Premiere wish list

[Tim Kolb]

[Ron Shook] “I’m no more a coder than you are, but I made that possibly presumptuous statement based on what an expert NLE coder told me several years ago. That sort of thing often doesn’t get done because it’s not a glamorous new feature unlikely to find its way into a “what’s new and exciting” list and because it’s no fun, coding grunt work.”

I can see making each function *available* to be assigned a shortcut key…that would seem like that should be easy I guess…I was thinking about the shortcuts in the default map that would have to be displaced and thinking that it could end up being a nightmare to make exactly the choice you describe…what is important enough to need a key shorcut?

…we can’t even decide what the most important missing feature is in this thread… 🙂

TimK,

Kolb Syverson Communications,
Creative Cow Host,
2004-2005 NAB Post Production Conference
Premiere Pro Technical Chair,
Author, “The Easy Guide to Premiere Pro” http://www.focalpress.com
“Premiere Pro Fast Track DVD Series” http://www.classondemand.net

[Ron Shook]

Tim,

[Tim Kolb] “I can see making each function *available* to be assigned a shortcut key…that would seem like that should be easy I guess…I was thinking about the shortcuts in the default map that would have to be displaced and thinking that it could end up being a nightmare to make exactly the choice you describe…what is important enough to need a key shorcut?”

Now we’re getting somewhere. (g)

You’ve said many times, and rightfully so, that no one NLE will ever meet everyone’s needs, but no one NLE has to be constructed to force the editor to work one way or another, and they can be constructed with maximum user preferences, so that the user can customize to something appropriate to their preferred style or the type of project they are working on. The common Adobe graphical structure of tool bars, drop down menues and such that make the products relatively easy to learn and use by the ocassional user are also the elements that often stand in the way of efficient use by the full time editor, for example, accessing a function through layers of drop down menus with a mouse as apposed to hitting a key. For one editor accessing that function may only be necessary once or twice a project if at all, so having it buried in menus is no big deal, but the next editor may be cutting something that involves accessing that function or macro series of functions over and over and it becomes a big deal, accompanied by knashing of teeth and cursing. If the macro functionality and keyboard assignability of all functions is available, including being able to shift focus by keystroke to any part of the interface, the sophistated user can make this available to his/her project on a case by case basis, and…, even more importantly to the broader base of the more casual user, a cottage industry can develop to deliver noodly editing tools that take the pressure off of the development team to deliver these same tools.

Case in point, Sony Vegas: Perhaps the one thing that has driven the software as much as all the efforts of the Vegas development team was the inclusion of a scripting tool, a somewhat more complicated thing but with the same design goals as what I’m suggesting here. It gave Vegas low cost, sophisticated multicam and other automated editing tools long before any development team could have delivered them, and…gave the user base very good expectations for rapid help in frustrating areas of the interface without all the pressure coming down on the development team. It builds loyalty as well as functionality.

BTW, I hate multiple keystrokes to access functions or anything that takes my right hand off the mouse, but there are ways around that. (g) I’ll give you a call next week.

Ron Shook