FCPX Newbie – is learning FCPX worth the time?

[Bill Davis]

[Walter Soyka] “I just think it’s good that the option is there to get access to all the power in Creative Suite for less than a fancy dinner.”

Not dismissing this at all.. but I will note that you don’t get any of that power without investing pretty huge personal time resources in learning to operate the software.

I’m not sure how comfortable I’d be in putting in the months and years to get really good at something that remains foundtaionally owned by someone else who is just letting me “use” it so long as I keep paying.

Photoshop is a good example for me. I had a large project late last year and did the rental thing on two copies of PShp for my suite during a big PowerPoint project working with out of state designers for a while. Then six months went by without my using it again (I typically use Pixelmator for basic graphics manipulation as I’ve noted elsewhere) only to realize that I’d left one of the rental licenses active which had been draining the rental fee each month away form my account without my getting any benefit from it.

Nobody’s fault but my own for getting distracted on the financial stuff during the busy holiday season, but managing software rental is another thing that’s more distraction than core practice to my thinking. So it starts out with a black mark in my brain.

But that’s just me.

“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’Connor

[Chris Harlan]

[alban egger] “Maybe you have a workflow that only works with these features you mentioned, but in X I never missed a sync marker and also don´t feel the need for rearranging windows and tabbed-timelines. For Exambple I just use the back/forward-arrow, which when you hold them flip-open a list of recently used timelines. So little different, similar functuality.”

Hey, Alban!

For me, its not tabbed timelines that I miss so much, as it is having multiple timelines–or Canvases, really–actually open. In FCP7, there’s a trick that I think people who use single monitors are not aware of. Forgive me, if you know this. If, when using dual (or more) monitors, you un-tab a timeline and move it to a separate monitor, and then un-tab and move its corresponding canvas viewer to the same monitor, it becomes a separate, open timeline from the original timeline, and you can move between them by simply clicking on one or the other. I personally like the spatial relationships this allows me to set up between timelines I’m using for intermediate editing and my final timeline. Its probably the single thing I will miss most about FCPL.

As for the sync markers–I do a lot of micro surgery on audio and I find them very useful, both in the offsets that display on the timeline even if footage is unlinked, and in the canvas monitor in the form of the overlay for color-coded track timecode. Yes, I can get by without it, but its not something I want to get by without. Sadly no other NLE quite matches FCPL’s implementation of sync tools.

I’m certainly not saying that everyone needs these tools, or even that I can’t function without them, but I am pointing out that FCPL has some very useful tools for a certain set of people, and that there really are reasons other than fuddiness that people might be sticking with it, or otherwise mourning its passage.

[Walter Soyka]

There’s some other stuff in Creative Cloud, like that 20 GB of storage and some kind of synchronization. I’ll have to try to give that spin and see if it’s valuable.

[Bill Davis] “Photoshop is a good example for me. I had a large project late last year and did the rental thing on two copies of PShp for my suite during a big PowerPoint project working with out of state designers for a while. Then six months went by without my using it again (I typically use Pixelmator for basic graphics manipulation as I’ve noted elsewhere) only to realize that I’d left one of the rental licenses active which had been draining the rental fee each month away form my account without my getting any benefit from it. Nobody’s fault but my own for getting distracted on the financial stuff during the busy holiday season, but managing software rental is another thing that’s more distraction than core practice to my thinking. So it starts out with a black mark in my brain.”

Would you have felt better about that if you had paid $700 for a full, perpetual license that you weren’t using?

I think a lot of our connection to ownership of our tools is emotional, driven perhaps by pride in craftsmanship or fear of of uncertainly. Most other business are trying to change their capital expenditures over to operational expenses wherever possible in part to make the books look better and in part to mitigate risk.

Personally, I actually really like the hybrid approach: buy a perpetual license and get on a maintenance program. I own a perpetual license of Maxon CINEMA 4D Studio, but I have a service agreement with them, too. I pay them a fixed amount of money every year, and they send me all the new updates, whenever they come out. It still has the high upfront cost, but you get the other benefits of constant updates and predictable costs.

