Premiere as NLE of choice, catching flak from peers?

[Ramon Dailey]

I’m a Premiere user who has never used Final Cut, so I can’t speak to the technical differences. However, it seems that there is really only one question you have to ask yourself… well, how did I get here? Wait, that’s not it. Do you get the results you want using Premiere Pro? If so, who cares what others think.

The only possible downside I see is if Final Cut is the new standard out there. It may be harder to find work with experience on Premiere Pro rather than Final Cut Pro. I’d be interested to know if that’s true.

[Harm Millaard]

Any NLE is a tool to get an editing job done, just like a car is a tool to get you from A to B.

Some might prefer a sports car, like Porsche or Ferrari, others prefer a sedan like a Bentley, Lexus or Maybach, still others prefer a SUV like a Cadillac SRX or Lincoln Navigator and still others prefer hybrids or compacts.

All have there different reasons and arguments, but ultimately the choice is a personal one. The relevant question for deciding on a specific brand is whether it does the job for an amount you’re willing to spend and in a fashion you like. All other opinions can be disregarded.

Harm Millaard

[Jared Flynn]

Thanks, Harm. That’s just exactly how I feel as well. Premiere’s a smooth system that has its particular foibles, as is Final Cut, as is your Vegas or Pinnacle or Avid, etc, etc.

I guess it’s a mysterious thing, platform wars. FCP seems to be fast-approaching Industry Standard status, and you’ve got to wonder what brought it there. Not because it’s not deserved of course, but any other platform could be just as deserving.

I think the problems arise when folks try to decide whose platform is the Cadillac and whose is the Volvo. 🙂

Thanks again,
Jared

[Jared Flynn]

Thanks Ramon. Yes, from my experience as well, FCP’s main advantage is its industry standard status. It’s sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy, isn’t it?

Work could definitely be tougher to find for a Premiere user than a Final Cut user purely by virtue of the fact that clients feel more comfortable receiving deliverables in Quicktime, or perhaps are more likely to have Macs themselves and already have access to Final Cut. So projects are perhaps more transportable, but it’s interesting to consider how that became the case, given the vast differences between PC and Apple market shares.

-Jared

[Mike Cohen]

Mac vs PC – Betamax vs VHS – the endless spitting match continues.
The bottom line big picture question is, can you make money with it?
If the answer is yes, then use what you like using.
if the answer is no, then perhaps you are in a segment of the business in which FCP is what you need. You need to compare apples to apples (the fruit, not the computer).
If one guy says “FCP is the industry standard. You can’t get a job using Premiere.” Perhaps this is true for some jobs, but then you talk to a guy who says “We use Premiere every day and make all of our projects with it and our clients are happy” then that answers your question.
Mike

[Vince Becquiot]

One thing I like about Premiere is that it is trying to move towards many native formats. That speeds things up many times over FCP, but the downside it’s that it’s a little less stable.

But that’s that main diffence between PC and Macs isn’t it?

Takes a risk and be in control or stay safe and follow the rules, including waiting for that lengthy conversion to Quicktime.

Vince

[Jeff Kosmicki]

FCP is what Avid was in the ’90s – a proprietary system with little to no variation (or soul). Our industry has always liked that, it’s really only been 20 years or so since the whole industry was proprietary with linear editing.
A lot of editors like to walk into a suite and have it look and work like every other suite they’ve been in. I guess if you are a freelance editor, that has some advantages. I own my own shop and equipment, so I never had the urge to look like the guys down the street, and my producer clients don’t seem to care.
Honestly, I would be embarrassed to run a professional business with Macs, all of those TV ads with Justin Long as the guy living in his parents basement calling the PC a nerd for having a job. To me, Apple’s message is “Hey, we’re a toy company making Ipods and Iphones”.

Jeff Kosmicki
http://www.toyraygun.net

[Jared Flynn]

I really appreciate your insight, Jeff. I’ve only been on the scene for a little while so I’m glad to gain some more background. And I feel the same way about the idea of running a company with all Macs– my current employer does, with the exception of our Avid Adrenaline. My background was in computer science before video, so feeling free to tinker, upgrade, and/or repair a computer has always been more attractive to me than a glassy case.

Not to knock Macs specifically; they’re very good at what they do, although I’ll never be able to wrap my mind around the price. As a tech support consultant I worked with a lot of Macs, and they serve their users exceedingly well. But then, so do the PCs I’ve helped service!

Thanks again for your thoughts,
Jared

[Steven L. gotz]

If you need to share footage with an FCP user, you are better off using FCP. And apparently there are export issues with no OMF support in Premiere Pro.

So, basically, a one man shop can do anything with Premiere Pro that he can do with FCP, but sharing is a different issue.

Me? I use Premiere Pro successfully and have no urge to switch over. But I am not inclined to say bad things about FCP. Both programs have shortcomings and features that the other does not have.

Steven

https://www.stevengotz.com

[Alex Udell]

Hi…

I’ve talked about this before.

I recently re-joined the creative community after several years of working in a sales, training, and product demonstration capacity, so I’ve worked on every major editing platform.

Yes, Premiere does get it’s share of knocks from industry peers. I’m was guilty of it myself. Adobe has themselves to blame for some of this. Premiere wasn’t good for a long time. Endlessly crashy with an unconventional editing metaphor and early A/V sync (pre DV era) issues. Combine this with Adobe’s propencity to bundle Premiere for free with every capture device didn’t do them any favors in terms of building cache with the product.

That changed with the introduction of Premiere Pro. New guts, a more conventional editing approach, and some good press combined with better marketing really helped Adobe a lot. But it takes time for the word of the improvement to ripple thru the industry. So a lot of people hang on to the old notions of what Premiere was.

I was required to learn Premiere Pro with Matrox Axio for my last job. At first I was a bit snobby about it, but my attitude changed quickly.

The company I am with now is an entirely Adobe facility with multiple systems running on a SAN. I edit happily away on Premiere (and Matrox) every day, and it works really well.

Now looked at from a marketshare point of view….In some cases, Apple may be a better choice. Apple does have a hot hand right now in terms of industry attention. If the work you do is work you finish…Adobe is great. If clients expect to walk away with anything other than a finished master project or file, meaning they want Project assets to take to other facilities….well then Apple may be more appealing, simply because more facilities have it, people can take their assets more places. There is one exception to this this beyond Premiere. More Pros may be editing with FCP, but Adobe does own the rest of the pipeline. After Effects, and Photoshop are the norm in most facilities and Apple’s Motion (and other bundled products) have not displaced them.

As I have used both FCP and Premiere Pro, there are any number of things I can say I like better about Premiere Pro, but I have also sent many feature requests to Adobe regarding things I’ve seen in FCP that could be implemented in PPro to make it even better.

So Adobe is plenty capable. Don’t let that dissuade you. Take a look at the kind of work you want to do (self contained or shared) and let that guide you.

Good luck!

Alex