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Apple Scrapped Completed 64-Bit Final Cut Pro 8 to Build Final Cut Pro X?
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Cheese with that wine.
I hope Apple scraps FC completely, so these whiners leave the boards. I don't care if these artsy fartsy people think they are the "foundation" of Apple customers.
If you don't like FCX, don't use it, buy a PC and GTFO. I'm an avid Logic user and if Apple released a crap version of Logic X, I'd be disappointed, but I wouldn't moan for ages on the boards, I'd go back to using Logic 8 and do what I do.
Don't blame Apple for your inability to put together a good cut. Blame yourself for sucking.
Cheeeerio
I hope Apple scraps FC completely, so these whiners leave the boards. I don't care if these artsy fartsy people think they are the "foundation" of Apple customers.
If you don't like FCX, don't use it, buy a PC and GTFO. I'm an avid Logic user and if Apple released a crap version of Logic X, I'd be disappointed, but I wouldn't moan for ages on the boards, I'd go back to using Logic 8 and do what I do.
Don't blame Apple for your inability to put together a good cut. Blame yourself for sucking.
Cheeeerio
What's wrong with FCP 7? Why not just keep using it and being productive? There's a weird compulsion people have to always have the "newest" version but at the same time I hear many of you people say, "I'm going back to FCP7". I doubt a "newer" version will make your story/film/documentary/music video any better.
People used to cut film.
People used to cut film.
In Apple's defense, they probably thought they have something so great, everyone would be blown away. Does not seem to be the case. Tells me: Bad market research.
Tip for Apple: Copy something from Microsoft: Open a timed Beta for your product and let the experts give feedback. This will save you and your customers a lot of headaches. Secrecy is good when it comes to some things like new hardware and served Apple well - but when it comes to software, not so much.
Tip for Apple: Copy something from Microsoft: Open a timed Beta for your product and let the experts give feedback. This will save you and your customers a lot of headaches. Secrecy is good when it comes to some things like new hardware and served Apple well - but when it comes to software, not so much.
I switched to FCPX a month or two ago, and it has been nothing but headaches. The GUI feels sluggish, button locations are ill-conceived, in and out points are basically nonexistent in clips in the bin, titles are (still) a joke, media management is more confusing, you can't have "white space" on the main timeline (oh, but you can add a blank clip), the timeline in general is much less snappy, color correction is a huge disappointment (no numeric inputs? no copying color correction to multiple clips?), transitions and grouped clips are cumbersome to manage on the timeline, applying a manual fade to a clip is much more complicated, fading audio between two adjacent clips is impossible. It's just a big mess all around.
I've gone back to Final Cut Pro 6, and I've never loved it more.
I've gone back to Final Cut Pro 6, and I've never loved it more.
This is typical of the management style of Jobs. One would hope under Cook one thing he would consider adding is new support for the installed base of folks not using the exact most recent release.
Some older CPU's (2+ years old) which are fully functional and in critical use need to run older instances of OS or software to address massive CONTENT.
I would like to see Apple continue to lean forward on hardware and supporting software, but lean just slightly rearward on installed base software. There is no reason why they cannot do updates to FCP 7-8 and also have a parallel FCX product.
An analogy was iMovie. They came out with a "better" iMovie and the users asked one of the older versions remain in distribution because it offered specific benefits. Apple has since taken iMovie to iPhone and iPad which they care about far more than Mac at all.
But there are still Macs out there. Even ones 2-4 years old as the MAJORITY of the installed base.
Talking directly to Apple now, even when I buy a new CPU, I keep the prior generation or two around to deal with massive accumulated content, an already learned software system, or to simply have a backup in case of an issue.
Support older OS systems and software suites for your installed base.
Rocketman
Some older CPU's (2+ years old) which are fully functional and in critical use need to run older instances of OS or software to address massive CONTENT.
I would like to see Apple continue to lean forward on hardware and supporting software, but lean just slightly rearward on installed base software. There is no reason why they cannot do updates to FCP 7-8 and also have a parallel FCX product.