Walter Soyka
Principal & Designer at Keen Live
Motion Graphics, Widescreen Events, Presentation Design, and Consulting
RenderBreak Blog – What I’m thinking when my workstation’s thinking
Creative Cow Forum Host: Live & Stage Events

[Dave Jenkins]

Yes, but they should have brought it out as another product! As FCP 10 people (me) had certain expectations. If it had come out as a 1.0 product it would have been looked at differently in my opinion. I look forward to the next update but is NOT version 10!!!!

[Charlie Austin] “I guess I just get annoyed when folks (in general, not specifically you BTW) rag on Apple, when all they’re really doing is exactly what they did with the original Final Cut. We’ll see how it works this time I guess… 🙂
“

Dajen Productions, Santa Barbara, CA
MacPro Two 2.66GHz Quad Core – AJA Kona LHe
FCS 3 OS X 10.7.4
FCP X, Adobe CS6, Logic Pro, Squeeze, Filemaker

[Christopher Key]

Hey Walter – I’m using the adobe cloud and I like it and I also find many of my clients want me to do much more than edit a video – they want me to make a website, design an ad, create a picture-book etc etc etc so I bought the CS3 Master Collection years ago and this year switched to the cloud and I like it – I’m getting it for 30 a month for the first year which is less than a third of updating and I have all the latest apps. The main reason I want to work with Premiere Pro more is because of the way all the apps work together – My dad is a retired computer programmer who predicted years ago that some day people would generally rent software on a need to use basis and it looks like things are headed that way. If Adobe continues to update their suite every year and a half the price should be about the same as traditional upgrades.

Christopher Key

[Christopher Key]

I just watched this video intro to FCPX at https://fcp.co/final-cut-pro/tutorials/780-final-cut-x-moving-forward-in-video-editing (found a link on the cow) and now I see what some of the fuss is about – this is definitely a new style of working – there were some interesting features, some of it seems more complicated rather than easier, and some of it seems like old time functionality in a new wrapper (instead of grouping its a compound clip) with some new lingo attached – almost as if they just wanted to be different – I hate that – Of course I haven’t actually tried doing an edit with it yet but I’m planning to – I just shot an audition for some local chefs and have one small edit left to complete for them – so I think I’ll try putting it together in FCPX and see if I can get it to work.

Christopher Key

[Alban Egger]

[Christopher Key] “some of it seems more complicated rather than easier, and some of it seems like old time functionality in a new wrapper (instead of grouping its a compound clip) with some new lingo attached – almost as if they just wanted to be different – I hate that – Of course I haven’t actually tried doing an edit with it yet but I’m planning to “

The “Wrapper” is much more than grouping. The compound clip is a timeline in itself and a great organizational tool (e.g. to control 8 or 16 audio-tracks within clips) and the main force in multi cam edits (where the compound turns into a multi clip container with its own functionality).

The only lingo issue is the PROJECT, which is a TIMELINE. I can live with the event name, but project is just wrong, agreed. If they did it to be different does´t matter really, but it seems that way and it does´t work. We still call the timeline timeline here, although we are used to the term “event” by now.

I suggest to you and the OP to get a trial and watch some training (I can recommend Ripple Training, but there are others and also free tutorials out there). FCPX is fundamental different, that´s why these discussions become what they are. But it is fundamental right for modern workflows.

[Alban Egger]

[Shane Ross] I said it wasn’t aimed at my specific market in Hollywood. Because it lacks pretty much every feature we need. EDL support (yes, we still work with EDLs and deliver EDLs), OMF or AAF support for DAWs (Apple didn’t do it…third parties did). Capture from non-firewire tape based decks. Oh…yeah, they rely on third parties to solve that too. It is designed for people to do everything INSIDE the app, including color correction (Yeah, speaking of THAT tool…aimed at beginners, not professionals) and audio mixing.

The Hollywood workflow is that of collaboration. Editor…colorist…audio mixer…VFX. We also still use tape input and output on a regular basis.

You use the word Hollywood as a trademark. Over here in Europe Hollywood is the world of Batman, The Avengers and The Hobbit. I wonder how many tapes will be used to distribute The Hobbit, shot on two REDs in a 3D rig.

What you talk about is a network environment stuck in a 2003 workflow. I am sure Apple did NOT aim at that market, because its workflow will die sooner than later. Our national broadcaster is still producing on IMX tapes in standard definition, although they broadcast in HD. But they at least acknowledge they choose to stay in their workflow (editing with FAST, which is from 1999), because the switch is so expensive, not because their way is better, faster or cheaper on a daily basis.

