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Impossible.

Apple's no longer supposed to care about their Pro software.

This will never happen.

A lot of pros have already left Mac, but I have been holding out. However, this is the last straw. If the new FCP disappoints I will be jumping ship, buying a high-end PC and switching to Avid or Premiere. I just can't stand the frustrations anymore of watching every consumer itoy get upgraded, and then the Pro stuff getting shafted.

The time is now. The new FCP had better have something equivalent to Mercury Playback, optimization for RED footage, different HD codecs, real-time playback, 64 bit, multi-core usage, etc. If it's a dumbed-down consumer product I will be absolutely livid.
 
To everyone who is hoping or Final Cut Server-like integration in the new FCS I have to ask... Have you ever USED the Final Cut Server?!?!?! Talk about a bear of a learning curve!

Asset management is easy if you are organized. If you're not, no amount of asset management software can help you!
 
Asset management is easy if you are organized. If you're not, no amount of asset management software can help you!

I 100% agree.

Using AVID at work was a steep learning curve for me, coming from a FCP background.

If anything asset management TELLS you how to manage your work rather than letting you do it how you wish to do it.... Organisation is key.
 
No Real web designer uses iWeb...
Tried it for 5 minutes until i realised how closed up it is, ie no code view.
Not that i really need any graphic program anyway. TextWrangler and Notepad++ FTW!

Its not made for real web designers, its made for MILFs and Soccer Moms who just wanna wack a site 2getha...
 
Apple to Introduce New Final Cut Pro on April 12th?

I'm just guessing but it's possible that Apple will announce the new FCS and ship it when Lion ships, perhaps around the June WWDC.

I think your probably right but I sure hope they announce something. I certainly didn't buy my brand new MacPro to run the leather clad iCal... ;-)
 
Have any of you been able to use Sandy Bridge hardware h.264 on the MBP for your AVC files?

I understand that there is an issue with 24p (it's 24.000 hz not 23.976 hz as it should be) which will be corrected with Ivey Bridge, but 30p/60p/60i should work fine. I'm assuming that this feature will show up in Lion, but probably isn't yet supported in SL.

Yes...using the new MBP, 17" SB 2.2 with FCP. Works fine, regardless of frame rate...however, there are a gazillion different "flavors" of AVC and h.264. I shoot HVX/HPX/EX1 and Canon 5d2/7d cams...all either at 24p/30p/60p. And obviously not AVC...however, h.264 I have plenty of experience with... Never had an issue with ANY FR, and this MBP is zippy as hell! Comparable to my '08 Mac Pro 3ghz/8 core machine for times on rendering and compression and exporting. Love this machine and I'm anxiously awaiting the new iMac/Mac Pro updates. I almost bought the 2010 Mac Pro 12 core...but I wanted to wait out the FCP news this year, so held off. If my new MBP is indicative of the performance boost we can expect with the new Mac pro....regardless of whether they use Sandy or Ivy bridge....it's going to be a phenomenal improvement. Big. Huge. Step up!!!

A lot of pros have already left Mac, but I have been holding out. However, this is the last straw. If the new FCP disappoints I will be jumping ship, buying a high-end PC and switching to Avid or Premiere. I just can't stand the frustrations anymore of watching every consumer itoy get upgraded, and then the Pro stuff getting shafted.

The time is now. The new FCP had better have something equivalent to Mercury Playback, optimization for RED footage, different HD codecs, real-time playback, 64 bit, multi-core usage, etc. If it's a dumbed-down consumer product I will be absolutely livid.

This is Bowl *****!!! Come on man....I see these claims with absolutely NO, ZERO proof to back it up...Links? Pics? Video???? IF anything, MORE people have joined the FCP camp...because more people than EVER are buying Macs! Even though Adobe and Avid are cross platform, the affordability of FCP is a real bonus. Everyone I know that uses FCP and has been using FCP has ZERO interest in flipping. Unless you have an extreme PC...Adobe makes no sense (unless you are using the Quadro nVidia cards in a Mac Pro). Sure, the Merc engine increases performance for a few transitions and filters....but rendering is still necessary in MOST cases! Today's speed of the new Macs....MBP, iMacs, Mac Pros...makes the transition from AVC, XDCam, DVCPro, etc to Pro-Res, is actually a very speedy process. Even Canon stepped up last spring with a plug in to increase transcode speeds almost a 1,000% (used to take a minute or two to transform...now done in 10 seconds or less!!!). Once in Pro Res, editing is an absolute breeze...a cake walk, easy as pie:) Especially if you have a recent generation Mac from the last couple of years.

Now...that said, absolutely, I totally agree improvements can be made. As mentioned many times....media management and better integration between other programs in the suite. However, being a long time FCP user, I'm "used" to the export/share option and don't find it too difficult.

