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Where is editing going
In accordance with Shane Ross’s desire that we not muck up the FCP-X for documentaries thread with a side discussion I’m starting this thread with a little cross banter that happened on that thread between Bill and Myself. Feel free to join in –
Bill Davis – For many reasons. I still think the basic truth is do you want to hang on to where editing ideas have traditionally been – or do you see value in where those ideas might be going?
Herb Sevush – There are many places where editing is “going” and X represents a slice of that – but not the entirety of it, not by a long shot.
Bill Davis – OK Herb, I’ll play. Hit me with the top few aspects of Premiere Pro that have changed edit workflow for you in the last 3 years. I’m ready to learn about how they have altered their approach to re-imagine how editing should be improved for the current, almost exclusively file-based era. I’m ready to learn.Well I suggest that first you need to learn that the field of video editing is not limited to the 3 A’s, so any sense of “where editing ideas might be going” has to allow for the entire breadth of tools available, even those tools that are not (gasp) available on OSX. Vegas (whose parentage was an Audio DAW which led to some unique approaches to video editing), Edius, Resolve, and Lightworks are all actively improving and innovating so anyone trying to get a sense of where things are going would have to have some knowledge of these tools as well as the 3A’s. While I have a much broader sense of the field than you, with your FCP blinders on, I am also not equipped to make such a complete survey, which is why I don’t make the kind of broad based pronouncements you seem to be so fond of.
Secondly I have only been back on Ppro for a little over a year, so I will have to limit my remarks to that time. However here is what I as the “new ideas” coming from Adobe.
Creative Cloud – similar to the polarizing effect of the magnetic timeline this new idea has a lot of haters, however indisputably CC has changed the rate of change in developing video applications. Much as I don’t like the inability to get off the train, I do appreciate how fast I’m moving down the tracks. Every 6 months or so I get amazing new tools thrown at me by Adobe, to the point where it’s a major problem keeping up with the pace. Full fledged grading system within the application, followed by morph cut, followed by the ability to export media at any length with speed changes made on the fly, followed by the ability to have the software automatically recut a piece of music to a desired length, followed by a tool that will create an automated voice over from supplied text. While any one of these tools might be no more useful that a 3D text tool, the speed, rapidity and variety of the appearance of these enhancements supplies the very sort of buzz that is so often heard by X proponents – gee this is making editing fun again.Adobe Anywhere – This is one of the places editing is going. Virtual teams. I’m supervising my current team from an office 60 miles north of NYC. I have one editor in San Fran, another in NYC, my GFX team is in Boston, my VO guy is in Las Vegas and my Producers are in Boston. Currently we use Kollaborate as an on-line screening site and Fed-Ex to distribute large packets of media. Someday soon the media will be centralized and all collaboration real time and its ideas like Adobe Anywhere that are going to get me there.
Dynamic Link. This is an ongoing old/new idea. There is a Yin Yang between making an NLE all inclusive vs the idea of specific tools for specific fields. Adobe is letting you have your cake and devour it at the same time. Greater ability within Ppro, in audio, EFX and grading – as well as ease of roudtripping to ever improving Audio (Audition) EFX (AE)Graphics (Photoshop) and Grading (Speed Grade) stand alone tools.
Infinite Customization of the UI – this seems to be the goal for Ppro. Do you use one monitor, well here’s a package of setups for that, two monitors, here’s a package of setups for that, three monitors – go ahead knock yourself out. Do you like lots of tool specific buttons – well here they are. Do you hate most tool buttons – well there they go. Mapable shortcut keys, yes. Custom timeline track layouts, yes. Do I want even more ability to customize – yes, like a junkie, I’m always wanting to up my dose of options. The one thing I won’t go back to is one size fit’s all – we are all snowflakes my children and should demand to be treated as such.So that’s where I, with my limited knowledge of the field, see video editing going – an ever increasing rate of change in my tool set, an ability to create virtual real time teams through the internet, an ever increasing ability to do everything within an application simultaneous to an ever expanding roster of linked applications, and an ever more customizable way of working within an application specific to the way I’m working on a given day.
Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
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nothin’ attached to nothin’
“Deciding the spine is the process of editing” F. Bieberkopf -
80 Replies
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My fav PPRO workflow enhancer is the ability to pancake timelines. Cant do that in FCPX and thats one place where PPRO excels above the others. Its doable in Avid in a different form but adobes implementation is dope.
Also, they were really the FIRST to have a edit anything, any codec, frame rate, etc in one timeline – which is very beneficial to file based workflows.
