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MacBook Pros “underpowered?” Not for FCP X editors. Not AT ALL.
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[Bill Davis] “[Shawn Miller] “What keeps Apple from offering more powerful GPUs and CPUs in the workstations they do make though? That doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the offerings of other PC integrators…
”I suspect maybe the cultural impact of the famous “4 quadrants” drawing Steve Jobs did about keeping the company focus on making fewer products, but making them as excellent as possible?”
Sorry, that just doesn’t make any sense to me. How would Apple be losing focus by updating the CPUs and GPUs in the Mac Pro?
[Bill Davis] ”
But the fact that those famously “under spec’d and under RAM’d” Touchbar MacBook Pros are crushing some higher spec’d competitors in open comparative performance tests speak to the value of looking beyond the easy answers.”Crushing which competitors (not all of them I presume)… doing what? And… weren’t we talking about workstations? ☺
[Bill Davis] “Maybe the path to satisfaction isn’t always more choice, but being given a choice that just works better than the other alternatives?”
Sure, and for many – the choice that “just works” is a machine with faster GPUs and newer, faster, multiple CPUs. ☺
Shawn
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[Bill Davis] “I don’t remember seeing it IN THE TIMELINE (where the editor presumably does the vast majority of their actual editing in a traditional NLE.) I know Premiere Pro has feature parity via “hover scrub” in the actual Timeline now. Right?”
You’re moving the goal posts by adding the timeline stipulation. Premiere offers standard scrubbing in the timeline, as it always has.
As an aside, I would suggest that as fun as FCPX skimming can be for the editor, it’s completely disconcerting for any client in the back of the room. All you see is a flash of images out of context. I often find myself turning it off when dealing with a client-involved session.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
[David Roth Weiss] “even if the renders were actually ten times faster”
I’m sorry… if? Which part of the tests are you not clear on? Let us help.
[Steve Connor] “Would love to see someone do a video covering the whole edit process on both systems.”
One of my personal favorites with one ever reoccurring task in “the whole editing process”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRZgVZd9UmQ
Obviously exchanging FCP 7 with PPRo would yield the exact same result. Check the time and do the math… there are a plethora of other examples.
And btw: rendering is far from just done on export, sorry. The example of export is merely the easiest to quantify in a comparison of this kind.
– RK
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[Oliver Peters] “I often find myself turning it off when dealing with a client-involved session.”
Having to hit that one key (S) must really throw everyone for a loop!! Horrible burden.
????
[scnr]
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[Shawn Miller] “Sorry, that just doesn’t make any sense to me. How would Apple be losing focus by updating the CPUs and GPUs in the Mac Pro?
“Managing a much wider array of retail SKUs would just be the beginning. Optimizing the App code for half a dozen CPUs and GPUs with different designs, strengths and weaknesses could easily turn into an unnecessary hassle. One strength of the Apple approach is that you’re pretty well assured that if it’s an Apple system, everything will be pre-tested to work smoothly as a system (presuming no non-spec anomalies – which ALL computer parts are subject to.)
[Shawn Miller] “Crushing which competitors (not all of them I presume)… doing what? And… weren’t we talking about workstations? ☺
“I’d cite editing magnetically for expanded storyline construction efficiency and stuff like the render speed advantages many have reported because the Mac OS, Hardware and Software is properly optimized for an All Apple workflow.
[Shawn Miller] “Sure, and for many – the choice that “just works” is a machine with faster GPUs and newer, faster, multiple CPUs. ☺
“I’m not convinced the “workstation” tag is long for this world. Not with the push towards modularization of components such as outboard GPUs making their way towards us due to modern fast I/O pipes. Who knows, really what the future will bring us? If I were a betting guy, I’d probably bet AGAINST the focus remaining on single box “workstation” development in the future. I’d bet more on modular components attached to “at will” – as the location and tasks demand. Your I/O module might look like a laptop with some on-board storage and a utility screen, but if you’re at the “office” you connect to assets including perhaps more CPU or GPU power, nicer displays, and a fatter pipe.
When you leave that situation, you keep the keyboard and personal device with decent memory and the core capabilities you need, until you attach it to the network at work, or in the clients space, where you leverage THAT array of peripheral assets to work with.
The “workstation” becomes kinda irrelevant in that scenario.
It’s been broken down and distributed with dedicated modules doing what USED to be housed in the workstation better and faster?
Just thinking out loud here.
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
[Oliver Peters] “You’re moving the goal posts by adding the timeline stipulation. Premiere offers standard scrubbing in the timeline, as it always has”
We’ll have to disagree on that. Moving the goalposts, not Premiere “standard scrubbing” which I’m afraid I remain ignorant about. Perhaps you can help me by explaining how it works compared to how scrubbing works in X?
For me skimming has ALWAYS been a “storyline thing” at heart.
My “skimming in the storyline” to “skimming in the browser” ratio has to be 100 to 1 – or more.
