Bill Davis
Forum Replies Created
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So open iMovie files in FCP X brought forward 2 years or so?
Welcome aboard, Adobe!
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
Mark, I’ve seen similar before on handheld stuff.
My solution is to skim the footage and REJECT all the really crazy uncorrectable stuff – Hide rejects – and then put the now unrated clips on a storyline and stabilize -that stuff – rather than everything.
A truly wild swing here or there seems to “lower the average” of correct-ability? and causes problems. So I try to let X focus on only the usable footage for correction.
Once those frames have their stabilization data stored, things get easier.
Just a thought.
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
For safety’s sake, you should first make a solid backup of the original file with some form of checksum duplication before you start working with, or delete anything. If you don’t have something like Carbon Copy Cloner or Shotput or Hedge – then at least make a finder copy to external media via drag and drop.
It’s alway better to have a solid copy of the original file (if you can) to “re-process” should some transcode not work.
Just a suggestion.
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
In my many years of futzing with audio for video – I’ve found that 99 times out of 100 audio drift comes from sample rate mismatches between the camera and the timeline.
If you simply take the source audio file and drop it on a utility like MediaInfo – note the parameters of the recording (taking special note of the recorded sample rate) and set up your video project to match that — drift disappears.
If the field audio was done with setting far from the digital video sampling norms of 48 or 96Khz, (e.g. 32khz) then you MIGHT need a transcode step on the incoming files if your software of choice can’t do the repair automatically. But I find that rare. The software folks were aware of the typical sample rates and have algorithms in place to handle most all of them.
There are times, of course, that something is TRULY strange – like an old audio recorder that doesn’t have even crystal sync or where bad design allows truly drifting timekeeping – and in those cases, the ONLY real solution is manual re-timing. But thank god I haven’t seen that type of situation in twenty years at least.
Just my thoughts.
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
[Neil Goodman] “Im curious what makes you think Adobe and Avid don’t work well on Macs? Kind of weird since Davinci notoriously takes significant more juice to run smooth than either of the two apps you mentioned”
Mostly just the constant kvetching I see about how Apple needs to beef up their “woeful” hardware in order to efficiently run those programs.
Reading about what seems like constant dissatisfaction on the PC side (let alone the laptop side of things) by others seems in pretty stark contrast to my experience on modest Apple hardware running X.
But I acknowledge it’s entirely anecdotal.
I’d you were to tell me there are legions of editors out there running PPro or MC on laptops as their primary day to day income producing tools, in the same fashion I’ve been successful on MacBook Pros with X — I’d have no reason to doubt you, really.
I just seldom hear that sort of talk. But that might just be me.
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
[greg janza] “But I also think the criticism that has been raised in this thread about the film just being a glorified marketing piece is valid. “
So then it’s equslly fair to slam a film like say, Top Gun, as just a military recruiting effort?
My point is there are hundreds of films upon which we can overlay the criticism that they are just thinly veiled marketing pieces. Hell, doesn’t that describe the ENTIRE DC and Marvel universes, Transformers and the Harry Potter oveure, just to note four out of thousands?
The ONLY reason some of you apparently find this notable AT ALL is that Brads feelings about the topic run – in whole or in part – counter to your own.
Who knows, perhaps there’s someone out there as passionate about AVID or Premiere as Brad became about what he saw in FCP X.
If so, have at it.
????
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
[Shane Ross] “No, it wasn’t funded by Apple or sanctioned by them. That’s not what I meant. it’s like…a “love letter” to Apple about FCP-X.”
Well, I suppose that’s true in the same way Apollo 13 was a “love letter” to NASA –
And The Social Network was a “love letter” to Facebook.
Yet nobody seemed to have a huge issue with those, as I recall.But a young filmmaker wanting to examine the roots of a piece of software in a creative fashion – no patience for that – cuz it’s…different, I guess?
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
[Shane Ross] “Shows that Apple doesn’t care about any other editing professionals OTHER than the ones who use Apple products. “Hey, it works with OUR software…there must be something wrong with yours.” Closing the ecosystem even more. Nice.
“Well…
In what way does Adobe or AVID “care about editing professionals OTHER than” the ones that use THEIR products?
How is Adobe, with their once you start in Premiere, you MUST keep renting our software to make use of any of your prior effort – ANY different? Nor should it be. It’s their playground. Walling it off is a smart business decision. Shouldn’t that work all ways? AVID will allow what improves AVID. If that includes Cineform but does NOT include ProResRAW – so be it. Business moves on.[Shane Ross] “Nope. Avid is keeping well in tune with our needs, thank you. But making hardware that’s not ideal for quite a few workflows, thus turning many to PCs…sadly…because Windows still sucks.”
Well, then at least THAT apparently isn’t Apples fault! ; )
[Shane Ross] “Anyway…OFF THE TRACKS was, IMHO, an independent marketing film made for Apple by Apple fans. I know docs need to have a perspective. This one just seemed like a large marketing piece.”
THIS I can speak to.
Made FOR Apple? No in any way, shape or form. Utterly NO WAY.
