[Adam White]

All great stuff no doubt. Hope these updates keep improving the app for those who use it.

I think the lack of a dedicated viewer is still a bummer. Particularly since multicam uses one – why not have an optional permanant viewer for those that want it? Its a bit of a mind block for me not having one. And there are still too many of those mind blocks for me to get on with X.

Those design decisions I always hated are still there, so whatever happens this isn’t going to be the App for me. But I think its cool that its getting better for those that like it.

[Adam White]

I’m in a simmilar position.

My advice – keep working on FCP7 for now, but get a trial of Premiere and get to grips with it (you’ll take to it like a duck to water – its very simmilar to FCP legacy) There are some different ways of doing things to get used to, but also some great aspects to it (not least the amazing performance which will be like a revelation if your used to FCP!) I would hazard a guess that there is likely no major reason why Premiere cant replace FCP in your workflow eventually.

BUT – and heres a slight curve ball – I would also strongly recommend you also try out and get to grips with Avid. Its the ultimate insurance policy for an Editor, it will be around in pro circles indefinately and is solid as a rock. I’m learning it now, as well as Premiere.

The FCPX debacle has taught me NEVER to rely on one software provider alone. Last year was an utter nightmare and I never want to be in a position again where I feel like the rug has been pulled out from under me. In short – learn both major alternatives (PP + Avid) then use what works best for you. No need to jump from FCP Legacy immediately, but you are on borrowed time with it so do prepare now for the shift that will be forced on you sooner or later.

[Adam White]

I noticed that, too. Couldn’t stream. Doesn’t fill you with confidence does it?

But seriously, good point about photographers diggin’ the design of X. I’ve observed the same thing. They were far more at home with iMovie than FCP anyway, so there is nothing for them to dislike in X. Good luck to them – Im pretty sure it WILL be the tool of choice for photographers dabbling in video.

For the rest of us terribly unfashionable old skool FCPers – probably not so much.

[Adam White]

Many thanks to you both, Jeff and Phil. Great advice which was all duly noted.

In fact, we needed to know about workflow sooner rather than later as we were very fortunate to get the C300 over the weekend for a shoot. Some very talented camera ops took it out to an airfield and we did a short feature. Great way to see what the camera can do and also a chance to have a test run with it in post. I didn’t cut this one, but I did colour grade it which was a great way to see how the footage held up.

Take a look at the result if you like!
https://vimeo.com/34851252

We used the Canon plugin which worked great (found it to be much more reliable than the equivalent plugin for the 5D which we never use now after it kept missing out big chunks of clips). All footage transcoded to ProRes 422 which was solid as ever. ProRes 422LT is usually our codec of choice so I think I may give that variant a go next time and see if there are any noticeable differences.

I thought the camera did an excellent job. The rushes were a joy to work with. Spent 4 or 5 hours grading it and I think the results are pretty good! Apart from how nice the footage was to work with, I was also struck (again) by what a great app Color is and how infuriating it is that its been EOL (but thats another topic altogether!)

We are delighted and very excited to start using the camera all the time. Working in 4:2:2 isnt really an issue for us as I can’t see it being a problem for the kind of content we produce – 90% of our output is straight to web.

Thanks again for all the advice and discussion – all really interesting and very useful. 🙂

Best,
Adam

[Adam White]

Hi Zoe,

I feel your pain on this one – occassionaly we get asked to supply WMVs at absurdly low sizes like this. I’d agree with David – you will never be truly happy with a WMV, whatever the bitrate, as in my experience they tend to just look horrendous on a Mac. However If you have access to a PC and take a look at them on it, you’ll find they dont look as bad as you thought when you played back on a Mac.

We use Telestream Episode which does a sterling job. Just use one of the many WMV presets built in to begin with, tweak it to your specifications and away you go. Episode is the only software I’ve ever seen spit out an acceptable WMV on a mac, so its an essential thing to have in the tool kit if you ask me. It also can produce just about any other format you can think of so its worth having! *sales pitch over

[Adam White]

I hear you Cade!

I’m the same age, thought I’d be working on FCP’s various versions indefinately. A massive Randy Ubillos shaped spanner has since been thrown in the works!

