[Tim Kolb]

[Bill Davis] “The POINT was that version 1 of ALL THREE were underpowered, feature poor, and laughable as to their regard by the working professionals of the time. “

But this argument implies that Apple hasn’t had a software product in that space for a decade and had no users waiting for a product they’d invested HEAVILY in to extend like the competitive products have… Your implication is that they’re inventing FCP v1 for the first time.

They’re not.

Adobe never promised Photoshop v10 users something great was coming…then released Photoshop Elements v1 promising that they’ll get some missing features put back in there eventually…while the earlier version of Photoshop is removed from the market while the new “think different and stop whining” Photoshop Elements isn’t even able to load existing Photoshop documents…but Corel does no problem.

“Hey Photoshop v1 didn’t have many features when it came out either, so printing industry and ad agencies everywhere that created an entire set of jobs and industry around Photoshop, that can no longer prepare anything for pre-press (who uses paper anymore?) …shut your cake holes.

Yeah… that makes lots of sense. However…THAT’s more of a parallel to the FCP vs FCPX scenario than just looking at version 1 of every other piece of software that started as version 1.

Even when Adobe rewrote Premiere from the ground up and tacked “Pro” on the end in 2003, existing users were still given an upgrade path…and the later version of the software, even though quite different, could load legacy version projects, as it does to this day.

It’s simply not comparable. Apple’s competitor is the only company that makes a current product that will load it’s own existing professional customer’s legacy projects…it’s absurd and it shows that Apple has nothing approaching reciprocal loyalty to what the professional post production market has shown Apple.

I don’t think there is a doubt that Apple once again got in the time machine and jumped ahead, but this time they cut off the very user group that they have been holding up as the user base they dominate vs Adobe and Avid in their messaging.

They made a smart move for Apple long-term. I expect that bleeding a point a day of their higher end professional market share is something they anticipated and as the drive is on to upgrade iMovie users….they’re simply focused elsewhere.

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor

[Tim Kolb]

Chris…

The Adobe engineers I’ve interacted with feel that the two platforms are roughly equal…each might have an edge over here…and might trail a little bit over there.

I think there are some Mac users that have felt their systems don’t run as smoothly as Windows (and there are a few who have a conflict of some sort that is not indicative of how Adobe typically runs on a Mac.)

I think if you are setting up a new system, most of the possible snares are already taken care of.

FCP users who may have more than one version of QT loaded up (by necessity) as well as lots of other software loaded and haven’t changed their driver configurations for years (the “holy grail” for an editor…the edit system just runs and runs and runs instead of constant updating, etc.)…I think the few of these guys who are running into issues probably have a system component or software issue that just hasn’t been run to ground yet.

If a mac is what you’d prefer to have, there is no official Adobe line on one running smoother or faster than the other…but do pay attention if you choose to comparison shop as how the processors are configured can be different (if you are looking at a Hyper-threading Windows machine, make sure the MacPro also Hyper-threads, etc.)

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor

[Tim Kolb]

Are you treating that letter like it’s real?

Check out the blog…”scoopertino”…it’s uh…the “Onion” of Apple information.

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor

[Tim Kolb]

[Sean Thomas] “Ford never improved the Edsel and droped it.

You think for a second that Apple is going to do that?”

Well there you go…they didn’t drop the industry-standard compositing application, “Shake”…or the very powerful professional color correction application “Final Touch”…

…oh wait. Actually they did.

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor

[Tim Kolb]

[Robert Brown] “You just listed a bunch of toys for consumers which I admittedly own myself but could live without – except for the mouse that was a good one.”

Thank Xerox for the mouse. That’s where Apple got it from.

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor

[Tim Kolb]

[Steven Gonzales] “Not to nitpic, but OS9 shipped with OSX early releases, and ran in the classic environment.”

As I seem to recall…you needed OS9 to run FCP at that time…

🙂

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor

[Tim Kolb]

[Robert Brown] “How could they not copy when the guy who developed Premiere then moved to Apple to work on FCP. It’s a small pond really.”

If you want to see Ubillos’ handiwork on an Adobe product, you’ll have to go back…waaaay back. Premiere 3 or 4 (before Pro) was the very last version he would have touched…way before it would have been even somewhat considered a Pro editing application. That would be 11 major releases back for those of you counting.

…and the ground-up code overhaul the application got when it added the “pro” to the name (I know…not very original…I think that’s the feature that Adobe stole from FCP)was 6 major releases ago.

I think Premiere Pro users are probably ecstatic he moved to another opportunity when he did, standing where we are today…

He makes an absolutely amazing consumer app though…and I say that without a shred of sarcasm.

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor

[Tim Kolb]

Yes, whether or not it’s possible, developing a feature for a user base of less than 40% of the user base is impractical.

It sounds like what you probably need is that consumer application.

(Keep in mind that your assertion of the proof of concept has all been for MPEG2…MPEG4 is a different animal.)

I like DSLR footage, but I can’t see myself needing this feature myself, so I will poach my eggs and eat them…they’re good protein.

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor

[Tim Kolb]

[Tom Daigon] “But you seem to like it…probably because its all YOU know.”

Tom, with all due respect…step carefully here.

Most of us who have been in this business any period of time have used a Mac…we had a fleet of them through the 90s…Media 100, ProTools (My partner had the first system in the midwest), Photoshop, Infini-D (there’s a blast from the past for someone no doubt.)…we ran Macs for every production role in the house.