An analogy was iMovie. They came out with a "better" iMovie and the users asked one of the older versions remain in distribution because it offered specific benefits. Apple has since taken iMovie to iPhone and iPad which they care about far more than Mac at all.
But there are still Macs out there. Even ones 2-4 years old as the MAJORITY of the installed base.
Talking directly to Apple now, even when I buy a new CPU, I keep the prior generation or two around to deal with massive accumulated content, an already learned software system, or to simply have a backup in case of an issue.
Support older OS systems and software suites for your installed base.
Rocketman
I'd buy it today...
I'm writing this post as I wait for a render and export out of FCP 7. IF there were a FCP8 64 bit, I'd purchase it today.
I still can't even consider FCPX as viable option, as nearly ALL of my work involves some form of multi-cam, so until Apple decides to put that feature "back in" it's not an option for me- I'm stuck with no native support for h.264 files and slow render/exports from an Octo-Core MacPro Tower
I have editor friends who have moved on (and in most cases, back to) Avid Media Composer and Premiere. There will likely be a time for me to move away from FCP7, but for now, thats where I'll stay, hopeful some of this dust will settle and Apple will come around to making FCPX an app that pros can use- or- they won't, and we'll move on....Sort of sad that its come down to this...
Regarding the switch from OS9 to OSX? Hell yeah- those early versions were downright awful- and it's no surprise back then that Apple replaced many of the disturbing omissions that seasoned Mac users were flipped over. Maybe they'll see the light with FCPX, but I really think Apple's days in the "Pro" end of things are just about finished. They make a lot of money selling very good consumer products to just about everyone- including my mother. I don't think they need, or even want the niche business that is Mac Pro Towers and FCP users. If you follow the numbers there is more potential business catering to the masses than to a select group of editors.
I'm writing this post as I wait for a render and export out of FCP 7. IF there were a FCP8 64 bit, I'd purchase it today.
I still can't even consider FCPX as viable option, as nearly ALL of my work involves some form of multi-cam, so until Apple decides to put that feature "back in" it's not an option for me- I'm stuck with no native support for h.264 files and slow render/exports from an Octo-Core MacPro Tower
I have editor friends who have moved on (and in most cases, back to) Avid Media Composer and Premiere. There will likely be a time for me to move away from FCP7, but for now, thats where I'll stay, hopeful some of this dust will settle and Apple will come around to making FCPX an app that pros can use- or- they won't, and we'll move on....Sort of sad that its come down to this...
Regarding the switch from OS9 to OSX? Hell yeah- those early versions were downright awful- and it's no surprise back then that Apple replaced many of the disturbing omissions that seasoned Mac users were flipped over. Maybe they'll see the light with FCPX, but I really think Apple's days in the "Pro" end of things are just about finished. They make a lot of money selling very good consumer products to just about everyone- including my mother. I don't think they need, or even want the niche business that is Mac Pro Towers and FCP users. If you follow the numbers there is more potential business catering to the masses than to a select group of editors.
This is just pathetic. This whole "if you don't like it then don't use and whine about it" thing is in total violation of human nature.
Yeah, hahaha multicam is the ONLY editing tons of people do!
Final Cut prices aren't bad for studios, or even expensive workstations.
But take the students who used their loans to get an incredible piece of software that can grow with them. $1,000 on Sunday. $300 on Tuesday, no upgrades!
Cruel.
64 bit software is great, especially if you don't have the cash for a Mac Pro (or desire to buy something that's 75 in computer years) so you go with a crazy quad MBP, cram 16gb of ram into it... You now have a complete mobile workstation that can put most towers to shame.
Oh come on! any modern tower that costs upward of $4k should be able to handle h.264 video natively... thats what's wrong with FCP 7- can you still use it? Of course- does it take exponentially longer to process / transcode / edit / export?? hell yeah! If you worked in this field you would understand that TIME is money, and waiting for footage to render/ transcode / export is like watching grass grow. Thats is in fact COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE!
