Douglas K. dempsey
Forum Replies Created
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I face same issue, but teaching at a small private high school, I will probably ask school to buy two sites of FCPX.
The most basic work that newbies learn on FCP7 is fine, because that Timeline and Source-Record metaphor coincides with Premiere, Avid, Vegas etc etc. So they get the concept.
We’ll then play around with the new product to see how the kids can switch from one paradigm to another.
Of course, I am not turning out college grads who need specific trade skills.
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I strongly agree with Walter Soyka, and I wonder what Chris Kenny’s agenda is on this forum.
As I have stated in almost every thread pertaining to the issues, the problem is NOT FCPX. It looks cool, and I have lobbied for a new editing paradigm to replace the tired “Source-Record” metaphor left over from tape editing in the 1980s. So Apple has begun that shift to newer ways of working. And frankly, if they DO intend FCPX to be a strictly prosumer app, and decide NEVER to add the pro features we’re arguing over, so be it. That’s their business model. Fine. We don’t have to buy it or use it.
EXCEPT, they have taken the actual pro app that works off the market! On the same day! How can you possibly apologize or excuse that and call yourself a pro anything?
As I have been pointing out elsewhere, we have no assurance, and very little reason to believe that “FCP7 will live on” as Larry Jordan said on his site. Why? Because, first of all, you can no longer even acquire a legal copy! The sellers on eBay are unauthorized vendors, and how do you know they are not simply using those serial numbers and then selling you the hard copies for a tidy profit?
Secondly, when in the history of software have you ever seen anyone post regular updates for discontinued products? Have you never had an issue with FCS when upgrading to a new OS? Doesn’t anyone recall the quirkly behavior many of us had when the ProKit 6.01 update was released (intended to be mainly Logic Pro fixes), that caused Compressor issues? That was a common enough problem that Jon Chappell posted a workaround on his digitalrebellion site.
Why do you have faith that FCP v7.0.3 will work flawlessly in Lion and beyond, while we wait for months or years in hopes that FCPX will eventually open our archived FCP7 projects, and do all the pro things we need?
The point here is that they took the app we want to use off the market. Until Apple assures us in writing that we can keep editing in FCP7 indefinitely, or until they bring FCPX up to its pro functionality… why shouldn’t we be worried?
Why shouldn’t we be annoyed that, after a decade of investing in Apple software, upgrades, new hardware every 2.5 years and incessant training — that it now looks like we may have to kiss our work goodbye and start over on another pro platform?
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You apologists are missing the point. FPCX doesn’t have to be a pro app, now or ever. That’s Apple’s business, and if they want to market a great prosumer app, fine. I shoot with prosumer cameras all the time.
But I don’t expect Sony to take the F35 camera off the market, now that they offer the NEX-FS100 Super 35mm camcorder body for $5,000. UNLESS they have decided to throw in the towel on high-end cameras, and sell only the prosumer gear.
But that is what Apple has done. It is the fact that FCP7 is not being sold, that you can no longer acquire a valid, legal FCP7 serial number from an authorized vendor (one who can guarantee the serial number you just bought is not already in use, and you are simply buying the eBay seller’s hard copies).
When is the last time you heard of a dead app receiving updates? How many times has an OS upgrade necessitated updates of your Pro Apps? Do any of you remember the Compressor irregularities caused by Pro Kit 6.01 Frameworks, a problem common enough for Jon Chappell’s site to post instructions on how to go back in Time Machine, retrieve the previous ProKit update and reinstall the old Frameworks?
Do you imagine FCP7 will run flawlessly on Lion and beyond, while we keep our fingers crossed that 2 or 3 years from now, FCPX will “go pro” and open our archived FCP7 projects — projects that we now open, modify and cut & paste from all the time, as we evolve and update projects for clients, or re-purpose footage for new projects?
Walter Biscardi and Richard Harrington, who bring up these issues in their podcast, are credible professionals with real companies — not hobbyists who take a training course and declare, “Hey I’m an editor.” They point out that they will probably have to invest a lot of time & money in exporting XML of all their hundreds of archived projects, to be cross-graded to Premiere or Avid at some future date, possibly as early as this Fall, as a hedge against the failure of FCP7 to live on indefinitely.
These are not small, “whining” glass-half-empty concerns.
