The Mother of All NLE Demos

[Bill Davis]

[Herb Sevush] “Which means that Oliver Peters and Steve Connor, according to Bill, have not”actually learned to use X at a professional level” because if they had they would feint at the thought of using any other NLE. So no matter what your actual experience, if you don’t love it you haven’t “learned it.” “

Wait, what?

Are you saying that Oliver and Steve are giving up on X and feel it has nothing to offer them? And that given the choice, they’d ALWAYS choose another NLE over X?

Because that’s kinda what you’re saying here.

Methinks you’re distorting the meaning of my words. I said “do not want to switch back” – I did NOT say “do not want to abandon all other approaches in favor of X”. Which is kinda seems what you’re trying to spin my comment into.

I think it’s fair to say that both Oliver and Steve find things of useful validity in X. But they are also required by the nature of their practices to keep a foot in multiple NLE camps. It’s a smart decision when you have to serve multiple NLE masters.

The more interesting question is how many folks have switched to X and truly learned it at a deep level – yet THEN decided to go back to another NLE as their primary tool.

I’m sure there are some. But in general, in the X communities where I largely hang out now, while there is always room for criticism, hope for new features, and even dissatisfaction, I know few who truly have any intention of switching back.

Plus, there IS a qualitative issue here as well. The guys working at the very high end of the X spectrum on big budget, high profile stuff – are among the MOST passionate about the new approach. It’s Cioni and Hodgetts and Matzdorff and Carter et al who are willing to go out front and admit that they prefer it to anything, and they’ve generally worked with a LOT of other NLEs.

So how do we jibe that with the voices who haven’t even taken the time to learn the program – yet who are always the primary voices calling it into question?

I’m going to cave in and say, (for the umpteenth time) that X is not perfect. Just to calm the frothing emotions of those who will read this and falsely cast it as me “once again” saying that “if you don’t use X, you’re foolish” – it seems there’s no way I can say something positive about X without it being about ME.

But none of those guys are ME. All of them have boatloads more brains, talent and experience than ME. But they generally say the same things I say. So even if I’m stupid and wrong, they might not be. And if that’s true, those of you who keep self-reinforcing the idea that seriously examining the X approach will always be unproductive and/or a waste of time – well, at least you now have another gentle prod that perhaps you’re decision to more or less ignore it, might have been a bit hasty.

That’s all.

Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com – video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.

[Jeff Markgraf]

Hi Herb.

I understood your response as being primarily about the blanket statements. Wasn’t intending to correct anyone so much as to redirect to what seemed like a more specific and useful discussion.

I don’t know if PPro is unique in having bussing. I’d certainly like to see it in X and in Avid. It would make it much easier for the increasing amount of “finish it in the NLE” I and others do.

While X can’t do this in its current state, I’m not so sure I’d call it impossible to do because of the trackless mode. Exporting roles as individual tracks is, in essence, assigning clips to specific busses. Right now it’s limited to exporting. I wonder why this function couldn’t be accessed inside the edit process, perhaps through a popup “mixer” or some kind of HUD. Maybe a plugin?

Obviously, moving a clip into or out of a track with a particular effect assigned to it is easy. But is it really so much harder to change a role on a clip? I know it’s a couple more keystrokes or mouse clicks, but what if it could be assigned to a hot key? Wouldn’t it then be pretty much the same as select and drag or shift up arrow, or whatever the PPro keystrokes are?

[Oliver Peters]

[Jeff Markgraf] “Avid doesn’t have it either, unless you can do it with RTAS (which I’ve never used). “

MC doesn’t have as sophisticated of a bussing structure as Premiere, but there is now a master buss. You can add real-time track-based filters to the master buss, as well as individual tracks. So adding compression/limiting to the full mix is easy.

Regarding X, when some complex mixing is required, I usually “pre-mix” to roles in X and then export as roles to Logic Pro X. Do a more involved mix there, master it and bring that back into X.