Yes- people used to cut film, (they also used to draw primitive images on walls to tell stories way back when) Cutting film requires HUGE expenses processing, prints, and there were about 6 assistant editors in a room... try telling your clients you need $75,000 to shoot, process and cut their industrial film and see how long you stay in business.... Please people. Get real!!
This kinda supports my idea that professionals leverage the tools available to them.
More importantly OS/X has never been static, it has improved steadily as has many of Apples other apps. If their is one thing I object to is the people that see a heavily refactored app like FCP X and think that the suite is and for ever will be static, unchanging and never suitable for their needs.
Now I don't know the specifics of the how's or whys of FCP X but I suspect one goal was to build a new code base that allowed for future growth. Many apps meet with unexpected success and where not designed to cope with constant improvement and growth. Hopefully one of the goals for FCP X was to allow adaptation in the future to meet the the more unusual needs out there.
Finally people have to realize that software is never really finished. As such you have to ship sometime. As a user though it is up to you to determine when to buy.
At work I still have to fire up DOS apps to work on some of the equipment there. The fact that I have to use these old apps doesn't mean that newer approaches with software running native on Windows or Mac OS are bad though.
It is only a mess if you want to believe it is.
All in all OS 9 to OS X transition is still not over, and was a mess at the start.
More importantly OS/X has never been static, it has improved steadily as has many of Apples other apps. If their is one thing I object to is the people that see a heavily refactored app like FCP X and think that the suite is and for ever will be static, unchanging and never suitable for their needs.
Now I don't know the specifics of the how's or whys of FCP X but I suspect one goal was to build a new code base that allowed for future growth. Many apps meet with unexpected success and where not designed to cope with constant improvement and growth. Hopefully one of the goals for FCP X was to allow adaptation in the future to meet the the more unusual needs out there.
Finally people have to realize that software is never really finished. As such you have to ship sometime. As a user though it is up to you to determine when to buy.
Doesn't take advantage of all the power and RAM in 12 core MacPro's. 64-bit FCP 8 would have addressed that. Could have dramatically sped up processing time.
OK - I'm a professional editor. I've got a window open with Final Cut Pro 7 rendering right behind this one. I make all my money editing, directing and producing. I work freelance at a lot of edit houses/ ad agencies and there's a few things that people who are whining about FCPx aren't making clear to everyone else, let me try:
-We don't really NEED new features. The tools of an editor are mostly cutting clips together. That's why most edit systems look the same. Preview, edit, done. It's like any audio player, for example: you want a playlist, you want a play, stop skip button... but when things like "Ping" are added to iTunes, people wonder why. This is a "pro" app, and the "pros" wanted a FASTER more reliable, 64 bit version of FCP 7, not to be able to import iMovie projects.
-Not one pro I know is using FCPx. At most they have it installed on some other computer and they screw around with it sometimes. It has NEVER been considered as a seriously useful product for people working in a pro environment by anyone I know.
-When you talk about the mark of a professional being able to get a tool to do what you want, yes, we want that. But the problem is that we can't simply all jump onto FCPx and start using it at work. We have to be able to make money and knowing that EVEN IF WE MOVE TO FCPx WE CANNOT OPEN FCP 7 PROJECTS means we'll never give up what we know and what what works for something that's a pain in the ass to lean and doesn't do everything we want it to do. (XML Support in FCPx does not allow you to import XML files created in FCP 7, another "sucka!" move from someone at Apple)
People who whine and complain are all over the web. So are loads of crappy work. I'm sure FCPx makes some people happy, but the people who make the ads and TV shows they watch on TV aren't. That's the problem we're bitching about. I waited so long for an application that I've built most of my career around to be updated and instead, it was completely redesigned into something new. Could you imagine bringing your automatic transition car into a repair shop and instead of fixing it they give you a brand new car. Only, now it's got a right-side steering wheel and it's manual transmission. Oh, and your wife is pregnant and you have to get her safely to the hospital. And there's no body around to help you learn to drive stick. That's basically what happened - we didn't expect the change, and we don't have time to learn something we didn't want to learn in the first place.
