FCP-X timeline

[Mark Suszko]

I’ll tell you what my biref glimpse thru the keyhole looked like to me: maybe this is something like a nodal interface, with the nodes all laying on a timeline. It seems with the linking behaviors to secondary assets like has node-like attributes. If you’ve worked in various compositors, like COmbustion, or the graphical link display mode in DVDStudio Pro, this will look familiar.

[Paul Roper]

I, too, am suspicious. Timeline editing has evolved to what it is over many years – because it works. I use FCP on a daily basis, and I have tried to use iMovie once or twice – it leaves me completely baffled. All Apple really needed to do was fix some bugs and bring the application into the 21st Century with 64 bit, multi core processing. That’d make me happy. Also, people get used to an interface – it really is very annoying when a software vendor moves something you click on hundreds of times per day to another location for no apparent reason. It’s like a car manufacturer deciding to put the accelerator on the left and the steering wheel under the seat because it looks nicer.

In the olden days of Quantel Henry/Editbox, I could edit stuff without even looking at the screen because nothing was customisable and all the buttons and menus were in the same place, so I knew exactly where to click. This resulted in a blazingly fast editing process. This kind of fixed layout is still used for Smoke and Flame. I think.

Just take a look at Gmail for an example of a company trying to do something different just for the hell of it. Every other email program/website has evolved into what we recognise and like – Gmail’s ridiculous ‘conversation’ crap is just misleading and silly. Let’s hope FCP X’s interface isn’t just misleading and silly.

Oh – and what happened to FCP 8?

[Nigel Thompson]

The no tracks makes total sense to me. it takes that ease of use in the timeline you spoke about to a whole new level. You cant accidentally delete a part of a track now, (and have to trim it back in) and have to shift everything down or up. the video tracks are there but its virtual. for example u can place video ontop each other at the software will see that.
With audio , most of us mix down to 2 tracks anyway, but im sure there will be a way to patch to 8 tracks or whatever for output. we just need to wait and see the other specs as they come. Super meet is for a few nights no so ?

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[Eric Jurgenson]

To me, this is quite different from a nodal interface, which I think of more as a patch panel. Timelines need to show relationships to program time, which nodes don’t do very well.

I’m more concerned about the ability to assign clips to tracks that can be muted, mixed, and solo’d. I don’t see any way around this being an absolute requirement for serious editing.

[Warren Eig]

How does this affect OMF export to go to protools? Especially when you make a compound clip? Does all audio end up on the correct track, say dialogue or SND FX on export? This is a wait to be seen.

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[Paul Roper]

….but more importantly, do we suspect that Apple’s pricing of this ($299?) and the lack of news about the other ‘pro’ apps is yet more evidence of Apple dumbing down its product line to target consumers and not pros? I was in a large Apple store yesterday (to return my dead MacBook Air – lasted only 4 months) and there was a noticeable absence of Mac Pros…well, there was ONE – a bottom of the range single processor thing, stuffed in the corner. Compare this to the probably about 200 other silly little fashion trinkets filling the shop – MacBooks, Airs, iPad, iPods, iPhones…

Is there really a future for professionals using Apple gear? I suspect not.

[Cory Caplan]

I’ve really taken some time to digest this. I think the timeline is a really mixed bag. Some things will work much better this way. Take for instance movie scenes. This is fantastic for that. Each scene is a unit, drag and drop, newly ordered.

Also the VERTICAL aspects of magnetic timeline are fantastic, and long needed. Best in class, for sure. The removal of a1 a2 is great. The audio features are sick.

The Horizontal paradigm, I’m not yet convinced. I think for many, many editors this will be a vast improvement, and I think for many of my jobs, this will be a just fine, but when I’m cutting things that are a matter of 1 frame adjustments, beats, time etc.. I think I’ll find it frustrating…

The one WAY overwhelming thing I’m at a loss to explain is things that are time driven. It seems like a nightmare to try to deliver a piece that has to fit an exact time like a TV Act or even a 30 second spot. It’s almost like they’re taking “time” out of the “timeline” in a way. I think that’s the takeaway for me– Some great tools for shows with no real time requirements, but could be frustrating when I’m editing something “to time”

I wonder how music video folks will like the magnetic timeline.. I guess when you cut something in, you have to manually “attach” each cut to the music track, so it doesn’t slide?

[Eric Jurgenson]

Yeah, it’s sort of like ACID for music composition. Great for moving chunks around. But what if you want to move PARTS of a chunk around? Very confusing.

[Cory Caplan]

Well, I really can see Apple’s point on this one– Audio mixing is a paradigm change from a track based system. I wouldn’t be surprised at all to see logic adopt a very similar interface, because for the most part, it will work very well (clip based, and then vertically) In either program, really, you can just “assign a clip to a submix/send/effects group/ whatever” if you need to. Change of habit? yes, but I don’t think it will add more time, and I think the time saved by not having to scroll up and down as much will be more than worth it in the Vertical

I don’t know whether submixes/sends/etc.. are implemented in FCPX, but it should be ASAP if its not.. I think this will reduce the tracks on something like logic and I will like it..

ie: Create a dialog send, music submix, fx send, and you can add effects to the each submix.. and that would work really well with this interface..

[Phil Hawes]

From what I read of the reports of the demo of the new Final Cut X, the new features demonstrated are targeted towards the amateur video maker with a camcorder or DSLR. Features like stabilization, rolling shutter correction, noise cancellation, and audio sync, all supposedly happening on import, are targeting users who have basic production equipment problems. These are all features to compensate for amateur errors. A lot of these tools are problematic and not what a professional is asking for.

Nor does the professional want a new “event list” , filmstrip viewers, a new iMovie like trim editor, or pop up color correction.

The only feature here that any professional would want is 64 bit and multi-threading and not so they could edit H.264 natively in an iMovie like environment or have a no transcoding workflow. A 64 bit multi-threaded Final Cut 7 would have satisfied most people and taken away a lot of headaches.

If the demo had been targeted towards professionals the following features may have been shown: better Media Management tools, improvement for filters (10 bit), a better Compressor interface, better integration with Color, and perhaps Motion working in 10 bit with more finesse.

It remains to be seen what the actual Final Cut X really is but as for now it is definitely not being marketed to the professional. Does Apple really have the audacity to believe that they can rewrite the history of video editing with a Final Cut GUI change? I think not. I just suspect that they are shifting their market.

Phil