You talk about a workflow that works. Fine. Agreed. FCPX won´t fit in there right now. It never will on its own.

But for producers who are on a tapeless workflow producing docs and films shot (maybe globally in 50Hz and 60Hz) on C300s, F3s, GoPros, Phantoms and 5Ds all in one EVENT edited in different projects for different distribution-lanes (in-house broadcast, sold broadcast, web and sale) FCPX offers a flexibility FCP7 can´t compete with.
We are working on a global campaign for a few months now. Every spot is shot on F3s and C300s. Edited and mastered in FCPX, graded in a post-house, audio done elsewhere in ProTools, graphics come in from After Effects…….I don´t know where the problem in collaboration should be? Oh yeah. We had to press Export XML instead of export EDL…..that´s about it. Tough. Phew.

When you diss the FCPX colourboard….have you ever tried it and tried FCP7 3-way corrector next to it. HUGE difference in QUALITY! 8-bit vs. 16-bit. You gotta be kidding calling FCP7´s color-correction professional – in 2012.

Collaboration? The future is XML, not EDL. Resolve, not Color. Probably AAF not OMF. Apple dropped the floppy, the FW400 port and other tools we thought essential. But usually soon after we realize they were right. The floppy? FW400? What were we thinking.

So what am I trying to say: If you have a workflow that works, fine. But that does not mean the new way is wrong, just because it is different.
Disclaimer: I don´t say it is right for everyone or the holy grail in NLEs (yet), but for me it works better than my previous NLEs (SpeedRazor, Fast/Liquid, Edius, FCP).

[Franz Bieberkopf]

[alban egger] “But for producers who are on a tapeless workflow producing docs and films shot (maybe globally in 50Hz and 60Hz) on C300s, F3s, GoPros, Phantoms and 5Ds all in one EVENT edited in different projects for different distribution-lanes (in-house broadcast, sold broadcast, web and sale) FCPX offers a flexibility FCP7 can´t compete with.”

Alban,

One of the projects that I’m cutting this year is shot on Epic, C300, FS100, GoPro, 5D, some HDCamSR (and a few other formats) in a variety of frame rates.

I’m cutting it (like the other projects I’m working on this year) in FCP7.

What “flexibility” am I missing?

Franz.

[Alban Egger]

[Franz Bieberkopf] “One of the projects that I’m cutting this year is shot on Epic, C300, FS100, GoPro, 5D, some HDCamSR (and a few other formats) in a variety of frame rates.

I’m cutting it (like the other projects I’m working on this year) in FCP7.

What “flexibility” am I missing?”

Well, Franz, just a small example: Let´s assume you are editing in a 1080p25 distribution timeline.
the C300 shoots 100 clips in 720p50 (so you have slow-motion and audio), a lot of over cranked 720p25 (with S&F recording enabled and mixed between 32 and 48 fps) and the rest in 1080p25.
In FCP7 to go the correct way of conforming the clips 720p50 clips so they play in slow-motion you would have to identify them, duplicate the original clips (to keep them untouched), then import the clones into cinema-tools and conform them (which is a destructive process!) and then re-import into FCP7. This will take you a while if all operators shoot that way and it happens a lot in our documentary productions.

In FCPX cinema-tools is implemented (just like the 16-bit engine of Color, the Logic effects etc). I have mapped the letter “4” as my conform tool. So I have all these mixed clips in my event and drop them into the timeline. Here I can decide if I want them to be 50p (and keep the natural speed and audio) or 25p (making it slomo and I now have to decide what to do about the audio). It is a button in the timeline. No roundtrip to cinema tools.

I have just finished production of a 9 day-shoot with 4000 clips (31 hours) and a lot is NOT in 25p and I never ever have to worry about it.

This is a small example (which can be huge on the time you spend in organizing your media) and once you get into key wording, pre-selecting and sorting footage it gets more and more in favor of FCPX. And that´s before you even start the editing process.

The only problem FCPX could have in your setup is ingesting the HDCamSR footage. Something we would have to solve out-of-house anyway, because we never owned any HDCam equipment; always rented.

EDIT: Since I was at this I made a small tutorial about this procedure: https://www.eggermedia.com/blog/2012/7/21/conforming-50p-without-cinema-tools.html