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Early 2011 MacBookPro for editing
I have the above MacBookPro and I just added a Hybrid SSD/HD and it is great. Anyway, I want to edit HD video with it. What do I need in order to do that? I have 16 gig of ram and the HD/SSD internal drive. Do I need a Thunderbolt external drive? If so, what work best? What software is everyone using for editing? Thanks!
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2 Replies
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It really depends on what kind of HD footage you’re editing. With ProRes422 and XDCAM 50 and DVCPRO HD I happily edit 720p and 1080i/p off of a G-RAID or a G-Drive Mini and Firewire 800 without any trouble. Sometimes two streams of 1080 can give me troubles, but transitions and normal editing go without a hitch.
If you’re going to higher end workflows and looking to use ProRes HQ, ProRes444, Uncompressed, and/or anything with alpha, and you want to keep real time you’ll want to move up to Thunderbolt, and consider retiring FCP7.
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Jeff is exactly right. As far as NLE’s go you pretty much have your pick nowadays – Adobe Premiere Pro, FCP7, FCPX, Avid Media Composer, Sony Vegas….you can find all these NLE’s in nearly every aspect of post-production somewhere. It’s up to you what you are comfortable with and what type of editing you do.
I would ultimately suggest moving away from FCP7 because it is no longer in development – no patches, no fixes, no support, no development. Apple has moved onto FCPX. Final Cut Studio, as we knew it up to 2011 is no longer supported by Apple. That’s not to say you can’t use it, but be aware that if you go that route your on your own. The last supported OS for FCP 7.0.3 was Mac OSX 10.6.8 (Snow Leopard).
Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
vimeo.com/ryanholmes
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