– Oliver

Oliver Peters Post Production Services, LLC
Orlando, FL
http://www.oliverpeters.com

[Herb Sevush]

[Jeff Markgraf] “While X can’t do this in its current state, I’m not so sure I’d call it impossible to do because of the trackless mode. “

Jeff –

I don’t think there’s anything that X can’t do. I also don’t think there’s anything Avid or Ppro can’t do – it’s all about how quick, how fast, how easy and most importantly how it syncs with your workflow.

Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
—————————
nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf

[Shawn Miller]

[Herb Sevush] “[Jeff Markgraf] “So one can look at this situation as a specific positive feature of PPro, or as a failing of all other current NLEs. And unrelated to the tracks vs. trackless discussion.”

First of all I don’t know for sure that no other NLE can do this, I’m thinking Vegas, with it’s history of starting as a DAW, might have a complete mixer built in.”

It does… bussing has been in the software since the Sonic Foundry days. It also has limited MIDI support.

Shawn

[Andrew Kimery]

[Bill Davis] “Sorry to be abrupt but I have to find some goats to sacrifice because I hear I’m now a Scientologist plus appear to have Catholic Priests somewhere lighting censors to send aloft incense born pleas for my immortal doom. Busy weekend ahead!”

And you were worried you weren’t going to be able to get your exercise in! 😉

[Andrew Kimery]

[Jeff Markgraf] ” But while the Avid shared workflow is rightly touted as a standard, I rarely hear any discussion of the precise daily must-have features. Perhaps the COW member best able to address this is Mark Raudonis, as he has direct experience with Avid and non-Avid large scale workflow.
“

I’ve never worked with Mark so I can’t speak to how his shows are run, but I’ve worked on a number of of reality shows on Avid/ISIS and I’ve worked at a few places that used FCP Legend in a shared storage, multi-editor environment (one place I worked at for nearly six years). For the TV shows I worked on I’d say the typical number of users (editors, producers, and AEs) working collaboratively was 18-24. For the non-TV content there wasn’t as much collaborate (basically users working off of shared storage but on different projects). After the 6yr stretch with FCP and Xsan (at a place where there wasn’t a lot of collaboration) I got a different gig that was on Avid and ISIS and, I’m not exaggerating, after the first night I was like, “Oh yeah, THIS is how a shared storage, multi-editor environment is supposed to function.” The FCP Legend places I worked at kicked out hundreds of hours of original content a year so of course FCP could work in a shared storage, multi-editor workflow but Avid just provides a smoother experience.

One of my favorite things about how Avid works in a shared environment is how you can manipulate Avid projects via the Finder. For example, lets say I’m working on a reality show with 11 other editors. Each episode has its own Avid project and 3 editors are working on episode 1, 3 on episode 2 and 3 on episode three. One day new b-roll comes in and needs to added to all the projects. First, the AEs ingest the new media into their project. Then they go to the Finder and drag & drop the b-roll bin from the AE project to all the episode projects. Finally, they send out an email to the editors letting them know the new b-roll is now in their projects. This all happens in the background so there is no disruption to the editors. There’s no sending of XMLs, no opening up of someone else’s project, just *poof* the new media magically appears in your project as you work.

Another advantage to Avid project structure (a folder in the Finder that contains folders and bins) is that you don’t have to worry about overall project size, just the size of your bins within the project. On one show I worked on each Avid project (1 project per episode) was around 12gigs and referenced between 35,000-40,000 pieces of media. Not a problem though because we kept the individual bins w/in the project a reasonable size.

If you are looking for less technical, more ‘art of the edit’ type advantages we can always talk about Avid’s great trim tool (which apparently is it’s own debate). 😉
https://provideocoalition.com/a-little-big-avid-media-composer-final-cut-pro-x-trimming-demonstration

[Jeff Markgraf] ” But it’s hardly unworkable or so cumbersome as to be impractical.

Given the many benefits I find with X, the lack of a Unity/ISIS shared project is far from a deal breaker. “

So keep using X. For someone else it might be a deal breaker so that person should use Avid and not X, or Resolve or Lightworks or PPro or FCP 7. My whole point with all of this is that there is no one size fits all solution. Users should look at their specific preferences, workflow needs, etc., and pick the NLE that best matches their unique situation. For example, I recently cut a documentary with Avid and it was a rough ride because Avid was not the right tool for that particular job, but if I was starting a shared storage, multi-editor gig tomorrow I’d probably want it to be on Avid.

