The one good thing about FCP_X

[H. Spencer young]

That doesn’t sound like a paid advertisement at all!

HSY
http://www.hspenceryoung.com

[Bob Tompkins]

Neil….do you work with J.R. Griffin at NBC?

[Neil Goodman]

hahah , sorry guys, wasnt meant to sound like an advertisement, im just pretty stoked at the moment.

No i dont work with that person, sorry man.

Neil Goodman: Editor of New Media Production – NBC/Universal

[Marvin Holdman]

Funny, some folks have pointed out that Apple’s main motivation to make software is to sell Apple hardware. Given the recent migration to other NLE’s it would seem FCPX is most effective at selling other vendors software.

Bad plan, or no plan?

Marvin Holdman
Production Manager
Tourist Network
8317 Front Beach Rd, Suite 23
Panama City Beach, Fl
phone 850-234-2773 ext. 128
cell 850-585-9667
skype username – vidmarv

[Chris Harlan]

Agreed. Over the years, the effect of FCP on Avid has been terrific, as well. I think without FCP we would have been stuck with something like 2.8 forever. I really like 5.5 and am looking forward to 6, which we will see in December, I’ve been told.

[Bill Davis]

We’ll likely know in about 3 years whether this public pronouncement is prescient or short sighted.

“…one good thing?”

Sounds extremely short sighted to me.

You’ve decided that the FCP strip and rebuild is 99.9% useless and .1% worthwhile. I accept that this is your reality based on what you need to do today. But I also think it’s limiting to consider what you do today as the ideal template for what the market is going to force you to do tomorrow.

The cloud is coming. Workflows MUST change. Look at the release attributes of Windows 8 if you don’t believe me. Agility will likely trump traditions. Ask the FLASH community who just learned that Windows 8 doesn’t support it. I’m pretty sure we’ll all need to learn and operate more than one instrument in order to secure seats in the media orchestras of tomorrow.

Maybe Adobe will actually end up being the agile and innovative editing platform of the future. Nobody knows for sure.

What we do know is that they are NOT the first company that took the astonishingly risky step of gutting and re-imagining the wholesale foundations of their code base in order to leverage what the media landscape might be in the future.

Every day studying FCP-X tells me it’s a new tool for a new age. I might be absolutely wrong. But I’m also NOT stopping my exploration. If for no other reason that when I jettisoned my fear of what was different, I finally starting seeing what about it might be a lot better.

For example I recently stumbled on a chart showing CPU allocation that showed that the code in FCP-X is a VERY minor CPU cycle drain where technology like Flash GULPS cycles like a binge drinker. Will that be critical as we move into a new generation of mobile processors and an increasingly Win8/iOS world?

Admittedly, I don’t occupy a seat where production efficiency is everything. If I did, I might feel precisely like you do. FCP-X is NOT a “buy it and get back to where you were in editing efficiency in 2 weeks” tool. It requires a LOT of revised thinking and a WHOLE lot of learning in order to operate efficiently.

But it’s also instructive to note that a whole lot of people are starting to understand what it’s unique strengths are and are starting to see where it can leverage success.

Short game or long game? In golf, you can’t win without both. Perhaps the same is true for media manipulation?

Just food for thought.

“Before speaking out ask yourself whether your words are true, whether they are respectful and whether they are needed in our civil discussions.”-Justice O’Connor

[Bernard Newnham]

“The cloud is coming. Workflows MUST change. Look at the release attributes of Windows 8 if you don’t believe me. Ask the FLASH community who just learned that Windows 8 doesn’t support it. “

If it’s going to take HD video, it had better be a very fast moving cloud. In any case, a lot of people aren’t going to want to send their expensive rushes out into who-knows-where where who-knows-who can hack it. Also the stuff about Windows 8 isn’t true. ZDNet says –

“The Windows update will come with one version of IE for the operating system’s touch-friendly Metro interface, which debuted in Windows Phone 7, and one for the traditional Windows desktop interface. The latter will support Flash and other plug-ins, but the Metro-style IE10 will not, according to IE team leader Dean Hachamovitch.”

B

[Marvin Holdman]

Bill, I think it’s all well and good to say the future is coming, but to make a blanket pronouncement that not embracing this particular application (FCPX) is simply “short sighted” is, well, simplistic and not true. I don’t think anyone will argue that perhaps cloud based work is somewhere in the future, but I also think you must admit that this software is far from ready for it. Not to mention the bigger picture in which our current network infrastructure is FAR from being able to support ANY cloud based viability for anything but proxy editing.