Motion is the program I would like to see take a big step forward. I am also a heavy Adobe user and have the entire CS5 Production bundle...but NOT for Premier...I solely use PhotoShop and After Effects. AE has been my go to animated title compositor. Motion, while decent...is certainly behind the eight ball in comparison to Avid and AE for these tasks.

However...most, if not ALL of the pros I know that have been using FCP continue to do so....and there are more motion pictures, BIG ones...this year, edited on FCP than I can remember in years past. Pulling this BS out of your arse is crap. The iToy phenomenon, in my very humble opinion will actually HELP the Pro Apps...as Apple is making more money than EVER!!! This will afford them the expertise they need to develop the pro apps...more so than they've ever been able to do in the past. Keep in mind...for these iToys to be great, they need content....and again, IMHO...I think Apple knows this, and would be happy if every app, movie, song, etc...that resides in iTunes, Mac Store, App Store, etc....was created WITH their soft/hardware as well. Again, just my opinion....Apple won't shoot themselves and the entire creative community in the foot....just when they've becoming the HIGHEST gaining computer sales platform in the world!!! They're selling more computers (MB, MBP, MBair, MP, iMacs) then EVER...and I attribute that somewhat to the excellent user experience so many folks have had with their "iToys". You gotta figure some of those folks will be "Pro" creative guys. And enticed they will be (my Yoda impersonation) by the hardware and software that Apple offers....so if anything, there is Growth in the Pro sector...hardware and software both. NOT a mass exodus. Again...if you truly have proof that "All those Pros have already left Mac"...I'm all ears. If anything, they've made significant gains. Hence the reason AVID has DECREASED their pricing from the astronomical rates it used to cost...and the proprietary rigs you had to have to run the program.

Sorry for the rant. But what you've stated is absolutely NOT true my friend. Period. And THAT is a fact! If you're deciding whether or not to stick with FCP, cool...fine to make that point. Don't make up BS about other "Pros" and their Post Workflow. Other than the BBC switching to Premier, I can think of NO other real, true professionals that have abandoned FCP because it's lacking. It's still a VERY powerful program. Getting older, several places to shine it up, but it still does the job and does it well.

J
 
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FCP supporting Bluray is irrelevant if Apple does not start putting Bluray drives into its Macs. The nice thing about the Superdrive is that I know if I have a Mac, I can do anything related to DVDs. I can play them, I can burn them, I can do Dual Layer. It's just as simple as "You have a Mac? You can play this disc!". Does anybody remember the days before DVD Drives became standard in computers? I remember giving DVDs to people that wouldn't play, and then having to have them crouch down next to their PC and read off the faintly printed logos on the drive and tell me if it said CD-ROM.

All the haters that are against Bluray, you have to admit that if it was a Bluray drive in every single Mac made that the requests for Bluray would be much higher.

I've dealt with clients that when our Client's Client needs to sign off on a final video, we have to mail them a DVD. Because they are so stupid that they either don't know how to download a file, can't play a file because their computers are so locked down they can't install quicktime (think bigger corporate environments where you need permission to install anything), or are just idiots to the point where all they can understand is "Put this disc in this slot". I remember having a end client one time where the DVD Video Logo on the disc wasn't enough, and I had to spell out on the disc label. "This disc will only play on a DVD Player". And then apparently that wording was too confusing and I had to reword it to "This disc will only play IN a DVD Player". Then they put the DVD in the computer and it wouldn't play. Sent their IT department to the owners office and find out that they downloaded DVD Playing software earlier that was on a trial, the trial ran out, then since it became their default DVD player they were incapable of playing DVDs.

I've also had stupid clients request DVDs (because files is too difficult...), fire it up on their 27 inch Cinema Display, then complain that the video is blurry because they don't understand the concepts of resolutions and that if a Standard Definition DVD plays full screen you're blowing it up 3 times it's normal size probably.

It's pretty ignorant to say Apple shouldn't support Bluray because you personally don't use it. I haven't put a spot to tape in forever, should the next Final Cut Pro not include export to tape options because it's a dying format?
 
This is Bowl *****!!! Come on man....I see these claims with absolutely NO, ZERO proof to back it up...Links? Pics? Video???? IF anything, MORE people have joined the FCP camp...because more people than EVER are buying Macs! Even though Adobe and Avid are cross platform, the affordability of FCP is a real bonus. Everyone I know that uses FCP and has been using FCP has ZERO interest in flipping. Unless you have an extreme PC...Adobe makes no sense (unless you are using the Quadro nVidia cards in a Mac Pro). Sure, the Merc engine increases performance for a few transitions and filters....but rendering is still necessary in MOST cases! Today's speed of the new Macs....MBP, iMacs, Mac Pros...makes the transition from AVC, XDCam, DVCPro, etc to Pro-Res, is actually a very speedy process. Even Canon stepped up last spring with a plug in to increase transition speed almost a 1,000% (used to take a minute or two to transform...now done in 10 seconds or less!!!). Once in Pro Res, editing is an absolute breeze...a cake walk, easy as pie:) Especially if you have a recent generation Mac from the last couple of years.

