[Mark Dobson]

If it ain’t broke why fix it?

Still seems a pretty relevant title to me and it really compliments the FCPX Techniques Forum. Mostly the discussions are pretty considered and informative, the individuals who derive huge enjoyment from winding up others stick out a mile – or should I say individual?

What it allows is a more erudite view of where FCPX sits in the market. And yes it is slowly gaining more traction at the broadcast end of the spectrum.

[Mark Dobson]

Hi Tim,

I’m running a Matrox MX02 mini to drive my HDMI monitor. I’ve also got a Blackmagic Intensity Pro card sitting on my shelf which is now redundant. The reason I’ve gone with the Matrox unit is because of the colour calibration capability.

To get the Matrox to work with my new iMac I’ve had to buy a Matrox Thunderbolt adapter and it all works fine. Unfortunately my Sony Bravia does not support 1080 25P so I have use 1080i 25P – they used to offer a PsF setting that got round this problem.

I’m really pleased with the ability to check the image out on an HDMI monitor but calibrating the set it is so subjective. I can’t afford to pay for a broadcast spec monitor and this is a poor mans solution.

I’m also finding that with quality of the screen on the new iMac that I’m using the external monitor less and less.

[Mark Dobson]

[Oliver Peters] “I concur with everything you mentioned. I would point out though, that FCP X sees the C300’s native MPEG2 XF codec as already optimized. It will not transcode it to ProRes (only rewrap as MOV).”

Thanks Oliver – I’ve just finished a 20minute edit on a 25p project timeline mixing the MPEG2 XF Progressive files with native 1080i XDCAM files and it all worked pretty smoothly.

The main cause for crashes is the unresolved problem with the CoreMelt plugins, Lock and Load and SliceX.

[Mark Dobson]

[Julian Bowman] “After reading up I upgraded my ram to 32 gigs from 16 and bought a ATI Radeon HD 5770 1024 MB and I cannot say i’ve noticed a blind bit of difference. FCPX still has this sluggish response time.”

I was in your situation – I had ( still have ) a 2008 Quad core MacPro and like you I upgrades my Ram, to 22GBs, installed a new 5770 graphic card and still found that my experience was frustrating and very sticky on longer projects.

So rather than wait for a new MacPro I bought the 27″ 3.4 GHz iMac and installed 32 GB of memory and I have to say it a huge improvement, not perfect, but a lot more responsive.

I’m still clearing the preferences on a regular basis with Preference Manager but spinning ball crashes are almost non-existent.

I am editing using native files from a C300, I don’t optimise the media and touch wood it’s all been worth it. It has also allowed me to move forward into thunderbolt and USB3 storage devices and to enhance the eSata drive performance using a Lacie TB Hub.

Should a new MacPro be released with superior performance I would probably sell the iMac and get that but for the moment I feel as if I’ve moved forward in the right direction.

[Mark Dobson]

Thanks for that unbiased comparison Oliver. It just reaffirms my decision to stick with FCPX which as you point out in your article runs extremely well on the new maxed out 27″ iMac.

I would agree with you that the main purpose of the updates in the last 20 months has been to bring the product up to scratch and iron out stability issues. My work experience has become a lot less problematic with each update. I believe that we will see total integration with Logic and full round tripping with Motion in the near future. I also think that the colour correction module within FCPX will have a major update soon, It’s one of the items that has remained unchanged since launch.

I’ve got FCPX installed on 4 machines at the moment, my new iMac, a macbook Air that we do interview analysis with, a 5 year old 17″ MacBook Pro we take to client meetings and my newly semi retired MacPro which I’m keeping as a back up and to burn DVDs on. The key here is that these are all Apple machines. That’s the deal, use Apple software = use Apple machines.

Updating the software is a pain free experience, apart from the 3rd party plugins I’ve got installed which often take a while to update.

[Mark Dobson]

Yes that is good news. A month and a half too late for me unfortunately but great for those who are about to buy.

Whilst we all know that Apple is struggling a bit at the moment their recent decision to drop business discounts if a product is in short demand smacks of opportunism and leave a bad taste in the mouth for a very loyal base of business customers.

I think this first happened with the Retina MacBook Pro and then with the new iMac.

What they said at the Apple store when I picked up my iMac was that business discounts were now awarded on the basis of how much one spends in a year.

So thats bad news for the people who only replace their MacPro’s every 4 years or so.

And yes despite not getting a 5% discount on a £2,300 purchase I did save £10 buying my Applecare.

However I’m now a member of the discount club and had a 5% reduction on a 8TB Gtech drive and Go Pro Black.

[Mark Dobson]

[Julian Bowman] “Oh, and yes, having conversations with myself is perfectly normal round my way.”

I would agree that the lack of organisational tools in the Filter section is something that needs addressing. I’ve discovered that it is possible to re-name the folders in the Effects section of Motion Templates so that they appear in the order of the ones I use most frequently. What I would really like is for there to be 2 Effects Sections within the FCPX interface one for video and one for audio. And it would be great if intelligent assistance were to develop a programme similar to Event Manager to organise the Effects display.

I also don’t quite understand why FX Factory have such a cumbersome way of introducing new FX or updating existing ones. Each change in their portfolio of Effects requires a new download of their software. But I’m sure there will be a good reason for this.

[Mark Dobson]

[Oliver Peters] “I try to be balanced in such posts as they are tips and not comparison articles. Personally, I’m still undecided. On any given day these days, I’m on FCP7, X, PPro, Sym/MC or Smoke.”

My brain just can’t cope with that many options with their different keyboard shortcuts and work patterns. I occasionally open up FCP7 and realise that I’ve forgotten most of the workflows I’d learnt in the 8 or so years of using it. So respect to those that can just switch between all these platforms and see them as tool sets to carry out any particular job.

[Mark Dobson]

Thanks for that article Oliver.

I would hope that your balanced point of view would help detractors get over their prejudice and at least give the software a spin.

It’s amazing how many people I speak to are still highly critical of FCPX. Their opinion is still based on the initial ‘iMoviePro’ backlash against the software almost 2 years ago and they have yet to even download even the free 1 month trial.

[Mark Dobson]

[Sandeep Sajeev] “Disagree on AppleCare not being worth it. I’ve had my DVD drive fail and my FireWire ports stop working. Both were replaced under AppleCare. The cost of getting it done without AppleCare (my warranty had expired) was a way higher than paying for AppleCare.”

Well thats one problem you won’t have with the new iMac. Neither of them exist on the new model.

I’ve just got a new 27″ iMac and I followed the advice on this forum and from guys like Larry Jordon. Get the best processor the 3.4GHz Quad-core Intel Core i7,
the minimum RAM ( and buy from OWC or Crucial ). I would really recommend the 1TB Fusion Drive it is very fast and it’s great to have some spare storage capacity.

The sealed nature of these units means that your local Mac repairer will have more difficulty working on it so I would follow Sandeeps advice and get Applecare.

However buying the computer is only step one of the process. Thunderbolt cables, Esata Hubs, Thunderbolt drives, USB3 peripherals all add up to a tidy sum. But then this is an investment into the future of high speed storage.