IMO the only thing FCPX did to “change the workflow” for the future is implement their lame timeline which is obviously still up for debate.
Metadata is nothing new, key-wording and search/filtering is available in the other NLE’s – they just dont call it key-wording.
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[Neil Goodman] “My fav PPRO workflow enhancer is the ability to pancake timelines. Cant do that in FCPX and thats one place where PPRO excels above the others. Its doable in Avid in a different form but adobes implementation is dope.
“Agreed, FCPX really needs the ability to edit from other projects. Also tilde key to fullscreen your currently selected window is extremely useful and the Lumetri Colour panel is a great first step to having Speedgrade built directly into PPro.
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[Herb Sevush] “Adobe Anywhere – This is one of the places editing is going. Virtual teams. I’m supervising my current team from an office 60 miles north of NYC.”
Yes, this is where I see editing going also, but not to NY, to some country where the rate is a lot lower.
“We don’t need you anymore. We got (fill in the blank) over there in India cutting for a third.”
Too cynical? : ))
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[Tony West] “Yes, this is where I see editing going also, but not to NY, to some country where the rate is a lot lower.”
I actually don’t see that as prevalent. If the servers exist in outside country but media is shot in US or similar, then upload bandwidth, time and cost may make it less appealing. If servers exist in US, then Internet across oceans is either a) very expensive b) low bandwidth and not suitable c) possibly both.
[Tony West] “”We don’t need you anymore. We got (fill in the blank) over there in India cutting for a third.”
Too cynical? : ))”
Yes, but I am from the Northeast (NY/NJ) so I’m down with it.
Dennis – Adobe guy
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In support of Dennis’ points above, a few years ago I did an animation project, working for a company in the US, with the producer and editor in the Central African Republic (Bangui). The collaboration went quite well, considering that the producer’s native language was French, and the editor’s was Sango.
The glitches all occured due to the lack of a fast connection in Bangui, frequent power outages there, and the fact that the final delivery had to be sent on a USB drive from New Hampshire to Bangui, CAR. The producer told me that even sending the drive UPS, the arrival date would fall somewhere between a week and a couple of months! Luckily it was a week and a half. Even our Skype communications had to be audio only, due to the lack of bandwidth. It was a nail-biter.
Joe Bourke
Owner/Creative Director
Bourke Media
http://www.bourkemedia.com -
[Tony West] “[Herb Sevush] “Adobe Anywhere – This is one of the places editing is going. Virtual teams. I’m supervising my current team from an office 60 miles north of NYC.”
Yes, this is where I see editing going also, but not to NY, to some country where the rate is a lot lower.
“We don’t need you anymore. We got (fill in the blank) over there in India cutting for a third.”
Too cynical? : ))”
Maybe not, racing to the bottom for the least expensive labor seems to be the rage in every industry. Luckily, the case can still be made that differences in infrastructure and timezones can make sourcing talent “locally” more economical than sending work halfway around the world. Then again, there are a lot of really talented folks south of the border who don’t have high living expenses either. 🙂
Shawn
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Editors will continue to tell stories just as they always have… some better than others. Which editing app they use isn’t entirely irrelevant, but is 99% personal preference at this point. Everything else is just sound and fury. How about “FCPX sound and fury” as a name for this forum?
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Editing is going into so many different places, that it’s good to have many diverse tools that work for different situations. It used to be that production was only done on films…features and shorts, and news reels. Then TV came along, and then film and TV dominated for decades.
But now? Wedding, corporate, realty…special interest. Online, but with MANY different sorts of online video…GIFs, VINE, Instagram….comedy shorts, documentary, sport, watching people play video games… and then interactive videos. The variety of video production is staggering, and not one NLE does what all need.
Editing is going everywhere…and the tools need to adapt to fit the needs. Just like we have the sledge hammer, claw hammer, ball peen hammer, framing hammer, tack hammer, mallet…we need different tools to complete different tasks. Not all are suited for the given task, but they can work. Or, there might be some features that are GREAT for the task, while other features work fine…just like the features in another NLE…but an editor might prefer them over the other NLE.
Sorry, but I’ve VERY tired of “THIS is the wave of the future! Get on or fall behind!” That’s total BS. It works for YOU…it solves a LOT of workflow issues YOU needed solving…it sped up YOUR process. Because it’s good for YOU, doesn’t mean it good for ALL. Some of us are much faster with other sets of tools. And some of those tools are adding functionality to work with more current cameras and formats, allowing us to KEEP using those tools, because they still work great. This attitude of poo-pooing others because we like using tools that still do the job…even though they are old…saying “you are stuck in the past”….I’m sick of that.