I agree with your use of the term “elegant” because basically that’s all we are really talking about. For example, obviously all NLEs allow users to move media around the timeline but many people find the magnetic timeline in X a more elegant solution. FCP Legend and Avid have had multicam functionality for years, but the multicam implementations in FCP X and PPro are certainly more elegant solutions.

[Jeff Markgraf] “And even shared by Avid, if used without the very expensive ISIS add-on.”

The other large and mid-sized shared storage makers have reversed engineered this so you can get ISIS-like functionality on non-ISIS hardware. From what I understand it’s a bit of a cat and mouse game between Avid and the 3rd party venders. Avid will usually tweak the code each major release and then the venders have to reverse engineer it again and release an update.

[Jeff Markgraf] “Of course, a failing also of FCP Legacy, which, as I recall, never got the level of abuse X has, except perhaps by Avid users in the first few years. 😉
“

Avid users got abuse from film and linear editors, Premiere got abused, for decades, from Avid and FCP users. Nuke users abuse AE users who in turn abuse Motion users. Film users abused video users, but now that film is ‘dead’, high end video users, like Red users, abuse C300 users who cope by lashing out at DSLR users. 😉

There is nothing unique, out of ordinary or special about the current situation with X in that regard. At least in LA, FCP Legend didn’t start getting much respect until FCP 6 (so about 8yrs after initial release) and I know more than a few Avid editors that will probably always think FCP (any version) is second rate. Oh well.

[Andrew Kimery]

[Bill Davis] “What does that have to do with my point? I love and value Herb. But it’s been four years that he’s been kicking the metaphoracal tires on X and participating constantly in the “but can it do THIS better. Well, can it?” parade.”

It has to do with your point because Herb was just responding to Carsten’s open challenge to the board that X can do any workflow equally well, if not better than, other NLEs. When someone says, “Hey, tell me why you aren’t using X.” You can’t blame the other party for responding. Especially when the response is about a workflow said person does on a regular basis and it’s something that can’t be replicated in X.

Herb organizes his audio by tracks and applies effects to entire tracks. According to Carsten himself you there isn’t a corresponding workflow in X. Therefore X probably wouldn’t be a better fit for Herb than PPro. It’s not a criticism of X it’s just a fact. That’s why I don’t understand the resulting drama. Carsten ASKED the board a question and people (me, Herb, Oliver, etc.,) responded. Did we misunderstand? Was it a rhetorical question?

[Bill Davis]

Here’s what you (and perhaps Herb) are missing. You guys think in tracks because every system you’ve ever cut on has had tracks. Me too until 2011. It was the default. Dependable and understood. But limited. And nobody really ever questioned the limitations. Then X came along and some of us started seeing the extra possibilities of thinking trackless. Concepts like why the software needs to present the editor with 100 empty tracks for audio when you might not need a single one of them. Or perhaps why the video of the piano players hands needs to be separated from the sound of the piano by 25 video and audiotracks of other stuff – just to keep an arbitrary track chart working.

I know it’s a well understood system that developed over time and all that – but at some point, it’s possible that following rules designed for the days when electro-magnetic multitrack head stacks ruled the industry might be limiting when nearly nobody is using mag tape anymore.

Me? I just want to get my work done fast and well and not waste so much time and energy struggling against my NLE anymore. I didn’t realize that’s what my $299 was buying me. But looking back, turns out it was precisely that. YMMV.

Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com – video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.

[Carsten Orlt]

[Bill Davis] “I know it’s a well understood system that developed over time and all that – but at some point, it’s possible that following rules designed for the days when electro-magnetic multitrack head stacks ruled the industry might be limiting when nearly nobody is using mag tape anymore.

Me? I just want to get my work done fast and well and not waste so much time and energy struggling against my NLE anymore. I didn’t realize that’s what my $299 was buying me. But looking back, turns out it was precisely that. YMMV.”

Nicely said 🙂

Gotta admire everybody’s energy to keep discussing this. And if we are really really honest we all know that it doesn’t matter but for our ego’s 🙂

Happy editing
Carsten