[Mark Dobson]

Anyone know if Lightroom CC or 6 is available as part of the Adobe Photograhic plan or is it a separate subscription.

Simple question which I just couldn’t find answer to. Probably putting wrong search question in google.

At the moment I have Lightroom 5 as part of the Photoshop / Lightroom package.

[Mark Dobson]

[Dennis Radeke] “Clearly, all software makers have made their faux pas’ but in nearly all cases, they change directions and corrected course based on market demand. We’ve seen this true in Adobe, Apple and Avid’s cases. “

To be honest Dennis, and I’m talking about the financial model, Adobe changed direction totally through introducing their subscription based payment system and whilst most people seemed to have rolled over and accepted this change, they wanted your software that badly, others have gone over to Apples pay once and buy a complimentary computer model as Oliver pointed out earlier.

There was little advance notice of Adobe changing their financial model just as there was no notice of Apple giving FCP 7 the EOL notice.

[Oliver Peters] “A lot of folks wonder if Apple can be trusted with FCP X and fear that at some point the application will be dumbed down or even dumped.”

Whilst this thread is based on a hypothetical scenario of Apple dropping FCPX I think Oliver has raised an important reality and that is that we are all, regardless of NLE platform, dancing to the commercial whims of the marketeers.

Either way most NLE editors are bright enough to pick up another set of tools should one become unavailable. But hopefully FCPX will see me out.

[Mark Dobson]

[Oliver Peters] “Tell that to photographers – and I mean the ones who aren’t only using iPhones to shoot pictures. Apple has gone with the mass user segment, giving them only what Apple feels they need. It’s a winning formula for Apple and certainly not wrong, but it doesn’t benefit photographers. Granted, I actually think Photos is rather slick, but I never used iPhoto much – opting instead for Aperture and Lightroom. But what do you expect for free (not counting that dongle that cost thousands). ;-)”

Your OT premise is probably something that worries a lot of people but the 10.2 upgrade, which a week in I’m finding much more impressive than I did originally, includes a lot of complex functions (made to look really easy) that seem to counter your prediction.

I’m just waiting to control FCPX with my Apple Watch, well using the watch face as a mouse is entirely feasible, and wait for Libraries, Events and projects become renamed as Moments, Collections and Years.

I’ve played around a bit with Photos and find it very impressive especially on my iPad and iPhone but it’s editing function and usability is much more closely aligned to iPhoto than Aperture. I wonder if they will build more complexity back into it in terms of digital picture editing. As soon as I heard that Aperture was EOL I took out the very reasonable Adobe Photographer subscription for Photoshop and Lightroom and this combination is far superior to Aperture. Photos would need to improve dramatically for me to drop this package.

[Mark Dobson]

I’ve got to say that the most exciting news for me from NAB are the 2 new 4k offerings from Canon. Whilst on the one hand I’m upset that my Canon C300 had just had a large chunk of it’s residual value knocked off it I can’t wait to get my hands on the C300 Mark 2.

It’s expensive but seems to have everything that’s required to move forward for the next few years as 4K slowly starts to take a hold. It’s not released until Sept earliest but in the meantime there is the dinky Canon XC10 4K out in June which will make a really great B cam or grip cam.

[Mark Dobson]

[Bill Davis] “I really don’t want to spend the next few years talking about X in professional circles and having to waste time explaining why it’s not “too simple” for pro work. And left unaddressed, I’ve seen comments such as yours take on a life of their own. The truth is that making complex things appear simple is brutally hard. The years I wrote my magazine column over my desk hung a snippet paraphrasing Blaise Pascal’s brilliant observation “I would have written you a shorter letter, if I had more time””

Chill Bill

The guys just expressing his opinion and really doesn’t need to have FCPXatic diktats shoved at him.

At it’s best this forum, as demonstrated in most of the responses to this post is a great place to kick ideas around and discuss.

[Bill Davis] “I think that’s the idea worth advancing. Not yours. “

And I don’t think people respond well to being told to sit in the corner with a dunce cap on.

[Mark Dobson]

[David Berez] “That’s it. Apologies for using the inflammatory “Fisher Price” metaphor.”

Yes, that was what did it!

Seriously though you are not alone in your reaction to the ‘look’ of the interface which whilst there have been a few cosmetic changes has not altered since FCPX launched all those years ago. My initial reaction was not good ( yes it did look like an expanded version of iMovie ) but like you I’ve learnt to really appreciate this NLE app.

Just re-read some of the ‘vintage’ comments on this forum.

[David Berez] “And its not about its capabilities . . not at all. Some elements of the software are just so damn elegant. I’m almost an FCPX evangelist, the way Apple has reimagined the timeline after all these years is groundbreaking but I am so ready to leave because of the crappy, two bit interface. I drool with envy when looking at Resolve 12 and I hope it lives up to its hype. I need my dignity back.”

. . . . And who doesn’t appreciate a nice bit of irony

[Mark Dobson]

Great post David.

I actually feel, despite the 3D titles, that this is a major update in terms of stability and smoothness of operation. Anyone who has stuck with FCPX over the period must be rewarded with these benefits when one remembers the buggy, spinning ball, crashes of the early days when to even get out of an edit alive was an achievement.

I understand the points you have made about the the appearance of the interface and think that this one factor is what put a lot of people off from evan trying the software out.

I guess I’ve just got used to it now but in the ( almost ) four years I’ve been editing with FCPX the actual interface is the component that has changed the least. We still have very inflexible elements such as the audio meters, the way that the effects browser eats into the timeline, the inability to save different layouts as we could with FCP7 and for me the most frustrating thing is the clip duration and height settings frequently reverting to their default setting. ( anyone else have this problem? )

[Mark Dobson]

Color Finale is one of the better color plugins and it works really well in combination with the new Apple Color not least because it sits adjacent in the FX browser.

Generally it’s received good feedback from users. I have to admit that I mainly use it for applying LUTs and tweeting the core levels before moving on to the FCPX color application for secondary corrections. After 4 years I’ve actually got very used to the color board and and also like the way the Apple controls can all be done on the keyboard whereas with Color Finale one is trying to do pretty minute adjustments with the mouse. Denver Riddle has already adjusted the calibration on his controls, its now very easy to move about within a color wheel and with a hit on his hands I’m sure we will see a bunch of further improvements.

I’d like to see keyboard control. I’d also like the ability to be able to resize the floating control display as I’working on a 2 monitor, different resolution , system and if I move the panel over onto my 1080p monitor it almost takes up half the screen.

[Mark Dobson]

If I analyse my iPhone usage the main activity is taking out of my pocket to see what the time is, that and politely answering calls from PPI companies.

So short of gaffa taping my iPhone to my wrist the Apple Watch seems a logical and elegant solution for me and who knows it might even help me lose some weight by telling me how long I sit staring at my computer screen each day.

[Mark Dobson]

I find that everything seems to work a bit better – hard to quantify though.

I don’t get the 3D titles – It all seems a bit old fashioned to me but it could lead to the control of more 3D objects from within FCPX in the future.

I really like the Masks that have been introduced in 10.2 ( sorry to Slice X ) and color now being an effect is huge for me as is the ability to save a combination of effects together as a new effect. As an example I’ve just created an effect that contains a Color Finale set up that includes a LUT, together with a sharpen filter and a colormask created from from Apple Color. this is now available to me with whatever library I open which could save a lot of time.

I also really like being able to display more than one video scope at a time – at the moment I have the vectascope and Luma both up.

So yes I’m pleased with this update whilst at the same time being a bit disappointed that there have been no improvements to the audio functionality or the long awaited Motion roundtrip.