We ran into some problems when G4s had so much RF noise in the case that moving forward with our Media 100s (hardware systems back then) proved impossible unless we wanted to run them case-open…not to mention an issue where the machine could ‘take’ a GB of RAM (a big deal back then, and priced accordingly) but anything over 512 MB actually slowed the machine’s operation…markedly. Of course, Apple didn’t tell me that and I had some expensive RAM that fit in nothing else made of course, that I could use to level table legs.

After all that, and a FW bus that would simply stop functioning whenever it darn well felt like it in the ProTools room (using a Digi02 control surface dependent on FW) requiring a trip to the authorized repair center each time, and the fact that Premiere 6.5 Mac version actually ran on Cheetah immediately, but we had to dual boot to launch FCP (possibly until Puma, but I don’t recall)…

We noticed that an evaluation workstation we had in-house that ran Windows 2000 Pro seemed to just run.

Windows machines were relatively inexpensive, so I bought another one later and once we rendered our first AE project on it…I was sold. The Macs were significantly slower when they were actually operational…but the time it was taking to keep them operational was unreasonable…we left for the dark side.

Until Macs went to Intel processors, every speed comparison that said Mac was faster at creative functions was just plain spin. Photoshop, AE…anything involving 3D…Windows machines were faster.

Now the Mac/Windows power debate is moot…the systems draw on so many similar hardware configurations…however, I could not move to a MacPro workstation if I wanted to as there simply are not enough peripheral board slots to move my system into one. I’ve had several colleagues who realized the board count limitations only after they’d purchased the peripheral that won’t go in without something coming out…they just assumed that a professional workstation, it had the capability to accommodate it.

When BOXX or Safe Harbor…or DV411 builds a system, the types of conflict issues that many seem to complain about just don’t occur. Judge Windows performance and stability on a professionally designed and built system if you want to compare one to a MacPro. If you want to use some computer homebrew guy’s account of how his system functions as a comparison, you’d need to find a home-built Mac…’nuff said.

Most Mac users are quick to point out the virus-prone Windows machines…well, we ran Norton AntiVirus on all our Macs in the 90s as there were several worm and trojan attacks…one that disguised itself as a print driver was rumored to have infected the entire print industry in Hong Kong in less than 24 hours.

I can’t remember ever having a virus that my antivirus software didn’t catch and quarantine on my Windows systems…and Macs aren’t immune…they’re just not popular enough to get much impact from hacking them. (I’d look for the next serious virus to attack iPhones at some point soon. If you want to make a name for yourself as a hacker, that’s the new frontier.)

I’ve used Macs on and off over the last series of years…they are very nice and the interface with the device is definitely a notch above most other computers, however, Windows 7 works pretty well in my shop…no more drivers and that sort of thing to deal with amongst the video peripherals than my friends on Mac deal with…in fact the last time I changed/added a harddrive subsystem, I don’t recall it affecting how many monitors I could light up…that was a problem a MacPro/FCP colleague had not so long ago. Some sort of Apple backdoor “resource balancing” or some such thing…the kind of nonsense a Mac user would expect from Windows I suppose.

Macs are nice, but it’s not like the rest of us are out here using Windows Millenium. Not everyone who has used a Mac has been baptized into the glow of its supposed indisputable and glorious perfection…

Some of us just need to get some stuff done, (and I don’t have to worry about Bill Gates jacking around with my edit software).

So I guess I’ll remain “un-churched” in the computer wars and when I can gain ground by switching again, I’ll do so.

Until then, we PPro users who run our Windows machines will continue to help FCP guys who are coming over, but remain working on Macs…but I’d steer clear of the OS religious wars because most of us PPro users are already setting aside the “You don’t use FCP? How can you be a professional?” prattle we’ve been getting from FCP users for too many years…

🙂

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor

[Tim Kolb]

Thanks for that Keith…

It sounds as if your system should have more than enough torque to be quite responsive…and I know there are Mac users who do not have runnability issues, so it’s not all Macs we’re talking about…

My colleagues who have told me that they wouldn’t switch to Windows OS on their macs…but it runs so much faster, now number 4 or 5, and far more I’ve encountered on forums in obviously a far less verifiable account of user perceptions on the topic.

I do know that Macs are a different animal running Adobe software, though Adobe engineers who I trust say the differences between Windows and Mac really are minor with each exhibiting slight advantages over the other in isolated areas.

I had an ad agency client recently that bought a new Intel quad core Mac Pro because they had a project that required rendering multiple versions of a specific video out with custom names placed in custom areas within the video that I set up in AE. They would replace the text in a source file in Photoshop, and the AE project would be re-rendered, etc.

Their Mac rendered that video so unbelievably slow that I was shocked. I did the test renders on an old AMD dual dual core 2220 BOXX machine that I have and rendered the viseo in something like 12 minutes…their system was hours. I left before it finished, but it was crazy…it should have been at least equal (ish) I would have thought…

I’m not a programmer, so I can’t speak to the problem directly, but the lag in response that I’ve seen now a couple times…that’s a conflict. That’s not slower functioning…that’s malfunctioning.

I have to believe that there is a conflict somewhere in the Mac systems that have the problem…certain hardware? Display cards? driver versions? Other Mac applications on the machines? A particular version of QT?…something.

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor