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  • Mads Nybo jørgensen

    April 22, 2023 at 5:21 pm

    Hey Oliver,

    Great run-through of NAB 2023, thank you.

    Out of interest, has the NLE grown up to a point where it is no longer interesting?
    Asking for a friend, obviously 😀

    Atb
    Mads

  • Michael Gissing

    April 23, 2023 at 12:46 pm

    Thanks Oliver, Maybe one day I will experience the NAB overwhelm in person.

  • Oliver Peters

    April 24, 2023 at 2:07 am

    “has the NLE grown up to a point where it is no longer interesting?”

    Good question. I think that may be the case. NLEs now seem to fit into silos based on type of product – social, corporate, film, TV, hobby. Blackmagic is trying to be all things to all users in Resolve. I don’t really think that’s workable if it weren’t for the low cost. And that really only appeals to individual users who don’t need to collaborate in a team environment. Since the toolkit for editing (not VFX, color, etc) is more or less the same for all software, there’s little reason for a user of one brand to want to move to a different brand.

    Oliver

  • Michael Gissing

    April 24, 2023 at 4:52 am

    “Blackmagic is trying to be all things to all users in Resolve. I don’t
    really think that’s workable if it weren’t for the low cost. ”

    When you compare it to the fractured round tripping Adobe expects to Audition or AE in their more expensive software, I do not agree. One of the first remarks I get from those that have converted from FCPX or Pr is how amazing that there is just one timeline with different toolsets on the various pages. No round tripping or weird linking. This is more workable and nothing to do with price. Do all editors need it? Perhaps not. You can always hide pages you do not use. As you point out NLEs are now all good at editing.

    “And that
    really only appeals to individual users who don’t need to collaborate in
    a team environment.”

    I don’t understand this rationale. Resolve has excellent collaboration tools. As Resolve is so commonly used as a finishing tool, having the ease of moving from editor to colorist to sound post with their approach seems to be the most usable in team workflows. Yes it also appeals to the single user to have that complete tool kit. In my case I now use Fairlight in Resolve having retired my standalone Fairlight as it is now superior and has ongoing development. Having that and the grading in one app means I have retired two computers and no longer need to round trip. The time and money saving for me is significant and the tools are superior.

    “Since the toolkit for editing (not VFX, color, etc)
    is more or less the same for all software, there’s little reason for a
    user of one brand to want to move to a different brand.”

    Again my experience is that editors are now moving from Pr & FCPX to Resolve in droves because it is collaborative, a single timeline with multiple toolsets and the workflow from edit to finish is now seamlesss, not via AAF or XML which have numerous translation issues not found when timelines or whole projects are sent to me from an offline edit. My only complaint about the Resolve workflow is the fact that fonts are messy when the font is not pre installed. That is also an issue with all AAF, XML translations and pretty nit picky.

  • Oliver Peters

    April 24, 2023 at 1:25 pm

    LOL. Hi Michael. Obviously perspectives are different depending on which part of the globe one lives on. My general point was that NLEs have hit a level of maturity. Everyone is waiting for “the next big thing” in the same way as Apple has struggled with going past the iPhone phenomenon.

    NLEs are mature products and people have largely settled into their preferred tool. Moviolas and flatbeds went on for years until the whole concept of cutting film went away. Linear videotape suites went on well until replaced by desktop computer editing. I’m not saying NLEs will be replaced anytime soon; but if and when replaced, it will be by a completely different shift in overall production and post. And so people are mostly comfortable with the tools as they currently exist.

    In the case of where Resolve fits, I personally don’t see any mass migration to Resolve as an NLE among active production companies, corporate, and broadcast media departments, etc. Some, yes. But it’s mostly individual users. The same ones who had previously tried FCP when X came out.

    In the larger world of broadcast and corporate post, ProTools is still the dominant audio post tool and After Effects the dominant VFX tool. Fairlight and Fusion are unlikely to upset that workflow. Not unless your favorite mixer or VFX artist is going to change their kit first. That’s unlikely.

    When I referred to collaboration, I was talking about editors sharing project files. On-prem, that’s easy to do via Media Composer, FCP, or Premiere Pro. Also easy with Resolve, except you either have to set up a dedicated Resolve project server or use Blackmagic Cloud. Both are extra steps and hassle. So if you are a Premiere shop, it’s less likely hat you’ll make that change.

    As far as an editor cutting in Resolve and sending that project to a colorist/finishing editor using Resolve – I’ve done that and it wasn’t pretty. The various project settings in Resolve are very detailed and confusing to new users. This can completely trip you up. In addition, in my case, missing fonts caused all titles (created as Fusion effects) to show up blank on my system. No warning or flags or font substitutions. No roundtrip is perfect and for now, this also seems to be true of a Resolve – Resolve workflow.

    I don’t mean to belittle Resolve. It’s a great tool. I’m just not convinced that there’s any sort of shift to Resolve from other NLEs, nor that it’s particularly desirable. For some, it’s the right thing to do, but not for all.

    Oliver

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