[James Ewart]

One other point about the Honda workflow….

Just thinking whether he might have made use of Auditions and replaced all the shots in the Timeline by changing the selection?

Maybe not as fast for replacing edited sequences I suppose but perhaps simpler?

Or am I missing something?

Why did they have to use Compressor to create the Proxy files rather than letting FCPX do the work?

[James Ewart]

That’s the “heard” mentality, and is the result of the way the rollout was handled. It’s the same reaction as you get to the Affordable Care Act – it sucks, it doesn’t work, it will raise prices – it doesn’t matter that this is demonstrably not true – public perception is a hard thing to change (When the legend becomes fact, print the legend) – which is why it’s so important to get it right the first time.

For sure here in UK the people who seem to hate FCPX the most (that I have spoken to) are the ones who have not really used it or learnt it. And producers who have formed their opinion from what they have heard editors say (who also have no used it). And yes people are still banging on about “How apple could be so unprofessional…”

In truth if Apple had just said “hey guys don’t panic this is under development and Legacy will continue to work fine for 4 years” maybe that would have been better.

Or maybe nobody would have even bothered looking at FCPX and it would not have got off the ground at all.

The best comment I got was from a corporate producer who said to me “… but that’s something that FCPX can’t do isn’t there … I can’t remember what it is though…”

[James Ewart]

Post deleted Simon but assigning it a role is a good thought.

[James Ewart]

“…makes you wonder what’s so amazingly threatening and scary about FCP X for some. Hmmm…”

Actually I do see something very scary coming my way. In the last six months the number of people who have contacted me and been on a one or two day course and told me they have “learnt FCPX” is now running over ten. And these are people who have never actually operated non-linear editing software themselves. Some are seasoned veterans of the industry and some not so. But because they have managed to cut something to music they are telling the world they are FCPX editors.

So we are all afraid of losing our livelihoods and that’s a natural enough fear to have. AVID MC is a much less user-friendly intuitive interface and so are FCP legacy and Premiere. For sure those user preferences and scratch disk settings were major head f^@k to many including Avid editors, but they also represented a psychological barrier to entry. Which equals job protection. Having started editing with FCP I still find Avid a bit of a ball breaker. And of course if you’ve been using it for twenty years you will love it and it does the job perfectly well. In some areas still better than any other system.

But anybody can hack something together in FCPX after not too much time. That’s what is brilliant the about the software in many respects it’s “approachable”. But it is also a massive game changer I think and will continue to be. Could it also put a lot of people out of business? There indeed is the Rub.

Nobody asked Shakespeare, Salman Rushdie or John Grisham (whatever floats your boat) what word processing software or brand of pens they use and this is where we have no arrived in our world now. TV has a legacy where once upon a time just being able to operate an edit suite gave you a gig.

With FCPX within a day you are getting somewhere (I would argue there is actually more to learn down the line) but it opens the doors to everyone. Apple’s vision is just that.

I clearly remember the three projects in FCPX I abandoned and cut in Legacy. I was inclined to go with the wave of negative publicity and go to Adobe (easy decision to make). I persevered because I figured the people at Apple might be smarter than me.

A lot of people hoped FCPX would be the end of Apple in the “professional” world of media.

There could be a massive changing of the guard about to take place (I hope that euphemism isn’t too British/English as I can’t think of another).

People are afraid of losing their livelihoods. Their response should have been to get acquainted with FCPX but I do understand why they are afraid.

So am I.

http://www.jamesewart.co.uk

[James Ewart]

… be quite nice to be able to disable an entire video “track” with one keystroke no?

[James Ewart]

I just find having my audio so very very far away from its related video in geographical terms, exceedingly tedious these days.

I wouldn’t say I was especially fast with other concept. Is speed really such a huge issue? Everything needs a tidy up at the end and a once over anyway ust to make sure everything is patched correctly or role correctly assigned no?

[James Ewart]

Thanks I’ll give it a proper read.

For sure the Avid community closed ranks with FCPX over here too but there is a wind of change or at least a gentle breeze that I am beginning to sense.

If only Apple had been more open about X being Beta on its release I think things could have been very different.

[James Ewart]

So we are talking split screen?

Okay.

I guess he would have found life simpler still with a second magnetic Primary Storyline unless he cut the fist then lifted it out of the Primary and then cut the other?

it’s funny isn’t it. Doesn’t take much but suddenly from nobody but me using FCPX in the UK and almost having to mutter it under one’s breath, suddenly everybody has realised that this is software that works very nicely.

The more I work with complex audio with multiple “tracks” the more I enjoy having my audio ext to my video no matter where it is in the timeline. It’s so liberating.

[James Ewart]

I must be thick. I do not understand the two timelines. What is the purpose of the timeline below? When it plays you see the upper timeline. What is the lower timeline for?

[James Ewart]

Have you tried the Ripple “Transfer Library” system for such workflows instead of XML?

Seems to make a lot of sense.