-
Reconsidering FCPX in Hollywood
-
[Tim Wilson] “topics as wide-ranging as poetry, Connemara, VR, and Cashel Blue cheese, among many others. If I could find a way to work those into this forum”
Seriously? We’ve been WAY further OT than than that!
-
He’s not lying. I myself learnt of the Emu’s, the standing stones and the solar power cell trees himself and his good partner Nora enjoy day by day.
https://vimeo.com/user1590967
producer/editor.grading/motion graphics -
I came to this thread late, from the COW newsletter and have read most of the comments. It seems to me, as our venerable colleague Phillip Hodgetts once said, “We are not in the post business, we are in the business of making money for other people.” When they make succeed, we succeed and we have a client who will come back. You choose the tools best suited for the job at hand. You pick the best talent for the job at hand. Whatever gets the job done on time and on budget is what we need to be concerned about. If a talented picture editor wants to work on Media Composer or FCP X, then that should be accommodated if you want the best cut. If you are working with multiple editors and other artists in a collaborative workflow, you better get the tool that is most robust for that with the best technical support, especially if you are on a tight turnaround.
When you need to push reality through the pipeline, I think your best bang comes from Avid Media Composer with the Symphony option and the Baselight Colour plugin. On shared storage, Avid wins hands down. On huge projects with lots of bins and sources, Avid wins again. The projects open fast and they don’t slow down because bins are separate files from the project, accessible at the Finder or Explorer in the OS. This is the secret to Avid’s project sharing and it eliminates the possibility of a project becoming corrupted and unopenable. You just create a new project and drag your bins into it. Mind you, I cannot recall every having a corrupted project in Avid. If you transcode media (you don’t have to), then media location is consistent and predictable in Avid, there is an active database that doesn’t depend on the OS or need to be rebuilt every time the project is opened. Avid tends to keep you organized because unless you force it otherwise, you can depend on the location of the project and bin files.
If you are doing promos and sizzle reels, Premiere is probably the best choice because of the tight integration with After Effects. FCPX with Motion might satisfy some and Resolve 15 with Fusion integration may eventually kick the others in the a$$. Avid sucks in this department.
If you are doing documentaries. Avid with Phrase Find or FCPX with it’s keywords might be more helpful in keeping track of content.
If you are doing scripted, the clear winner is Avid Media Composer with Script Sync. Script Sync was not available for quite a few Media Composer versions and a lot of people stayed with an older version of Media Composer just to use Script Sync because it makes them do their job better with less stress. It was the right tool for the job. Avid projects are not version dependent, so you can go back and forth from newer to older versions, unlike all competitors.
Also consider when you are done the project and need to archive it with media. Avid MC and Adobe Premiere are far better choices because they will consolidate and trim the media to whatever you used plus handles. Unless something has changes, the only option I recall with FCP X is to store every frame of source media, even if you used 30 frames out of five minutes. That is not at all efficient for archive storage and retrieval, but for some people, they may prefer this.
Editing software is the cheapest part of the post-production equation and should never even be debated, just evaluated for the work at hand. I am a long standing Avid guy who also worked with Final Cut Pro Classic right from version one, but I will also work in Premiere and I have worked with FInal Cut Pro X. Since I focus on colour and finishing more these days, I love working with DaVInci Resolve. For what it is worth, the best round trip into Resolve I ever had was from FCPX and Premiere was the worst. Avid can be flawless or a complete disaster. There are a few protocols you need to follow with Avid and then it is nearly painless.
To say there are people who refuse to change is not at all fair. Change for the sake of change is not helpful. There are productions that won’t even update to a newer version of their weapon of choice because what they are using works and they can’t afford to miss delivery milestones due to new surprises and gotchas. Beta software? Not if you want to meet the delivery.
At the end of the day, did you enjoy your work, were you able to meet the client’s expectations and did both the client and you make money from the job? If so, you are on the right track. If you are trying to force Mac or Windows, FCP X or Premiere down everyone’s throat because of some idealogical or illogical reason, you are making a huge mistake. I’ll use the best tool for the job. I’ve recommended all three of the Big A’s to different projects at different times. You don’t use a Lawnboy to trim the grass on a sports field, even though it cuts grass; you find the right machine fitted to the job.
Dennis Kutchera
Online Editor / Colourist
Halifax – Toronto -
The only thing I can add to this discussion is I started on final cut #1 through studio 3 and then, went on to use Final cut X. I’m in the process of using Resolve more and more as of 13 and 14 for edits, color, and audio. Last year, I had to use my old copy of Studio 3 on a particular section of a project that needed very delicate audio scrubbing … it succeeded where Final Cut X did not.