OFF THE TRACKS was made by ONE guy who was sitting in Utah and had an idea for a story that interested him. Period. It started as a purely personal labor of love and grew organically from there.
At the Creative Summit where he shot most of the initial interviews, it was a sleepy Brad by himself with a BlackMagic Production Camera, one lav mic and one light in the corner. The very definition of low budget, personal film making.
As he bootstrapped it and met more and more people in the X community, he CONVINCED lots of folks of his seriousness, but outside of a few mostly EX Apple guys who late in the process helped him connect with interesting players who were there in the early days (Ubillos, Cerf, some of the folks in Europe, etc), this was HIS deal from day one.
And Apple (while I’m SURE they were quite aware of what was happening, cuz I spotted a few in the early screenings) I know from talking personally with Brad that Apple did not editorially touch anything before, during or after.
I got to know Brad pretty well during the process. He would occasionally ask my opinion about things at the screenings and the ONLY advice I ever gave him was simply “this is YOUR story – don’t listen to ANYONE who tries to tell you how to do it, myself included. Trust your gut and tell it the way YOU want to.” And at every turn, that’s exactly what I saw him do. Just Brad, working, learning and putting what HE found interesting on the screen.
Period.
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
[Shane Ross] “I would like a Mac Laptop for professional video toolsets…thus I need a fast processor, good GPU, non-throttled…good cooling. Bulk doesn’t matter to me, I prefer it be bulkier to accommodate that.
“But Shane, that’s EXACTLY what I have and it serves my needs as a Professional Video Producer perfectly. The only difference might be that I rely on a well coded, optimized piece of editing software that doesn’t cause my workflow to choke. I can work with 2K and 4K right now including LOG and ProRes RAW without my laptop missing a beat.
I TOTALLY get that some editors want to cut with AVID or Premier. But it appears that the main problem is that THOSE programs are simply NOT currently powerful enough or optimized enough for Apple Hardware – the same way FCP X currently IS.
SO you’re saying that it’s APPLES requirement to NOT do what they want to do (which is offer solutions that are TUNED to the hardware and software choices they own) and manage to satisfy some of the most demanding users on the planet – in order to accommodate users of OTHER software solutions that they have absolutely no control over?
That makes no sense.
Davinci Makes a track based editing program that handles video perfectly well on current Macs including Laptops. I’d merely ask you why can’t AVID and Adobe do the same?
The answer appears to be that their business model simply doesn’t allow them to do what Apple did and jettison the old stuff and re-create their software to run more efficiently on a more modern hardware and code foundation.
How is that Apple’s fault?
Apple has acknowledged publicly that they are planning for a new (presumably) flame thrower desktop unit.
Their laptops ALREADY approach desktop computational performance. (Hell, I understand even their PHONES, and iPads have managed THAT in terms of pure computational speed!)
So at some point, doesn’t the problem get down to those other NLE software vendors NOT keeping up with THEIR customers needs – rather than it being something to blame Apple for?
Maybe I’m wrong. I’m NOT a hardware guy. But chasing fatter, more power hungry, more horsepower originated hardware might NOT be the ONLY way to get higher speeds. It just might be ONE of the PC industries favored processes.
Heck, maybe we can take a hint from boating. It’s not boat with the largest engine that always goes fastest. If it was, ocean liners would beat everything. It’s the boat that matches a bunch of fluid dynamics, weight to power ratios, hull strength and OPTIMIZED everything – not just ONE thing – that gets those trophies.
Maybe there’s a lesson there.
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
[Shane Ross] “Release a MacBook Pro that throttled the processor…only fixing it AFTER huge blowback. “
Seems to me there’s been a “big blowback” EVERY single time Apple released anything at all.
Antenna Gate
Trashcan MacPro Gate
Headphone Jack is Gone Gate.
Overheating Gate
Laptop Too Thin Gate
Screwed up Color Correction Gate
EOLed My Favorite Program you Swine Gate
Touchbar SUCKS Gate.
And on and on and on…It’s a wonder they make any money at all.
OR.
As I’ve noted since 2011 when FCP X moved out of boxes and on-line – it’s simply an era where hardware is virtualized for testing and then iterates generation by generation as thebindustry developes – but software is ALWAYS an evolving work in progress – so when functional flaws get discovered when the stuff finally gets its real-world shake out – they get addressed.
And THAT is simply the new normal we all live in.
I bought my Wife a 12” Macbook two years ago – cuz she wanted something basic and super lightweight to carry on location in her shoulder bag. It was an odd compendium of weird design decisions that were worthy of head scratching wonder. I thought at the time that since it was fanless and totally silent -when she was done with it – I might make it a purpose dedicated VO recording hub. And that it’s fanless design might let me record at my desk without messing with soundproofing.
That didn’t work out.
BUT, looking back she got two years of solid general computing service out of it and toted it onto sets where it helped her earn at least 20 times its cost.
So was that machine a success or a failure in that context?
I suppose It depends on what you’re looking for.
And so it goes.
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery.