The NLE that keeps moving forward?

[Gary Huff]

[Bill Davis] “Working with FCP-X and it’s Proxy workflow, he specifically mentions techniques like using the built in “Ken Burns” effect to do moves in post involving his running single cam HD footage.”

Not sure what a proxy workflow has to do with this particularly, however, I don’t see what FCPX adds to this. I used Premiere CS5 with 4K Red One footage and had to reframe on a 2k timeline in order to have inserts that weren’t being shot. FCPX wasn’t even out then.

[Bill Davis]

[Gary Huff] “Not sure what a proxy workflow has to do with this particularly, however, I don’t see what FCPX adds to this. I used Premiere CS5 with 4K Red One footage and had to reframe on a 2k timeline in order to have inserts that weren’t being shot. FCPX wasn’t even out then.
“

It’s kinda funny, but the the moment I wrote this I said to myself that somebody here was going to pop up with the same old same old – “but Software X does that too so X is really nothing special!” – I honestly thought it was going to be Harlen. But not this time! (maybe he’s finally tired of making the same comment over and over??)

SO in the spirt of upholding my traditional response, here’s your (yikes) analogy…

Yep, and a V8 Truck and a Honda Prius both get you to the grocery store.

So what?

If you don’t understand the reality that a new tool that gets the job done might turn out to be worth exploring – it’s hopeless trying to convince you otherwise.

You can spend your whole life figuring that because matches create perfectly good flames – that means theres absolutely no good reason for the world to have Zippos, flares, or butane torches.

But please, some of us are simply interested in the ability to learn and enjoy new approaches to things.

My little, quick, affordable, fun, and amazingly capable software does 2K/4K via Proxy really well and has nice capabilities to make moves within those frames easy and fun!

The article was informative and interesting to folks like me (and presumably the readers of Broadcast Engineering) who might have come out of an era where it was typically unrealistic to even think of blowing up our poor SD rasters. When we first got to HD, same issue. Now that bigger rasters are the norm, we get some of the same capabilities with a MacBook Air and X and a $4500 camcorder.

Are you just upset because you likely had to invest in a RED workflow to do it and now Mr. Mullen talks about an alternative that sacrifices what might in some workflows be a non-critical level of quality in exchange for saving about $30 thousand bucks?

Wow.

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.

[Rafael Amador]

[Bill Davis] “It’s kinda funny, but the the moment I wrote this I said to myself that somebody here was going to pop up with the same old same old – “but Software X does that too so X is really nothing special!” – I honestly thought it was going to be Harlen. But not this time! (maybe he’s finally tired of making the same comment over and over??)”
Bill,
You could have started your post pointing out to and interesting article on FCPX/4K workflow, but when you start it with a subject that sounds to old propaganda (“The NLE that keeps moving forward?”), you should expect whatever answer from people that are not so in love with the application.as you are.
You suggest that FCPX is the only NLE that moves forward. Let others think different.
rafael

http://www.nagavideo.com

[Andrew Kimery]

Here is the link in to the article.
https://broadcastengineering.com/cameras-amp-lenses/shooting-quad-hd-hd-projects?page=1

I’m not sure why you tried to represent this as a FCPX-centric piece Bill when the article is really about the usefulness of reframing and FCPX, to me, just gets mentioned as an aside.

From the article:
“It’s also possible to edit Quad HD using Final Cut Pro and Media Composer (OS X and Windows).
.
.
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The advantages of shooting Quad HD are available whether one shoots with a low-cost ENG-style camera or a far more expensive cinema-style camera. The difference is one of image quality, not post production.”
Emphasis mine.

[Walter Soyka]

[Bill Davis] “It’s kinda funny, but the the moment I wrote this I said to myself that somebody here was going to pop up with the same old same old – “but Software X does that too so X is really nothing special!” – I honestly thought it was going to be Harlen. But not this time! (maybe he’s finally tired of making the same comment over and over??)”

It could have just as easily been me! 🙂

If the subject of this thread were “An NLE that keeps moving forward” then there would be no debate. However, you chose “THE NLE that keeps moving forward” (emphasis mine), so surely you can see how others may infer a suggestion that other NLEs are not moving forward.

I read the article. It’s not mainly about FCPX; it’s about shooting at a higher resolution than final output, so you can reframe in post. This was an optical trick when shooting on film, it was pretty commonly done with 1080 footage in a 720 raster. It was also famously done for Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, which was shot in 4.5K and 5K but finished in 4K. CreativeCOW Magazine had a nice article on their 4K workflow [link] with Michael Cioni last year.

Mullen himself also notes in his Broadcast Engineering article that you could cut quad HD in FCP Legend or Media Composer.

Conspicuously absent among his mentions is Premiere Pro, which also easily handles Quad HD (and beyond), and which, with a CUDA card, uses the ultra-high-quality Lanczos scaling algorithm. (This could be an interesting point of comparison for this workflow with FCPX. Unless someone knows off-hand what scaling algorithm FCPX uses, I’ll have to try to design a test for it.)

For the sake of completeness, I’ll note that you couldn’t (easily) do this in FCP Legend with true 4K, because it exceeds FCP’s 4000 px limit (quad HD at 3840×2160 squeaks in under the wire), and because FCP Legend’s scaling tended toward icky.

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]

[Bill Davis] ” I honestly thought it was going to be Harlen. But not this time! (maybe he’s finally tired of making the same comment over and over??)”

Ah, Bill. Maybe my calling you out on your egregious BS does get a little one note. Sorry about that. At least when I do that, I’m specifically responding to something you’ve written, and not defaming you as an aside to someone else. Lord knows, though; I’ve probably been guilty of that. Maybe even to you. If so, I apologize.

I would normally make some kind of comment here like: Me?! You’re the biggest tape loop on the whole forum! But, you’re right. What’s the point in repeating that over and over. It always sounds the same, and it never sinks in.

[Shane Ross]

I have a hard time taking anyone seriously as a professional to calls camera moves on stills “The Ken Burns Effect.”

(Them Bill, not you.)

Points directly at who the audience of the app is…not professionals, but consumers.

Shane
Little Frog Post
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def

[Morten Carlsen]

yes, overusing the KB effect looks like crap. However, imagine having a 1080p project which you plan on releasing as 720..

You’d create a 720 project and ingest the 1920 clips with spatial conform set to none… Here the KB effect becomes extremely interesting.
The KB effect is nothing but animating keyframes only automated… In above scenario the KB effect will save many many hours.

Consider the KB effect as animating several keyframes at once and that on motion pictures. I often use the KB effect to smooth a real camera move.
I’ll just “anti” the move but slightly less which will save me from smoothing the move via motion tracking in AE…

Just a thought

[Jeremy Garchow]

Hmm.

I thought Ken Burns produced high quality content and not facebook worthy consumer level drivel.

Here, you can listen to Ken Burns talk about the Ken Burns Effect:

https://www.pbs.org/pov/blog/2012/11/ken-burns-on-the-ken-burns-effect/

Jeremy

[Shane Ross]

He does produce high level stuff, and I like his response to the Pan and Zoom on pictures being attributed to him.

BUT…

Panning and Zooming on pictures has been happening LONG BEFORE Mr. Burns came along. It was called Motion Control (if a platter was used), moves on stills, panning and zooming…any number of things. Apple called it The Ken Burns effect in iMovie…a consumer level app…so that people would know what it was. Which people? Consumers who watched Ken Burns. Because us Pro’s already knew what it was.

Shane
Little Frog Post
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def