Dean Harrington DCS CCVS
-
Look,
You guys are all legends, and I’ve yet exist, but the word I don’t think I’ve heard is “disposable” for Apple software. Starting on 10.6.8, I didn’t think I was getting in on the high point. All we wanted was a 64bit FCP, with maybe some more resolution options. EOL was the option- for the whole suite. So I can never take Apple seriously for any product they whimsically produce today. It’s not hate anymore, as soon as ProRes doesn’t matter things will really change…
Michael E Locke
Roxie Summit Productions, LLC
-
[Michael Locke] “You guys are all legends, and I’ve yet exist, but the word I don’t think I’ve heard is “disposable” for Apple software.”
Because FCP 7 still works, FCPX is quite a few years old now, Apple are clearly still committed to it – disposable doesn’t really apply!
Perhaps if you compare it Avid, but in that case everything is disposable, personally I like things shaken up every few years. If I wanted glacial change I’d still be editing on Avid
-
[Dennis Kutchera] “At the end of the day, did you enjoy your work, were you able to meet the client’s expectations and did both the client and you make money from the job? If so, you are on the right track. If you are trying to force Mac or Windows, FCP X or Premiere down everyone’s throat because of some idealogical or illogical reason, you are making a huge mistake. I’ll use the best tool for the job. I’ve recommended all three of the Big A’s to different projects at different times. You don’t use a Lawnboy to trim the grass on a sports field, even though it cuts grass; you find the right machine fitted to the job.”
Brilliant, even gets a lawnmower analogy in, thanks Dennis. I might slightly disagree with some of your conclusions but that last para nails it!
-
To me Michael really hits the nail on the head. it’s been a very interesting conversation thread to read now seven years into FCPX. Apple has failed in a fundamental marketing issue which is technical evangelism of their product . they have left it to Larry Jordan and a few others to make their case, and as an ex user of Final Cut Pro I was shocked when Apple simply abandon the product and told us to move on to a new product that was essentially still in beta. There was no roadmap from Final Cut Pro to Final Cut X. Apples insistence on silence before launch only works in the consumer world. For corporations and other professionals, roadmaps are a necessity, so planning is able to be done, for budgeting purposes primarily. The lack of trust has just recently been shown again as we start to hear that the Macintosh operating system team has been dismantled. This can only point to one thing, that Apple is betting the whole farm on the iOS operating system. The fact that Apple is not discussing this publicly is another example of poor marketing on their point to this piece sector of the market. The latest products in the laptop market from them are underwhelming from a professional standpoint. The idea of any of us who were professionally whether a one-man band or a major editing shop in Los Angeles to consider running our business on iOS for editing is just absurd at this moment in time. The limitations of this consumer operating system is evident anyone that tries to work deeper than email or Facebook posts on it . it would be trivial for me to learn final cut Pro X. It’s even more trivial for me to buy it. But the notion of investing in an editing suite which is what we all do means we have to believe that the company is not going to go out of the market tomorrow. Apple has done little to convince us that they won’t do another FCP switch again. We know that for all their faults, Avid and Adobe exist to produce professional products for editors. Apple does not. They could dump us all tomorrow, and it would not affect their bottom line at all.
Al
-
This is a great example with snowboarding. I work in the sports action industry, when the snowboard came out everyone on ski’s laughed, calling it a gimmick, no shops would sell it, ski resorts banned it. It took a long time from it’s original inception to get going, but man when it caught on it took over and dominated, now look at where the snowboard is today. Every kid wants a snowboard, ski’s are for old people, at least that’s what my nephews say.
FCPX is a great tool, If people don’t want to use it or learn it it’s there loss.
-
[Al Bergstein] “The lack of trust has just recently been shown again as we start to hear that the Macintosh operating system team has been dismantled. “
Not sure that’s actually true?
[Al Bergstein] “This can only point to one thing, that Apple is betting the whole farm on the iOS operating system. The fact that Apple is not discussing this publicly is another example of poor marketing on their point to this piece sector of the market. “
They have, they’ve said they’re not! https://www.macrumors.com/2018/04/19/tim-cook-still-opposed-to-merging-mac-ipad/
[Al Bergstein] “The latest products in the laptop market from them are underwhelming from a professional standpoint. “
Products are fine, just need inelegant dongles
[Al Bergstein] “Apple has done little to convince us that they won’t do another FCP switch again.”
Well they’ve just released iMac Pro, also going to release a new Mac Pro as well, would be a bit stupid of them to discontinue FCPX after doing that
[Al Bergstein] “They could dump us all tomorrow, and it would not affect their bottom line at all.”
True, but it also wouldn’t affect mine as I would simply switch to Premiere or Resolve.
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up