Hope this helps you understand why I'm such a pissed off little bitch
I feel all of these complaints results from an unwillingness to learn how the new software works. The sluggish bit is non-existent for me on a 2.8 QC i5 iMac.
Agreed. This is why I use Motion, which integrated LiveType and is DESIGNED TO MAKE TITLES.
I'll agree with this if you're using multiple drives.
I don't seem to have this problem? I can have blank space just fine.
See first comment. Learn how it works.
I will agree with this.
It's not impossible if you cross the clips properly. Spend some money and do the Mac Pro Video tutorials. That said, I wish I could export to Logic or something, but I have faith that functionality is coming.
So they actually had the product the market was gagging for, but a group of adults thought that to release it would be a bad idea, much better to hand a captive market straight to their competitors and create a new benchmark for product launch failure. How the mind boggles.
9 times out of 10 this is the smartest strategy in the current market - i.e., Lion, iOS, etc.
There is still that 1 time, however, when it won't work out.
Unfortunately, Apple was aiming FCPX at the Prosumer, and the Pros had no idea this was happening. Result: Pros' expectations were not met, and they got miffed that Apple went ahead and switched market focus on them. Long-term, however, it's still smart to serve the Prosumer. The Pro market is dwindling anyway. It might very well turn out that over the long term, Apple's decision was right after all.
Then why not switch to the best software / hardware on the market? Buy a PC, get Avid. If TIME IS MONEY, I would think you would have already done this.
My point is that everyone sits around complaining about Apple when they should just be streamlining their work flow. Media Composer is a wonderful program, and superior to FCP in many ways.
Its the projects that matter. I'm unconcerned with the "brand name" that gets me there.
OK - I'm a professional editor. I've got a window open with Final Cut Pro 7 rendering right behind this one. I make all my money editing, directing and producing. I work freelance at a lot of edit houses/ ad agencies and there's a few things that people who are whining about FCPx aren't making clear to everyone else, let me try:
-We don't really NEED new features. The tools of an editor are mostly cutting clips together. That's why most edit systems look the same. Preview, edit, done. It's like any audio player, for example: you want a playlist, you want a play, stop skip button... but when things like "Ping" are added to iTunes, people wonder why. This is a "pro" app, and the "pros" wanted a FASTER more reliable, 64 bit version of FCP 7, not to be able to import iMovie projects.
-Not one pro I know is using FCPx. At most they have it installed on some other computer and they screw around with it sometimes. It has NEVER been considered as a seriously useful product for people working in a pro environment by anyone I know.
-When you talk about the mark of a professional being able to get a tool to do what you want, yes, we want that. But the problem is that we can't simply all jump onto FCPx and start using it at work. We have to be able to make money and knowing that EVEN IF WE MOVE TO FCPx WE CANNOT OPEN FCP 7 PROJECTS means we'll never give up what we know and what what works for something that's a pain in the ass to lean and doesn't do everything we want it to do. (XML Support in FCPx does not allow you to import XML files created in FCP 7, another "sucka!" move from someone at Apple)
People who whine and complain are all over the web. So are loads of crappy work. I'm sure FCPx makes some people happy, but the people who make the ads and TV shows they watch on TV aren't. That's the problem we're bitching about. I waited so long for an application that I've built most of my career around to be updated and instead, it was completely redesigned into something new. Could you imagine bringing your automatic transition car into a repair shop and instead of fixing it they give you a brand new car. Only, now it's got a right-side steering wheel and it's manual transmission. Oh, and your wife is pregnant and you have to get her safely to the hospital. And there's no body around to help you learn to drive stick. That's basically what happened - we didn't expect the change, and we don't have time to learn something we didn't want to learn in the first place.
Hope this helps you understand why I'm such a pissed off little bitch
- If you don't need new features, then why would you switch? Apple wants you to use their new product, so they put all the new features in with the speed increases. You can't have one without the other. At least not indefinitely; FCPX had to be re-written from the ground up to optimize it and give it the biggest increase in speed possible.