You are tasked with building a house. Use whatever hammer you want as long as it does the job. Sure, you can say “my hammer has a claw so I can easily remove old nails, or fix a mistake I made in placing the nail there,” but to laugh at someone because they DON’T have a claw to remove the nail, but instead have a separate little mini-crowbar tool to do the same thing…who cares? The nail gets removed…the house gets made.
I don’t use FCX for personal preference…it doesn’t solve any issues I am currently having in post. OK, it does solve a couple (working with stills sucks in Avid…and working with native footage does in fact speed things up)…but those are solutions I also have in Adobe PPro. I still keep my eyes on the other apps, as you can see by me posting here, and in the TECHNIQUES forum, and the Adobe forums.
I do like the friendly discussions “well the magnetic timeline is great for me because…” or “stacked timelines save me so much time….” and “Without roles, I don’t know what’d I’d do!” CONSTRUCTIVE conversation. Convince me…or rather…show me what feature you rely on in your NLE that makes it your NLE of choice…how does that feature save you time and frustration. And not “Man, that magnetic timeline sucks arse…I don’t know WHO in their RIGHT MIND can use that.” That’s not helpful. That’s a political debate, and none of us like politicians who say “that person sucks.” WE prefer people to say “vote for me because I’ll do this!”
I just did a memorial video for a friend, and I used Adobe PPro…because it consisted of about 400 stills, and 6 video sources of varying types…and I just imported and started editing. Moves on the stills was easy and smooth. And resizing the videos was great and clean…some 640×360, some even lower quality, but a 720p timeline. Resized just right…the stills looked great. The client was happy, and the 8 minute video only took me 8 hours to do…even with the 6 revisions we did. If I had to use Avid for that…I’d have taken 3x as long and my frustration level would have been through the roof!
Shane
Little Frog Post
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def -
[James Culbertson] “Editors will continue to tell stories just as they always have… some better than others. Which editing app they use isn’t entirely irrelevant, but is 99% personal preference at this point. Everything else is just sound and fury.”
Maybe, but Bill did say…
[Bill Davis] …Hit me with the top few aspects of Premiere Pro that have changed edit workflow for you in the last 3 years. I’m ready to learn about how they have altered their approach to re-imagine how editing should be improved for the current, almost exclusively file-based era. I’m ready to learn.”
Shawn
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Where is editing going…
In terms of NLEs I think it’s pretty clear what each of the Big A’s are bringing to the table and editors just need to pick whatever they think works best for them (it might be one, it might be all, it might change project to project).
In terms of editing as a profession I think there will be continued expansion but not really wholesale change in terms of the new driving out the existing. For example, we all know TV as a distribution medium is facing stiff competition from streaming services like Amazon, Hulu and Netflix, but from an editing perspective it doesn’t really matter as the content, regardless of distribution platform, still has to be cut. I’m meeting more and more ‘TV editors’ that are being asked to cut original content for Amazon or Hulu (on Avid) because they have the skills/experience cutting the type content those companies are looking for.
I know a place that’s cutting everything from TV pilots to branded content for the web to original content for SnapChat and they are using PPro. Sure, with SnapChat you have to deal with vertical video, but besides that the only real difference between “this is going to the web” and “this is going to broadcast” is in the final delivery requirements.
With regards to not everyone being local for post, I think it’s inevitable as the tech barriers keep getting smaller and smaller. I know some editors that routinely work with companies based out of the east coast. There is something to be said for getting face time, but not all projects/people need that.
With regards to something nifty about PPro (unfortunately this goes further back than Bills 3-year time span), the multicam in the PPro was the first of the Three A’s to treat multicam as a nest/container instead of just creating whole new clips. This is a way more flexible way to work as you can make adjustments, add angles, etc., without having to recreate all new multicam clips. I’ll also ‘second’ the mention of pancake editing. Yes, you could do it in FCP Legend, but the windows there were much harder to manage so I rarely did the pancake back then.
As I mentioned in another thread, for a current project I made one sequence for all my broll selects (about it’s 12hrs long) and I organized it via markers (red extended markers to highlight entire events/dates and then green markers to highlight specific people/places/things). I keep that broll sequence on top of my editing sequence and I have a big Markers panel open in my second monitor to quickly keyword search for things. Given the duration of the sequence I’m pleasantly surprised how snappy it still is on my 2009 MacPro (it’s all GOP camera media, no transcoding to ProRes or anything like that).
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