In the Event, I use nearly 100% keyboard commands to markup and tag stuff at the Event level in X. I rarely skim things using JKL transport nearly exclusively. It’s just faster than mousing around. And my content is rejected and tagged, I have little reason to skim anything at that stage againt. In fact, you could easily argue that this is precisely what keywords are DESIGNED to do in X – make the need for asset skimming in the event far less necessary.
I’m sure it’s just a difference in conditioning and orientation.
I’m also sure, now that I think about it, there are likely lots of people still skimming assets in FCP X. I wonder if the people doing this have ever considered that once again, they are sorta making X work slower (even with SKIMMING available!) by trying to match their prior “bin” conditioning, rather than learning more about how X is designed to work?
Skimming ANYTHING in the Event Browser is VASTLY slower than having the asset you’re seeking pre-defined by a keyword range. Don’t get me wrong, as an exploratory process I’m all for skimming and randomly exploration of footage “at will”- and X does that just as well as all the other NLEs – BUT – in X it’s NOT the optimal way to bring content to into your storylines. I find organization via keywords and instant range addition to the timeline via keystroke beats it by a country mile for efficiency.
Oh well.
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
[Robin S. Kurz] “Obviously exchanging FCP 7 with PPRo would yield the exact same result. Check the time and do the math… there are a plethora of other examples.”
The original post was about FCPX and Intel’s Quick Sync. Who stated Premiere Pro CC is better than FCPX as of now? Can you show how FCPX can allow for speeding up collaborations like Adobe Anywhere? Why not demonstrate FCPX’s alternative to Adobe’s Anywhere? I don’t doubt the Apple alternative is much better but I would like to see a demonstration first.
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[Bill Davis] ”
Managing a much wider array of retail SKUs would just be the beginning. Optimizing the App code for half a dozen CPUs and GPUs with different designs, strengths and weaknesses could easily turn into an unnecessary hassle. One strength of the Apple approach is that you’re pretty well assured that if it’s an Apple system, everything will be pre-tested to work smoothly as a system (presuming no non-spec anomalies – which ALL computer parts are subject to.)”Who said anything about offering a wide range of CPUs and GPUs? Apple could still limit their offerings to two builds… just with better hardware. I find it strange that you wouldn’t want that.
[Bill Davis] “[Shawn Miller] “Crushing which competitors (not all of them I presume)… doing what? And… weren’t we talking about workstations? ☺”
I’d cite editing magnetically for expanded storyline construction efficiency and stuff like the render speed advantages many have reported because the Mac OS, Hardware and Software is properly optimized for an All Apple workflow. “
So… what does that do for 3D, VFX and motion graphics artists who need faster computers? That was what we were talking about wasn’t it?
[Bill Davis] “I’m not convinced the “workstation” tag is long for this world. Not with the push towards modularization of components such as outboard GPUs making their way towards us due to modern fast I/O pipes. Who knows, really what the future will bring us? If I were a betting guy, I’d probably bet AGAINST the focus remaining on single box “workstation” development in the future. I’d bet more on modular components attached to “at will” – as the location and tasks demand. Your I/O module might look like a laptop with some on-board storage and a utility screen, but if you’re at the “office” you connect to assets including perhaps more CPU or GPU power, nicer displays, and a fatter pipe.”
None of this precludes the need for fast workstations today.
[Bill Davis] “The “workstation” becomes kinda irrelevant in that scenario. “
Right… and if that becomes the reality, we’ll make our choices accordingly, just like we do today. ☺
Shawn
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[Bill Davis] “Premiere “standard scrubbing” which I’m afraid I remain ignorant about. Perhaps you can help me by explaining how it works compared to how scrubbing works in X?”
Are you pulling my leg, or are you seriously asking me what scrubbing is? After all, it’s been in NLEs since day one and generally works the same way in most. Hold down the mouse button and move the cursor/playhead across the timeline. Same as in FCP7.
Of course, if doesn’t work at all right in X. If I turn off skimming, in order to scrub, I lose the ability to hear audio when I scrub. If I try to scrub in the event, it wants to set a range. It then won’t let you scrub within that range, because it thinks you want to drag it to the timeline. Clearly they designed X for skimming and broke scrubbing in the process.
[Bill Davis] “I’m also sure, now that I think about it, there are likely lots of people still skimming assets in FCP X. I wonder if the people doing this have ever considered that once again, they are sorta making X work slower (even with SKIMMING available!) by trying to match their prior “bin” conditioning, rather than learning more about how X is designed to work?”
Aren’t you making a value judgement based on how you think it should work, not how it actually works? That’s like saying list versus filmstrip is “wrong” or vice versa.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
[Bill Davis] “If I were a betting guy, I’d probably bet AGAINST the focus remaining on single box “workstation” development in the future. I’d bet more on modular components attached to “at will” – as the location and tasks demand. Your I/O module might look like a laptop with some on-board storage and a utility screen, but if you’re at the “office” you connect to assets including perhaps more CPU or GPU power, nicer displays, and a fatter pipe.
“That works in theory, but is unreliable in actual practice. For example, a MBP with an external chassis with GPU is touchy at best. The better bet is cloud processing, which is already done in the VFX world.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com
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