That being said, I think the “clouds” that most of the people in our business will be using won’t be some third party server farm that we rent space at. Perhaps some kind of VPN solution that will make if viable to have more mobility to where our edits and scrubs might take place, but I still believe that for our industry (let’s just say broadcast video and above) cloud distributed media assets won’t come for at least another 10 years. Provided we trust the current ISP’s to actually invest their profits in the future instead of merely reaping short term gains on existing, sub-par infrastructure (but that’s another subject).

This all comes back to why I think it’s foolish to “embrace” this pity of a program. While it might be worth a day or two of time invested, trying to incorporate it into any existing workflows is a fools errand. There is NO WAY you can know how long it will take for this thing to have the features needed to be productive. It is so vastly different from the interface and terminology side that it is simply incongruent with the existing industry. Why should anyone take the time to learn this magnetic timeline approach and in-bred meta convention? The likelihood of industry wide adoption of this bastard child is less than likely.

At the end of it, I really wonder why you would deride anyone who might feel anyway other than enthralled with this strange dysfunctional application (Bill Davis -“Sounds extremely short sighted to me.) I would propose that it is exactly the opposite and that say that very astute to take advantage of the current pricing structure of the competitors NLE’s due to this debacle. In three years time, what will happen will happen. In all likelihood, they will upgrade from whatever is purchased today based on the CURRENT capabilities of the choices at hand on THAT day. To struggle with a half-built application in the meantime is nothing short of silly and painful.

I agree that FCPX is worth a look. I agree that there are some good things about it. I think SOME of the features MIGHT gain widespread acceptance. I just don’t see how anyone can justify more than a 5% commitment of time to using this application in it’s current form. What i hear from most advocates is that it “has promise” and because of that they feel that something will be missed if they don’t try and incorporate it today. I don’t believe that it’s necessary, or even wise, to even try at the moment. When (or if?) it gets fleshed out most here will be able to learn it rather quickly. Look around, there are very bright people here. Nothing will be missed by NOT adopting it for the next three years.

You want to be an early adopter? Great, good for you. If you have the time and inclination, go for it. It will certainly be appreciated by everyone here in the long run. But to call people out because they don’t share your fascination with this half-baked application is just rude.

[Bill Davis] “Every day studying FCP-X tells me it’s a new tool for a new age. I might be absolutely wrong. But I’m also NOT stopping my exploration. If for no other reason that when I jettisoned my fear of what was different, I finally starting seeing what about it might be a lot better.”

I believe you are absolutely wrong to say that FCPX, in it’s current state, is “a new tool for a new age”. I think it MIGHT be one day, but this is not that day. I KNOW you are wrong about implication that most folks here “fear” change. You can’t work in this industry for ANY length of time and fear change. The implication that folks here “fear” what FCPX proposes for change is just silly. Most that I see simply wonder if this new way of thinking is pertinent. The jury is still out on that one, but it doesn’t appear that everyone is going to adopt magnetic timelines and Apple’s proprietary metadata formats as an industry standard anytime soon (or at all for that matter). The rest of the features seem fairly innocuous in terms of being fearful of their adoption. Things such as background rendering and format compatibility are all well and good, if they are included in a functional package. No one I know fears either of these concepts. Nice, sure, revolutionary? Not really. More evolutionary actually, and in all likelihood some form of these ideas are likely to appear in coming versions of the competitors NLE’s. I’m really not sure what you think people “fear” in this program, but the assumption of it is condescending to this herd.

Sorry for what might seem like getting personal, but it appears you enjoy engaging folks in this manner. Thought I’d return the favor one time.

Marvin Holdman
Production Manager
Tourist Network
8317 Front Beach Rd, Suite 23
Panama City Beach, Fl
phone 850-234-2773 ext. 128
cell 850-585-9667
skype username – vidmarv

[Neil Goodman]

While i understand It could be something great one day.. How long should we wait ? Theres definately some good things there, but the software is unuseable for me and lots of others. Aside the slew of missing features, the program is just unstable and a resource hog. FCP_X should be more efficient on my comp then FCP 7 but its just not. It crashes, bogs down, and is just riddled with bugs. Not too mention i think connected clips are the devil. To assume the footage above my main track needs to follow along, even when slipping and sliding is just ridiculous and aware of the workarounds but i shouldn’t need a workaround for something so simple.

That said, i do own FCP-X, bought it to learn it and get ahead of the curve in case it does one day become what we all want to it to be, but Media Composer is quickly becoming my prefrerred editor. its what i started on and knowing theres a future for it, gives me the motivation to dive in full time.

Neil Goodman: Editor of New Media Production – NBC/Universal

[David Lawrence]

John Gruber linked to this article today. While its focus is mainly on mobile platforms and pre-announcements, what the author says about the “just wait” mentality seems relevant to the situation with FCPX.

https://mobileopportunity.blogspot.com/2011/08/two-most-dangerous-words-in-technology.html

_______________________
David Lawrence
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