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Quick Poll. So what’s your decision?
I’m not sure this forum has an actual poll function but I’m interested in what everyone’s decision has been- FCPX Or Not? Here’s my experience:
There’s a lot of talk about FCPX adding functions and becoming a fully rounded tool. However for me it will never be useable. I primarily edit narrative films and the lack of a source window takes FCPX out of the equation entirely. In my opinion a source window is essential for narrative work. I can get by without one for a coporate job but I don’t do enough of those- 1 or 2 a year to keep the coffers ticking over- that it’s worth keeping an up to date Mac around. Apple can add monitoring, multicam etc but it doesn’t help me. This is built as a single window system and I can’t work that way.
I’ve played with all the other major contenders and been surprised to find they are as capable as they are. Premiere is the faster FCP 7. AVID just didn’t run smoothly on my system. No idea why but I did like the basic feel of it. Lightworks is FUN. I would love to get deep into it but ultimately only an idiot trusts important work to beta software. EDIUS is the fastest, most intuitive software I’ve ever used. I just love that I can chuck any frame rate, any format into the same time line, add effects and never have to render. Inconceivable to someone who learnt their trade on FCP. That said, it’s useless as far as graphics go and probably not of much interest for corporate work.
Anyway that’s where I sit and at this point I’d be surprised if Apple could do anything to change my mind. Which side do you fall on?
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53 Replies
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[Dominic Deacon] “Anyway that’s where I sit and at this point I’d be surprised if Apple could do anything to change my mind. Which side do you fall on?”
So why ask? No NLE will do everything well. You pick what works for you, your projects and your clients and adapt accordingly. For example, you can do virtually anything with Symphony or Media Composer, but a DS or Smoke editor will never accept it as a finishing tool. FCP X will evolve and get better. It will come closer to offering the demands of many pro editors. Some will plunge in and others will continue to shun it. From your description of your likes, it sounds like EDIUS plus After Effects would be the right mix. In my own case, I’ve routinely gone back and forth between Avid products and various FCP versions since 1.0. I don’t see that changing in the short run.
Oliver
Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com -
I am sticking with FCP7 for the immediate future. I did purchase the half-price Adobe Premium package, but mainly for Photoshop and After Effects. I will play around a bit with Premiere Pro to get comfortable with it and probably also purchase FCPX at some future date. But for now, FCP7 works just fine, so that is where I will do the bulk of my editing.
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I agree with Oliver. The poll option needs an “all of the above.”
In 3D, it’s very common for artists to bounce back and forth between applications because each package has different strengths and weaknesses. Look at Terra Nova — it’s modeled on Luxology Modo, animated on Autodesk Maya, and rendered on Newtek LightWave. Some shots are composited on Adobe After Effects, and some are composited on The Foundry’s Nuke.
Why should editorial be different? FCP Classic, FCPX, Avid, Premiere Pro — they all have different strengths and weaknesses. They’re appropriate for different needs and in different workflows. Why limit yourself to one?
Edius has been widely overlooked in all this discussion, but you’ve made it sound interesting. Maybe I’ll take a look at that, too.
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 -
I used EDIUS for about five years up until going with FCP in 2007. I loved it. Rendering was so rare, it was as if I thought there was a problem with my Windows computer every time it was required. Unfortunately, EDIUS didn’t have motion graphics and other software packaged as a suite. I needed something better, and bought Final Cut Studio.
I’ve liked FCP for the last four years. My only complaints were the frequent, slow rendering, and Motion crashing far too often. I had hoped FCP 8 would help solve some of those problems.
After seeing FCPX, I went with Premiere Pro and After Effects. I didn’t want to switch, but FCPX wasn’t going to cut it for me. (I’m glad to hear that I’m not the only one who wants a source monitor.) I took the risky step a few weeks ago of undertaking a significant project in PPro / AE without having spent too much time at all learning how to use them. It was a very pleasant surprise, to say the least. Yes, I missed a few things about FCP and Motion, but things went very well and the project was completed quite satisfactorily. Of course, it took longer to complete due to my lack of experience with it, but there’s a learning curve to everything. (I’ll bet the FCPX learning curve would have been significantly longer.) I absolutely love the integration between PPro and AE. (I hated having to work in Motion with FCP closed, or risk another irritating crash.) I also love not needing to render very often.
So, I’ve happily moved on to PPro and AE. I’m planning to spend lots more time learning them, and I think I’ll end up liking them even more.
On a side note, I’ve been waiting Apple to update the Mac Pro to the Sandy Bridge processor. (I’ve been using a MacBook Pro these last four years.) I sure hope they don’t EOL the Mac Pro like they did FCP.
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i made the switch to back to Media Composer. Was a natural choice because its what i use at work most of the time, and it was finally affordable and useable on my home setup.
To me the lack of a source moniter is also what kills it for me. That and the lack of tracks, mostly audio. I could getu sed to a magnetic timeline but those two things are majorshowstoppers to me.
Neil Goodman: Editor of New Media Production – NBC/Universal
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Using the FCPX, PPro 5.5. and the Avid 5.5 trial, I came to the conclusion that we didn’t know how good we had it with FCP 7. If my job situation does not force me to switch to a PC platform, I am going to run as a FCP 7/X user. I have a new appreciation for 7 and a great love for X, though to be truly useful to me it needs multicam, and video out.
My big concern at this point is that when FCPX finally does talk to the AJA cards, it won’t be usable to to my 3 year old Kona Lhe. This happened with MC 6.0, and could happen with FCPX,
If I do go to a PC workflow, I would push hard with the powers that be for a Avid, BMD/AJA system.
don walker
texarkana, texasJohn 3:16
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[Walter Soyka] “Edius has been widely overlooked in all this discussion, but you’ve made it sound interesting. Maybe I’ll take a look at that, too.”
I haven’t give a try to Edius because runs only on PCs, but four or five years ago I saw a massive migration from PP to Edius in this remote and peculiar market.
rafael -
I don’t use Edius because I’m a mac guy (now), but Edius is a beast. I never learned to edit so fast on a foreign editing software as I did with Edius. It’s so fast it literally feels like I am working with analog tape. Never waited for my computer to catch up…and that was with an older Core 2 Quad processor. I can only imagine what it would be like with a modern machine.
Edius is actually what delayed me adopting Premiere Pro for a long time.
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I’m waiting for Speed Razor to come back.
Jason Jenkins
Flowmotion Media
Video production… with style! -
FCPX for most primary work, FCP7 for broadcast finishing and multicam.
I downloaded Avid MC6 today, quite excited about the new interface quite disappointed to see it looks almost entirely the same as the old interface I first used all those years ago.
“My Name is Steve and I’m an FCPX user”
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