Smoke 2013 Changes Everything

[Lance Bachelder]

Will do – they did mention the Avid Artist stuff but I’ll see about the other brands.

Lance Bachelder
Writer, Editor, Director
Irvine, California

[Lance Bachelder]

Yeah we have a Smoke keyboard on the system in the booth. I’d probably keep these “training wheels” and learn the Smoke way when the time comes…

Lance Bachelder
Writer, Editor, Director
Irvine, California

[Lance Bachelder]

Yeah they did some pretty cool compositing and tracking n the demo today – better than anything I’ve ever seen in AE. And the CC tools rock and they simplicity of right-clicking to add effects is really nice

Lance Bachelder
Writer, Editor, Director
Irvine, California

[Michael Gissing]

Thanks Lance. I couldn’t be physically further away from NAB but I am getting lots of good info. What an exciting time.

[Walter Soyka]

[Craig Seeman] “That does it. I’m sticking with a “traditional NLE” like FCPX. How can it not have JKL and be considered professional? It’s a toy. It’s iSmoke.”

I’d have thought iSmoke would be Smoke on Mac with the FCP key bindings…

I get the joke you’re making, but I don’t think anyone dissed FCPX over its hotkeys. C/Space/V is a bit easier than JKL when your right hand is holding a Wacom pen.

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

[Chris Harlan]

[Walter Soyka] “I get the joke you’re making, but I don’t think anyone dissed FCPX over its hotkeys. C/Space/V is a bit easier than JKL when your right hand is holding a Wacom pen.
“

I believe the relevant quote from Walter B.’s brief overview might be “In fact, Autodesk has provided a Final Cut Pro 7 keyboard mapping preset so your years of muscle memory will work with the new Smoke 2013.” I’m guessing jkl will find its way.

[Walter Soyka]

[Chris Harlan] “I believe the relevant quote from Walter B.’s brief overview might be “In fact, Autodesk has provided a Final Cut Pro 7 keyboard mapping preset so your years of muscle memory will work with the new Smoke 2013.” I’m guessing jkl will find its way.”

Smoke has offered FCP hotkeys for at least the last few releases (and possibly since its Mac launch) — but from my limited time on Smoke (and all pre-Smoke 2013), the default key bindings make quite a bit of sense once you take a little time to learn them.

In the example above, JKL is just too damn hard to do if you’re right-handed and are wielding a Wacom pen. Much as Mac OS hotkeys are built for the left hand while the right hand is on the mouse, most of the common Smoke hotkeys seem to assume your left hand on the keyboard and your right hand operating the tablet.

Personally, I think there’s a lot of value in learning an app’s native hotkeys. When functionality doesn’t match 100% from app to app, I find close-but-no-cigar key bindings to be absolutely maddening. In my opinion, it’s better to go through the pain of learning the new shortcuts once and make new muscle memory than discovering over and over again that a particular key doesn’t work quite the way you expect every time you hit it.

But my original post wasn’t really about hotkeys — it was mainly a response to that tired FCPX/professional argument that got drudged up again, and in a thread that has nothing to do with FCPX to boot.

We need to move past this. It’s needlessly divisive, and we have far more interesting things to talk about.

Anyone who keeps declaring FCPX professional should acknowledge that FCPX earned a poor reputation among broadcast/film/conform/complex-workflow/whatever professionals with a launch release that simply excluded current workflows without providing working alternatives. It’s ok if FCPX isn’t the best choice for some people. They have good reasons.

Whoever it is on the other side declaring FCPX is flat out unprofessional (though I am not sure who this is) should accept that FCPX has come a long way since launch. It’s ok if FCPX is the best choice for some people. They have good reasons.

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

[Chris Harlan]

[Walter Soyka] “n the example above, JKL is just too damn hard to do if you’re right-handed and are wielding a Wacom pen. Much as Mac OS hotkeys are built for the left hand while the right hand is on the mouse, most of the common Smoke hotkeys seem to assume your left hand on the keyboard and your right hand operating the tablet.
“

Being a lefty, I always find this a little discouraging, and yet I’m used to it.

[Walter Soyka] “Personally, I think there’s a lot of value in learning an app’s native hotkeys. When functionality doesn’t match 100% from app to app, I find close-but-no-cigar key bindings to be absolutely maddening. In my opinion, it’s better to go through the pain of learning the new shortcuts once and make new muscle memory than discovering over and over again that a particular key doesn’t work quite the way you expect every time you hit it.
“

I agree completely. I generally remap sparingly, and only after I’ve gotten the default down.

[Walter Soyka] “t was mainly a response to that tired FCPX/professional argument that got drudged up again, and in a thread that has nothing to do with FCPX to boot.

We need to move past this. It’s needlessly divisive, and we have far more interesting things to talk about.
“

Agreed.

I’m curious what you think of the Symphony cross-grade in the light of this.

[Dave Boampong]

Have they removed Paint from Smoke 2013?

[Alan Okey]

A Paint node is clearly visible in the Connect FX node bin in the feature videos on the Smoke for Mac website. Whether or not desktop paint is available isn’t clear. I think it’s highly unlikely that they would remove paint functionality altogether.