Apple Issuing Refunds for Final Cut Pro X Upon Request

[myca]

If Apple had approached this in a similar way that Adobe recently approach the new version of Audition (a total rewrite of the application) things might not seem so messy.

Here's what they did.

Early announcement that it would be released as a rewrite of a much loved piece of software.

They were honest and upfront that some features would not make it into the first version.

They offered a (I think about three month) public beta where users could try it out and communicate directly with the devs.

Upon release version 3 is still available to purchase, so people can still buy licences if they need the features that are not yet implemented.

And voila, a pretty successful launch of Pro grade application. Granted some PC users are a little annoyed that some of their more favoured esoteric features are not yet included, but for us mac users it's finally a decent wave editor released on the platform.

Just goes to show that Apple need help with the Pro market, or they should just leave it and say so, because if Adobe are doing it better it says quite a lot.

 

[HelveticaRoman]

Does anyone know how distance-selling regs (in the UK at least) works (if at all) with downloadable content?

You get a statutory 7 days cooling off period with all physical objects.

If the product is not fit for purpose, no terms and conditions can shield the vendor. Or the credit card company with which you paid for it.

 

[tacoplenty]

WTF was Apple thinking?

Bottom line is you don't abandon your customers' library of projects by not allow for the import FCP 7 files.

Apple made FCP legendary by creating a swiss army knife application for editors of all skill levels, projects of many levels of complexity or simplicity.

Bet the coen brothers don't cut their next movie on FCPX!

 

[gkpm]

Avid's Media Composer 5.5 is a fully pro-level picture (video or film) editing program and sells for about $2500.00 Avid provides a fully functional, 30-day trial period for this software.

Adobe does the same for the latest Premiere Pro editing package.

Many other pro-level packages and/or expensive plug-ins are sold in a similar fashion.

Apple could easily have done this too.

Yes they could, but can you really compare a $2500 product to a $300 one?

There are plugins for Avid more expensive than the whole Final Cut Pro X, and you don't get a trial period on those.

 

[sined13]

...I don't understand the uproar and whining.

When all your stuff works and there is a possibility to really upgrade in the sense that what I have is made easier, I would upgrade...

For those who have missed it, here's a good (lengthy, but an eye-opener) rundown on what many of the problems are and why the pros are whining:

http://podcasts.creativecow.net/fin...-we-cant-use-final-cut-pro-x-at-our-companies

The real pros (people making a living and have a lot invested) have genuine/valid reasons to be pissy. The non-pro crowd shouldn't really have much to complain about.

 

[Doug Young]

Rewrite the playbook

I haven't yet read any of the comments here, but it seems like others can bring out incomplete products :cough:blackberry:cough:xoom:cough:, but only Apple get slated for it

As a Mac user and lightroom/aperture/photoshop/ipad/iMovie/.mac/mobileme user I've been here before

Lack of Curves and Actions in Lightroom or Aperture (now un-needed thanks to targeted adjustments)
Lack of Floppy drive and SCSI connector on iMacs (now unneeded thanks to USB, FW, Thunderbolt)
Lack of usb port on iPads (now unneeded thanks to iCloud)
Lack of free option on .mac (now sort of back with iCloud)
Lack of iDisk etc on iCloud (tick, tock, tick, tock...)

Get over it as follows

Use what you have been using
Download a demo (where available, read and experiment)

It just goes to show these professionals are just as premature as regular people - the really smart ones are watching and waiting while they carry on as they did last week

 

[B. Hunter]

I have to say, the excuse of this being a rewrite that took as long as it did and be lacking the major features that made Final Cut Pro the great program that it has become in the industry is just unacceptable. To me there is no excuse for that unless they had programmers that have never used the previous versions. In my opinion, Apple seems to have focused all their attention on their portable devices and have put their pro devices in the "Hobby" department along with Apple TV.....

Your opinion is fact. Jobs himself said many moons ago how the FCS team was assigned to IOS development for a period of time. FCPX probably would have been released last year if not for that.

 

[robeddie]

I honestly think that Final Cut Pro X is the best thing that Apple has created in a very long time. It is just amazing to me how powerful and fluid it is to edit with it. It is more amazing to me the amount of backlash it has received.

There are countless people who have blogged/written about what is wrong with Final Cut Pro X.

You would not be so 'baffled' by the backlash if you took the time to read some of these ... many of which go into exhaustive detail.

 

[K42]

So all software sold in the Netherlands needs to support all the features of its predecessors? The courts must have their hands full deciding these cases!

I can think of dozens of examples. Think Windows Mobile 7 vs 6.5 for instance...