Until Apple issues a press release stating that I will be able to use my FCP7 projects through Lion and/or until FCPX opens FCP7 and does multi-cam, OMF, XML, has organizable/identifiable tracks for dialogue, music and effects, and all the other fairly basic stuff that any pro needs… until I see it in writing, I have to assume Apple has bailed out of our miniscule high-end pro market, and will now serve only the great mass of one-man band operations.
Calling that observation “negative” or saying “migration is not a priority” is a reasonable statement are simply selfish, ignorant statements.
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Herb, you underestimate my pessimism. The comment is rhetorical; of course it won’t happen.
As I have said all over this forum, the fact that FCP7 is discontinued, that FCPX won’t open our previous work, proves to me that Apple is out of the pro market for good. They would like to redefine what “pro” means of course, casting the high-end users as wonky, whining “elites” and convince every YouTuber out there that a MacBook “Pro” and Final Cut “Pro” X will accomplish 99% of everything that matters.
And they will be proven right, if the popularity of reality TV is any indication. Let Pixar labor with Renderman and proprietary software, let network TV folks cut on Avid, let feature films do the same… but the rest of the entertainment world will survive on instantly-shot-edited and spewed media.
I think Apple has been exiting the pro market for awhile, and this is the harshest evidence yet.
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Unfortunately Conrad, I think you are exactly right, as I have said elsewhere on this forum.
By withdrawing FCS3 and allowing FCPX to be the only “Pro” video app, we are being told Apple is no longer in the pro market, it’s too small. (except as a marketing suffix, e.g. MacBook Pro, Final Cut Pro as in “Work like the pros do!”).
Yes…iMovie, no profit. FCExpress, a failure, too complex for the average user. FCS3, too expensive to keep fixing and upgrading for a few high-end users. FCPX solves everything.
For those holding out hope, listen to Biscardi & Harrington’s podcast
https://library.creativecow.net/harrington_biscardi/FCPX/1Why would Apple make FCPX not only NOT open or import all your FCP7 projects, but actively make your old FCP7 projects unable to open the older app with a double-click?
It’s a race against time; will Apple make FCPX “pro” before FCP7 stops working with the OS altogether? Many people assume the MacPro will go away, and the OS will go away and everything will be an iOS gesture-controlled device. Edit video shot on your phone, share to the cloud, end of story.
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Exactly, the idea that anybody cares one way or another about Final Cut Express proves this article is a bogus, spin-controlled piece of propaganda.
And I am tired of people all over this forum saying “don’t be so negative” and “don’t buy the software if you don’t want to.”
I am NOT buying the software, because as many have noted, it won’t function for my pro work. What I AM impacted by is the simultaneous decision by Apple to pull FCS3. Not only does that indicate lack of continued support (like bug fix updates once it doesn’t work correctly in Lion), but I now have no valid FCP7 purchase options. Suppose I need to install another license on another machine so I can hire a freelance editor to work with me on a high-volume of footage documentary I am making? Well now I have to troll ebay, hoping that the FCS3 packages there are legitimate, accept an invalidated warranty because I am buying from unauthorized vendors, etc etc.
As I posted elsewhere on this forum, it is a race against time: will FCPX achieve the necessary functionality (OMF, XML, import old sequences or projects, multi-cam, and many other details listed in Biscardi & Harrington’s podcast) BEFORE the current FCP7.0.3 stops working in Lion or subsequent “Lion King” or “Cheetah” OS or whatever comes next?
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Scott, exactly. As Walter Biscardi says in his audio talk with Richard Harrington,
https://library.creativecow.net/harrington_biscardi/FCPX/1
there are many users who have paid for multiple licenses and lots of shiny Apple hardware, and who have hundreds of project files that are continuously opened, as sequences are modified and updated and distributed.Those files cannot be opened, imported or used by FCPX. So they must continue to work in FCP7, but without ANY assurance that this discontinued software will work in Lion, in subsequent updates of Lion or in “Lion King” or “Cheetah” or whatever comes next. Suddenly your entire decade’s archive of work is in jeopardy.
Sure there are lots of other tools out there, but your “creativity” needs to be going into your storytelling, not devising creative work-arounds for porting all your Final Cut sequences over to Avid and Premiere as a hedge against FCP7 becoming eventually “Failure to Cut Pro”
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I initially speculated: Maybe Apple thought, “Look, we can pump our iMovie interface up to 64-bit, solve a lot of ease-of-use issues (like the background transcode) and move virtually everyone over from iMovie (free w/no profit) and FCExpress (unsuccessful) to this new app. We can do that NOW. THEN we can begin to port over functionality from FCP7, eventually achieving a new edit paradigm AND a fully pro app.” In other words, release v1.0 now because most everyone in the world will use it now. The truly Pro app will follow.
But in light of FCP7 being pulled, and listening to Walter Biscardi and Richard Harrington’s mp3 talk on all of this
https://library.creativecow.net/harrington_biscardi/FCPX/1
I no longer hope for that. Not only does FCPX not open up your old FCP7 projects, rendering your life’s work over the last decade irrelevant… but the installation changes your old FCP7 project icons to Unix icons, and double-clicking them prompts a “what app do you want to open this with” dialogue! And it won’t allow you to run FCPX and FCP7 simultaneously on the same machine, to refer to your old sequences. That would indicate to me no intention of any further support of FCP7 on any level.I need to see a press release from Apple saying, “Randy Ubilos has used all his creativity to create a new editing paradigm, one that will be intuitive to everyone, and his FCPX shows the promise of this paradigm. Meanwhile, we urge professional editors not to panic; we will support FCP7 while our new product evolves. We want the professional community to continue working on the Apple platform.”
Until Apple says that, I must assume Final Cut “Pro” is over.
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I agree with Russell. The fears that Apple would leave the high-end post-production pros in the lurch were well-founded.
The user interface, the price, the default settings all point to Apple’s commitment to making movie software “for the people.” This is clearly an app to replace iMovie and Final Cut Express. iMovie was too limited, Final Cut Express was too complicated and yet missing key features, and Final Cut Pro 7 is too complex for all but the pro user or heavy-duty hobbyist. I know because I teach film/video at a private high school, where the kids hate iMovie because it won’t do anything, but they are frustrated by the complex feature-set of FCP, of which they only use about 10 percent. FCPX will clearly hit the sweet spot for my classes. So it will become the consumer’s “serious video app.”
I think Apple will be happy to sell FCPX to every one of their customers, rather than selling FCP7 to a limited group of pros. So FCPX just doesn’t look to me like an app waiting to be expanded back toward the feature density of FCP7. I find it hard to believe they will “pump it up” to that level. If the do, then they will need another “lite” product because the Pro product will again become too complex, expensive, etc.
And no matter what, a usable version of FCPX ain’t happening for a year or two. Who can wait that long? With FCP7 no longer for sale, support will disappear soon enough. How can the message from Apple be any more clear? “Forget the pro apps, we are not in that specialty business anymore.”
We are facing the possibility that cheap “high-end pro” editing is finished, and we will return to a more expensive, specialized workflow for high-end work — like the post-houses of the ’80s, or effects houses for feature films — with ALL other work (news, reality TV, documentaries, weddings, corporate, rock videos etc) being done cheaply and quickly and with ingenuity on the consumer apps.
As it stands, Avid…which used to be an $80,000-100,000 turnkey investment, is now a workable pro tool for network TV editors at a modest price. When Apple looks at that landscape, they must think “Why even bother competing with a specialty company like Avid? We are the biggest tech company in the world because we SELL to the ENTIRE world, not just a handful of TV and a few movie editors.”
For everyone who remains hopeful, here is your ticking clock: Will FCPX expand and acquire pro features, BEFORE FCP7 stops functioning on whatever OS or iOS follows Lion?
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FYI I have same issue when L&T 24p footage from CF card (shot on Sony Z7U).
Since Sony Z7U supposedly shoots true progressive @ 23.98 fps, the “Remove Advanced Pulldown etc” checkbox shouldn’t make any difference, and I have tried it both ways without any apparent effect.
My 24p footage plays properly in a 24p Timeline (23.98, “Compressor HDV 1080p24” in codec settings).
I have read from some people on this issue, that there is a missing 15 frames at head and/or tail during L&T; perhaps that would account for the oddity of the “half-moon” indicator.
Does this have something to do with the counter-intuitive notion that HDV is a LongGOP codec, yet Sony claims you are creating true progressive frames when you shoot 24p to card or tape with the Z7? Which is it, really? I don’t entirely understand it, and maybe FCP doesn’t either!