- Hmm. Maybe it's just where you work; I know a couple guys that work in production that really like it, although they hated it when it came out.
- Again, if it doesn't do everything you want it to, then don't switch. And of course you can't import old projects; the underlying construction of projects has been completely changed.
And your car analogy only works if your boss forced you to update. But it sounds like that was on you. I'm not saying its a replacement for FCPX, clearly it's not and you'd know better than I would. But it's the direction Apple wants to take. The choices are simple - stick with FCP7 and try to get speed increases out of hardware upgrades, update to FCPX, or move away from Apple's editing suite. The third is just silly because you'd have to learn a new system anyways [although it could be justified if you really need a missing feature]. The first is practical. And the second is riskier, but would pay off as features are added back and updates re-take an evolutionary form.
So yeah, it's not ideal. But notice how "bitching about it" wasn't on the list of options. Because at the end of the day, it doesn't get anything done.
It's people like you that I feel sorry for, the ones that legitimately need a feature and recognize that investments can't simply be scrapped willy-nilly. For your sake, I hope Apple includes multi-cam support in a not-too-distant update.
I agree on almost all counts; as long as Apple does not charge insane money for the program (and it does not), there is no real profit in staying in the pro market.
I however, feel that it should aim to retain the creative market (or at least a sizeable chunk of it - the one it is currently good at).
I trully believe it was the pro market that saved apple in the first place, making it the desirable icon it is today. There is a certain appeal to a "pro" brand - if handled correctly it can make a huge difference.
The "Pro" market we remember fondly is not the same today. Today, it can't save anyone, and relying on it exclusively isn't a recipe for growth - at least not the kind that Apple wants. The money is in serving the consumer sector - all that insatiable desire for new and interesting devices, and the sort of software that empowers people and let's them do things that weren't even on the radar a few years ago.
The business you're in today can be reinvented tomorrow. Everyone must reinvent themselves. Tech is changing. Even specialized, niche markets. There is no niche market that is today immune from the sea-changes that take place in the wider consumer markets. It all filters and branches outward to niche segments.
And those niche segments are also changing, and are being integrated with the wider consumer segments. The average person a few years ago would be hard-pressed to do any advanced level of photo-editing, especially without purchasing ridiculously expensive software and having to put up with serious learning curves.
Now, in the span of only a few years, look at the kind of power that has been put into Joe Average's hands. It's incredible. You can even do, with some iOS apps (of all things!), things that were a few years ago only possible with much more complex and expensive software.
The line between "Pro" and "Consumer" has been blurred to an unprecedented degree. Hence, today we have what is known as the "Prosumer." And these Prosumers are growing in number and strength every day. One of the companies serving them is Apple.
The Pro market is dwindling. The Prosumer market is expanding rapidly. The skills that at one point were hard-earned and rare (Pro skills) are being steadily, slowly but surely, acquired by even average users with a little time and curiosity. As tech becomes much more accessible to Joe Average, those skills that were once prized in the industry will eventually become commonplace. What took a lot of skill yesterday can be easily accomplished and on a larger scale today, due to increased exposure and access that Joe Average, and for that matter you and I, are enjoying. It all filters down due to increased access.
The "Pro" market is not the same market that Apple allegedly turned their back on years ago. It has changed. And it is no longer a market that can sustain anyone exclusively. At all. Especially with the Rise of the Prosumer. The traditional "Pro" market is slowly dying, but also changing. It is becoming integrated with the consumer market, and Prosumers are making it happen.
In time there will be no specialized, niche markets at all in consumer tech, and that includes the "Pro" segment. We will all have access to them, with better tools that will be far easier to use.
Yep. Avid would work great for your needs. Any competent editor can learn it in a week by themselves. But if you need a "class" to hold your hand, there are many out there.
Also, any successful editor wouldn't have any problem with the funds necessary to upgrade. Right? Right.