Well, no, it is not like that.

First of all, it matters a lot if the seller is clear about missing features. If I go to the app store however, Apple is just talking about the things it "adds". That is sort of misleading.

And secondly, disputes will normally get settled. Not in the last place because of these laws.

And thirdly, it is far less common to go to court in the Netherlands for these kinds of things than it is in the USA. One can also loose a case, and then (part of) the costs of the trial are for you. Class actions suits are (still) not as easy to arrange I think. So there are some obstacles. And then the question mainly becomes whether your damage outweighs the risk.

 

[JohMai]

@gkpm

Yes they could, but can you really compare a $2500 product to a $300 one?

There are plugins for Avid more expensive than the whole Final Cut Pro X, and you don't get a trial period on those.

My point was that Avid and Adobe offer free time limited demo's of very expensive programs and seem to have that process under control while Apple essentially is demanding that you buy FCPX to "try it out".

On an earlier post, someone mentioned the cool way Adobe introduced "Audition" to the Mac. They did the same with LightRoom, by the way.

 

[Doug Young]

I just realised...

As a photographer with an interest but not much experience in Final Cut Pro my landscape just changed

Apple has realised that there is a huge market of people out there who are getting on fine with iMovie, would love some of the features of FCP, but are scared silly of it's interface.

I am even put off by FCP Express because I can't invest the time to learn it

Sounds like I already know how to use FCPX
I hadn't realised how big a rewrite this was. (perhaps this reaction was their plan all along - what better way to get people like me to finally get off the fence than to make it both affordable and easy and make sure I knew about it)

I'm going to buy it

 

[robeddie]

And NO professionals should have ASSUMEed (you know what they say about that word) that a $300 video editor software would do what they need.

Apple is moving the product to a new market, as it fits the new way they see the world. Sorry Pro's they are not just into you any more.

FCS, which contained FIVE high-end professional applications, cost $999.

So, $300 for a SINGLE one of those applications is NOT really a drop in price.

This notion that FCP suddenly got cheaper is not really accurate.

 

[a.gomez]

They need a Demo

Microsoft does it with Office (60 days) and so does Adobe (30 days) hell even Quark gives you 30 days.

 

[lshaner]

Avid's Media Composer 5.5 is a fully pro-level picture (video or film) editing program and sells for about $2500.00 Avid provides a fully functional, 30-day trial period for this software.

Adobe does the same for the latest Premiere Pro editing package.

Many other pro-level packages and/or expensive plug-ins are sold in a similar fashion.

Apple could easily have done this too.

Really, a demo version would have been nice.

But even more helpful would have been for Apple to be forthright about the fact that FCPx doesn't read any FCP7 content -- that alone would have been enough deterrent for most to wait until some future version of FCPx that can at least convert/migrate the old content into the new format with as much of the timeline as possible left in tact.

For the 1.0 release of FCPx I would have even settled for simply collecting all the media files from my FCS projects into one place under FCPx control and at least maintaining the cut in / cut out markers so that at a minimum I would have a shred of a working project that I could then further re-tweak as needed.

Of course I can continue to use FCS for old content, but the point is I reuse a lot of old content and I really need to be able to carry things forward when developing new content.
I at least need my old media files to be gathered together and copied for me.
That much would be the MINIMUM level of "backward compatibility" that FCPx should have included and we didn't get ANYTHING like that.

 

[gkpm]

First of all, it matters a lot if the seller is clear about missing features. If I go to the app store however, Apple is just talking about the things it "adds". That is sort of misleading.

Umm that's not what I read in the app store page. Nowhere does Apple state you'll have all the previous features and more.

They actually say it's all been redesigned from the ground up, and on the webpage goes further to say "everything just changed in post".

Maybe people presumed that Apple would keep all the previous features and rushed into it, but that's far from being legally misleading and doubt that would hold up in court.

 

[odedia]

There are countless people who have blogged/written about what is wrong with Final Cut Pro X.

You would not be so 'baffled' by the backlash if you took the time to read some of these ... many of which go into exhaustive detail.

I have read them all, lack of OMF/EDL/XML, FCP7 import, output to tape etc.

These are all important features for legacy editing. For modern editing, you don't need any of that. You record digital, you edit digital, you use flash storage, you output to file and do whatever is needed with it. OMF is a problem that is still relevant but 3rd parties will soon handle.

Bottom line - keep your FCP7 application for legacy projects, use the new FCPX for modern projects. Have the best of both worlds until FCPX is improved. The performance and new feature set is worth it. Just syncing clips to secondary audio is worth 300$ alone.

 

[PatrickCocoa]

Quite the Opposite, in fact

Wow you know some heads rolled over this one.

Can you say Job Opening?

Randy Ubillos, the driving force behind Final Cut Pro X, will probably get a promotion and a big bonus. I believe that the top levels at Apple look on the controversy as proof that they've done something right, that they are dragging the reluctant masses into the glorious future.

 

[iLilana]

while its good they are offering

film makers should wait. They will fix everything.

 

[spiffers]

To the guys telling us to stick with FCP, yeah, I can still use it like I used it yesterday. But yesterday FCP was barely hanging in there, crashing, rendering, crashing renders, pizza 'o death. It works, but it works like a old beat up VW Beetle firing on just three pistons. So we where promised this new wonder, that just changed everything in post. Yeah, it changed crap into ****. A golden turd is still a turd!
I can still use my old FCP, and for now I have to, but I cant buy another new FCP editing suite, Im stuck with what I have, unless someone is willing to sell their license to me.
I really really hate Adobe CS, but maybe thats gonna work out better than iMovie X. Or maybe its gonna be Avid.
Looks to me Apple is ditching the pro customers. They just want the iSheep.

 

[gkpm]

FCS, which contained FIVE high-end professional applications, cost $999.

So, $300 for a SINGLE one of those applications is NOT really a drop in price.

This notion that FCP suddenly got cheaper is not really accurate.

Well I didn't need the rest so FCP was still $999 for me.

Now it's $300 and I got it for ~ $150 using a supermarket promo in the UK that exchanged £90 worth of shopping points for £180 of iTunes vouchers.

So I'm really over the moon with it's performance/price. It's ridiculously cheaper.

Even the exchange price in £ is amazing, they don't add the VAT.

 

[robeddie]

film makers should wait. They will fix everything.

So after a decade of releases that were better, stronger, more capable than the last ... after 10 YEARS ... now an 'update' comes along that we have to wait, and hope, that they restore the functionality of the version that they no longer sell.

 

[DisMyMac]

Cut the price in half, rename it iMovie Pro, and keep supporting version 7. EVERYONE will be happy. Only Apple's pride will hurt slightly. (So there is really no chance of it.)

 

[myca]

I have read them all, lack of OMF/EDL/XML, FCP7 import, output to tape etc.

These are all important features for legacy editing. For modern editing, you don't need any of that. You record digital, you edit digital, you use flash storage, you output to file and do whatever is needed with it. OMF is a problem that is still relevant but 3rd parties will soon handle.

Bottom line - keep your FCP7 application for legacy projects, use the new FCPX for modern projects. Have the best of both worlds until FCPX is improved. The performance and new feature set is worth it. Just syncing clips to secondary audio is worth 300$ alone.

Absolute nonsense.

So if you're making a film and need some foley what are you gonna do? Need proper colour correction? Need to do a full 5.1 mix? A stereo or Mono mix for TV? Send stuff off for visual FX and/or composites?

The fact is that this looks like an amazing piece of software for a single user who does it all, which is how some people work, once you reach a certain level and need to have multiple editors, output to Pro-Tools for foley/scoring/mixing and many other reasons you need to import export this software becomes absolutely useless.

 

[Eye4Desyn]

It's good to see that Apple is issuing refunds to those users not kosher with FCP X being up to snuff for professional/personal use. However, I can say that having used iMovie quite extensively for the last eight months and having dabbled in FCE for the last two, FCP X has been (for me) a god-send.

On another note, I've been slightly disappointed with FCE and what I felt to be a somewhat cumbersome workflow. FCP X brings the ease of use of iMovie with the power and wherewithal (some yet to be released) of Final Cut as most of you have known it to be and yet know it to be. For me, it was a no-brainer at the $300 asking price. I've wanted more user customizable features/functionality in a NLE than what iMovie is capable of offering - but not at the expense of a steep learning curve and of course time. Trying to learn any of the older Final Cut applications video track, audio track hierarchy was a bit daunting. Other than very simple tasks in FCE, workflow there just didn't seem natural or that intuitive. IDK - for the hard-core guys and gals out there that have been using FCP for years, I understand this 1.0 release for FCP X has been a huge let-down, but for those of us just entering the fray of very-capable NLE software (not to mention coming from iMovie) I think it's the perfect transition. I'll be keeping my copy of FCP X and expanding from here.

 

[JHankwitz]

I wonder how many of the 562 people giving the software a single star actually spent time learning all that it has to offer. I find it hard to believe that anyone could take the time needed to learn such complex software in so short a time and be able to provide an objective review.