Did anyone lose their job after FCPX mistake ?

[Steve Connor]

[randall wurster] ” I, honestly, would love to hear a differing opinion and see how FCPX is working in professional (or honestly, even prosumer) environments.”

Just read back on here and you’ll see how some of us are using FCPX successfully in our working environments, search for other FCPX forums and you’ll see plenty of people happily using it.

Steve Connor
‘It’s just my opinion, with an occasional fact thrown in for good measure”

[Randall Wurster]

Search my posts. There are quite a few other “pro’s” here as well who use X. But honestly, if you can’t let go of traditional tracks, then X probably isn’t for you.

Willdo re: the search. Again, this is from two trial experiences from FCPX, so I continue to hope I’m wrong. But at the same time, I’ll continue to make my opinions on my experiences with FCPX rather clear.

I don’t think trackless editing as seen in FCPX is actually new.

The standard Movie maker, iMovie, whatever free editing app is on your system, etc. all feature what amounts to “trackless” editing because its geared towards the average user that the creator of said software deemed incapable of dealing with a track system.

Again, purely my opinion, but “trackless” editing is just watered-down editing. It’s been around for a while, and FCPX repackaged it as something revolutionary because it fit into the iMovie crowd they were targeting.

Now, it might so happen that it has use for specific pro or prosumer workflows (music videos, wedding videographer, and maybe, maybe some documentary stuff spring to mind).

Bottom line, if you edit with the keyboard, if you know all your shortcuts, if you know your footage inside and out, you don’t need the gimmick that is the magnetic timeline. Crap like that just slows you down.

[Charlie Austin]

[randall wurster] “The standard Movie maker, iMovie, whatever free editing app is on your system, etc. all feature what amounts to “trackless” editing because its geared towards the average user that the creator of said software deemed incapable of dealing with a track system.

Incapable? lol. How about an editor who doesn’t want to waste time “patching” tracks like a 1920’s telephone operator? I like trackless editing because I generally have 16-24 “tracks” of audio cut in at any given time. It’s nice to have the software figure out where it’ll fit, and organize it for me. I can thenconcentrate on cutting and fine tune the organization later if i want to. Now, if that doesn’t suit your workflow, cool. But I assure you, I’m quite capable of “dealing with” tracks. I just happen to like the fact that I can finally stop dealing with them. 🙂

[randall wurster] Again, purely my opinion, but “trackless” editing is just watered-down editing. It’s been around for a while, and FCPX repackaged it as something revolutionary because it fit into the iMovie crowd they were targeting.

iMovie crowd? Seriously? Other than some underlying data structure features, superficial interface similarities, and some (admittedly unfortunate) effect names, iMovie and FCP X have very little in common, And honestly, what’s wrong with iMovie? Not enough buttons for ya? 😉

[randall wurster] Now, it might so happen that it has use for specific pro or prosumer workflows (music videos, wedding videographer, and maybe, maybe some documentary stuff spring to mind).

Why do you feel that way? Just because you don’t like FCP X? It seems you’ve made up your mind that it sucks, which is fine. But do you really need to justify that decision by subtly denigrating people who aren’t necessarily working on whatever it is you work on – which for some reason you feel is more “professional” than that?

By the way… are you actually familiar with music video editing? Have ya seen a music video lately? That sh*t is hardly amateur hour. Just sayin’.

[randall wurster] Bottom line, if you edit with the keyboard, if you know all your shortcuts, if you know your footage inside and out, you don’t need the gimmick that is the magnetic timeline. Crap like that just slows you down.
“

Well, speaking for myself, I know and do all the above and, uh… no it doesn’t.

**Actually, to be fair, it does slow you down ’til you wrap your head around it. After that it speeds you up. 😉

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~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~

[Randall Wurster]

Where did I denigrate or say that any of those industries were not pro?

In fact, I rather explicitly said those were pro applications of the product in my post.

And no, what I work on isn’t more “professional” than any of that.

And I also never implied that FCPX users were incapable of dealing with tracks, only that the writers of the software wrote it for a target audience that was.

If a capable editor happens to enjoy the trackless workflow, as in your case, I’d guess that this is a happy coincidence and not Apple’s intentions. Every bit of evidence of where Apple is headed in terms of production suggests this to be the case.

I also said I hadn’t made up my mind on FCPX, which is why I was here. I said these were my feelings after cutting two projects on it. There’s really no need to put words in my mouth, I’ve said enough as it is.

iMovie and FCPX share the same verbiage, some features, similar workflow, similar interface and – and this is the arguable point – the same basic principle: to hide an awful lot of control from the user with the assumption that the program knows better. If you have found a way around that, or not found that to be the case, then more power to you. Obviously the power behind FCPX trumps the outdated FCP7 and I truly wish it could work in my workflow. There are certain projects where maybe it could, but others where it would be hopeless.

[Charlie Austin]

[randall wurster] … “And I also never implied that FCPX users were incapable of dealing with tracks, only that the writers of the software wrote it for a target audience that was.

…

I also said I hadn’t made up my mind on FCPX, which is why I was here. I said these were my feelings after cutting two projects on it. There’s really no need to put words in my mouth, I’ve said enough as it is.”

Fair enough… apologies if I seemed to be putting words in your mouth. It just struck me as another “FCPX is just a fancy iMovie and is not a real pro app” post. There’s a lot of that going around. 😉

I guess I just disagree with your assertion in the previous post that ” …its geared towards the average user that the creator of said software deemed incapable of dealing with a track system.” And again here saying “..to hide an awful lot of control from the user with the assumption that the program knows better.” Now, I suppose if we’re splitting hairs that could be true, but in the same way that OS X “hides” it’s Unix underpinnings. It’s there if you want it and know what to do with it, but you don’t need to use it if you don’t want to.

In my opinion, the idea of FCPX was to make an app that, setting aside the new interface etc., Would work for people who didn’t need all the bells and whistles and for people who do. I think they’ve succeeded. And I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree about Apple’s intentions toward the “pro” market. FCPX isn’t perfect, and it isn’t done. It’s really a 1.0 release and, despite a pile of missing and not yet implemented features, works really well. They’ve publicly stated that they have a 10 year plan for the app, it’s only going to get better. There will be at least one more new Mac Pro. After that, who knows.

IMHO, with the advent of thunderbolt etc, the need for a giant tower is coming to an end. That may be why Apple is holding off on the next Mac Pro, waiting for T Bolt to migrate to fiber rather than copper… I dunno… I just think we’re in a computing transition, not at the end of the line.

Anyway, didn’t mean to single you out, there’s a lot of irrational, and in my opinion incorrect, hate for FCPX, so sorry if I jumped to conclusions. Also, you said “Obviously the power behind FCPX trumps the outdated FCP7 and I truly wish it could work in my workflow. There are certain projects where maybe it could, but others where it would be hopeless.” What type of thing do you think it would be hopeless on? Honestly curious. 🙂

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~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~

[Randall Wurster]

Fair enough… apologies if I seemed to be putting words in your mouth. It just struck me as another “FCPX is just a fancy iMovie and is not a real pro app” post. There’s a lot of that going around. 😉

Understood – granted, I can see why you’d come to that conclusion reading some of my posts so far. And I apologize if my post seemed to insult other areas of the pro editing world. I wouldn’t want to do that – especially given the wide variety of jobs we get up here in my area. I just wanted to make it clear that my opinion on FCPX is not cemented yet, and that these were my gut reactions to using the program in a limited fashion.

In my opinion, the idea of FCPX was to make an app that, setting aside the new interface etc., Would work for people who didn’t need all the bells and whistles and for people who do. I think they’ve succeeded. And I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree about Apple’s intentions toward the “pro” market.

We’ll probably just have to agree to disagree on this point – time might tell, but I have way less faith in them than several years ago.

What type of thing do you think it would be hopeless on? Honestly curious. 🙂

We do a lot of industrials (technical training) and then scenario based compliance training (typical two camera shoots, occasionally three).

For the latter, while multicam in FCPX actually looks pretty promising, the editing just looks too cumbersome to me. I use timecode to sync, so I don’t need the nice sync features that come with FCPX. I don’t need magnetic timelines for it, I’m not grouping pieces together and moving them around in bulk, and if I am, simple in & outs will do. I can do L & J cuts far simpler in FCP7 than in FCPX, despite being advertised as otherwise, I don’t understand what people felt was so difficult about it in FCP7. I don’t like the video being so literally attached to the audio as it is in FCPX. Among other things that slowly drove me nuts in my FCPX trial.

For the industrials, there’s two problems: one we have twenty to thirty sequences per project, that we’re working on, grabbing pieces between and exporting at the same time. From what I experienced, that’d a nuisance – and prohibitive – in FCPX. Also, for technical training like this, the most important thing is the continuity of the cuts. The traditional viewer-canvas in FCP7 let’s me do that.

Again, I can see FCPX being awfully useful in several implementations, and I was a little harsh in dismissing it so rashly. I still, however, would find their change in verbiage, interace, & workflow a nuisance – and a step down from FCP7.