional editors, we could look on our screens and see little icons that represented the same boxes that we used when we were learning to edit.

But it’s 50+ years LATER, for pete’s sake. i love traditions and proven workflows as much as the next guy. But honestly, if people as bright as the teams at Apple have actually done some thinking about what editing MIGHT be from a 2011 perspective – especially given the ASTONISHING developments in computers and general digital technology since the 60s – then I for one am willing to give an alternate vision (if, in fact we will actually see something like that at NAB) a chance.

What we DO know is that Apple is investing heavily in orders of magnitude improvement in internal box thru-put (I was told that the first implementation (copper) of Thunderbolt represents a 10x improvement over USB3 and FW800 – but that implementations 2 (copper with optical) and 3 (all optical) will drive data rates up to 100 TIMES the current rates.

This means so much change about to how “data” is handled – that perhaps the INTERFACE necessary to handle digital assets like video, audio, and graphics also might be changed in ways to better leverage this new style of system wide global data access?

I’m just blue-skying here, but REAL advance only happens when someone is ready to adapt to new realities – rather than settle for incremental advancement on the old – which, while comforting for the existing base – hardly ever really change the way people work.

Nobody knows if this will be a LISA change (amazing tech, but a flop because the market was no where near ready) or a MAC change (a whole new way of icon-based graphical computing that changed EVERYTHING about computer interface design, forever)

I’m actually pulling for the latter. Yeah, it will be uncomfortable. But even at my age, I still love riding scary waves of transformation. Makes me feel fresh and young again!

YMMV.

“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Conner

[Dave Johnson]

Very well said, Scott. It seems that practical implications are often overlooked for the more intriguing cool factor so it’s nice to see someone make a well-stated case to at least consider the flip side of the coin … the cutting edge versus bleeding edge question, I suppose.

[Mark Suszko]

Well, you know that saying about how to tell who the pioneers are… just look for the guys all full of arrows….

Regardless of what I want to do, our shop is going to be a year or two behind you cutting-edge early adopters all the time, heck, I’m still not upgraded to Snow leaopard yet myself.

So while I get to look at and drool over the new release with the rest of you, I also get to sit back and let you all be the beta testers to find out what works and what still needs work. Once it has the kinks worked out, only then will we’ll go for it.

[Stephen Smith]

[Mark]

Well, you know that saying about how to tell who the pioneers are… just look for the guys all full of arrows

Love it, great quote. Sometimes those “arrows” can really hurt. We used to produce a weekly TV show that we needed to deliver to the Station on a Friday. We upgraded to Final Cut Pro HD on a Thursday morning. For some reason it deleted all of our clips. Ahhh, that was a long two days that still hurts to think about. We ended up going back to Final Cut Pro 4. Other then that disaster every upgrade from 2 to 7 has been good.

Stephen Smith
Utah Video Productions

Check out my Motion Training DVD

Check out my Motion Tutorials

[Bill Davis]

Mark,

I totally understand your perspective. I will note however that the last time I faced this kind of technology rev – in the “what camera should I shoot on” quandry, I took a flyer and became an early adopter of the Canon 5dMkii. As a 3 decades experienced video guy, I understood the risks and the limitations.

That was nearly two YEARS ago. The first year, I had the luxury of building expertise without the stress of it being my MUST USE tool. Then, suddenly, everywhere I looked people were demanding the camera that I had significant experience using. That fact alone allowed me to move into higher and higher end work – getting calls from larger ad agencies and bigger corporations rather than smaller clients.

It’s always a toss up as to when you adopt something new.

Bet wrong and you waste time learning something that will be obsolete or irrelevant all too soon.

But bet correctly, and when everyone starts demanding the new toys you already know how to incorporate what they do with your existing experience.

YMMV.

“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Conner