As much as I love FCP7 Im now learning alternatives. If you havent already get stuck into Premiere there is alot to like! Avid is much harder to like, but I hope once I get over the “I dont want to work like this please stop making me” I’ll like it better – its clearly tremendously powerful.

[Adam White]

This will be our last year on FCP. By Autumn time we will almost certainly have moved all post over to another NLE. I’m now really eager to move on. FCP is finished as a professional editing tool as far as I can see. The thought of changing everything to fit within the ridiculous half baked paradigm of X is laughable – why on earth would we do that, I cannot see any gain in doing so at the moment

I should probably point out I edit for a company specialising in short form content of all sorts for the web. Its a relatively new company that was built on FCS. There is no reason for us to stay with FCP and really we are pretty easy to please! This is a company that should have been based around FCP for at least another decade, but X was just such a catastrophe in every possible way that we have no choice but to move to something else.

[Adam White]

My guess would be that there is some more development to come.

But in truth I do wonder how much. The top and even medium end of the professional market are walking away from FCP in droves. I think this year is going to see a mass exodus.

With all those kinds of users jumping ship, I wonder where the motivation to keep developing the tool is going to come from. It was professional editors and their feedback that pushed legacy FCP forward and kept it evolving for all those years. Those users have overwhelmingly shown that they hate X and dont want to work with it, so who is going to encourage Apple to keep developing it?

At the moment I feel its going to end up a half baked, stagnant tool because I dont know where the push for development is going to come from. The Pro users are jumping ship, and I dont think Apple even wants them back. Just my two cents – we’ll see.

[Adam White]

Hi Steve,

I agree with some of your points there. When I say that I think FCPX is over as a professional NLE I should be clearer in that I dont think its going to be taken up by editors in the middle and top end of the market as the previous versions of FCP were. I fully expect it to be used by large corporations who need non-editors or unskilled people to turn around video content that doesnt need to conform to any real quality standards (i.e we need this video to fill a whole on the website, and we need it quick). For that reason it will almost certainly become a factor in a more professinal editors day to day work eventually, but only in a perennial sense. At least thats what my little crystal ball here tells me – no disclaimers offered on that though obviously! 🙂

And yes, with some more functionality Im sure X COULD be used in a professional environment, and as I said in initial post doubtless some people will do great work with it. BUT I still think those key design decisions will continue to be roundly rejected by the majority of editors because I dont think they enhance or improve the editing process, in fact in many respects I think they are a step backwards. And in terms of the next generation of storytellers, the best of them will not want to be tied to an app seen by the industry leaders as amateurish and unreliable and I am now really struggling to see how FCPX is ever going to rid itself of its currently atrocious reputation. We will see – I may be eating my words and wizzing around a magnetic timeline in a few short years!

[Adam White]

Hi Jeremy – a good point on not being too reliant on one tool for yor work. Whilst it was never the case that I picked FCP as my primary platform for anything other than positive reasons (i.e. Being very strong choice for short form content, which I specialise in, excellent multicam, being quick for simple VFX work + extensive library of 3rd party plugins + being most adopted NLE among companies I did/would be working for) what the whole FCPX issue has made clear to me is that I was becoming too reliant on one tool, no matter how good it was/is. Its not a mistake I’ll be repeating, believe me.

In terms of FCPv1 being a questionable choice for editors at the time, whilst I’m sure that is true its not quite the same as FCPX because the former didnt try to reinvent the whole editing paradigm. Although different, it didnt require the user to change their entire way of working to such a degree as X does and it wasnt nearly as polarising. My point was that I do worry younger editors learning X at college/film school/whatever are going to find that their whole way of thinking and working is going to be totally at odds with whats happening in the “real” world because X shares virtually nothing with any other software (other than iMovie). There will be a whole lot to relearn and rethink, much more so than when going from FCP to Avid.

And whilst I totally agree that our NLEs do need to change periodically and keep up with changes going on throughout the industry, my issue with X is that VERY few of these changes appear to have anything at all to do with the editing process. Who was arguing that a source monitor was no longer needed or that tracks on a timeline were archaic? In the end I’m not at all adverse to change, but only when its actually enabling greater creative control and efficiency – I’m still totally unconvinced that the major and deeply divisive overhaul of FCP was worth it, by any measure.