Seconding this. And also would like to add... What businesses out there can just switch operating systems on a whim because they latest and greatest came out for another platform? Sure if you are Joe Schmo freelancing out of your house you can do it, but any actual business with existing equipment doesn't just switch like that. I just can't picture anybody going "Damn Apple won't support the Mercury Engine, I'M SWITCHING BACK TO WINDOWS!!!"
 
What do you mean true 3D? Motion 3 integrated 3D reflection, shadows, depth of field, etc.. It was around that time I stopped using After Effects. There are still things that AE can do that Motion can't, but that's mostly due to 3rd party plugins.

I mean 3D objects with materials, textures, shaders, better lighting, better shadows, no crashing several times a day...
3D like ProAnimator FX or Kinemac at least. No plugin required.
 
Just want to chime in on the Blu-ray issue. I shoot weddings professionally (~$60k per year) and a majority of my clients want Blu-ray. I encode with Compressor and author with Encore. It does the job just fine but I would love for DVDSP to support Blu-ray authoring. Doing menus and buttons in Encore is a major pain in the rear and if authoring Blu-rays could be as easy as authoring DVDs in DVDSP, I will be upgrading sooner rather than later.
 
Motion is the program I would like to see take a big step forward. I am also a heavy Adobe user and have the entire CS5 Production bundle...but NOT for Premier...I solely use PhotoShop and After Effects. AE has been my go to animated title compositor. Motion, while decent...is certainly behind the eight ball in comparison to Avid and AE for these tasks.

I agree with this, I feel like motion is not really fulfilling it's potential, especially after the acquisition of shake. I do really like Motion, it's great in it's intuitive and straightforward approach, I feel like it's really fast for putting together certain projects. For higher end compositing projects or for just complex scenes in general I feel like there could be more powerful tools and the speed can just go down too fast when things start to get a little complex.

I'd love to see Blu Ray support for DVD Studio Pro, I don't feel like it's necessary but Blu Ray, I feel, is easily relevant enough to justify it's implementation.

I'd also LOVE to see some things tweaked with bugs and performance with Soundtrack Pro. I think the program is fantastic in many ways but once a project gets to a certain level of complexity / size it can be game over. Not just crashes but bugs that actually destroy work and can render a project unusable. You can just segment projects, which is fine, but it'd be a really nice work flow bonus to not have to do that.
 
Plus to everyone saying 'digital distribution!' in the US we have 'data caps' and to send one blu-ray size 2hr movie (not compressed to hell with 2ch stereo MKVs) it would eat up 1/4 of my monthly bandwidth per movie.

I agree that digital distribution IS the future but we are a long ways away from having 100+Mbps constant stream broadband without caps as long as a handful of ISP's have all the control. So for now blu-ray is a wonderful alternative.

Let me be clear - FCS needs a robust blu-ray authoring feature. We don't live in a wireless world where you can transmit video free over the air. We still put disks in a player to watch and also preserve our video memories.

Not having a good blu-ray authoring feature is a huge problem for Final Cut Studio. Not only does it impact professional wedding video-graphers, but ordinary people who want to put their video on a disk to send to people. I can't just put my video on netflix to have a friend watch it on his ROKU.
 
What businesses out there can just switch operating systems on a whim because they latest and greatest came out for another platform?

Not that I disagree with what he said, but there are a good share of big post houses that had switched from Avid to FCP or vice versa. Also, from Avid/FCP/other to Adobe.

Not on a whim of course, but it's certainly not crazy to think companies will switch platforms if a better solution is out there.
 
A lot of pros have already left Mac, but I have been holding out. However, this is the last straw. If the new FCP disappoints I will be jumping ship, buying a high-end PC and switching to Avid or Premiere. I just can't stand the frustrations anymore of watching every consumer itoy get upgraded, and then the Pro stuff getting shafted.

The time is now. The new FCP had better have something equivalent to Mercury Playback, optimization for RED footage, different HD codecs, real-time playback, 64 bit, multi-core usage, etc. If it's a dumbed-down consumer product I will be absolutely livid.

I would try out Premiere on your Mac before jumping to PC. I edit on Premiere for Windwos at one of my part-time jobs, and it is terribly unstable on every machine I've used. Constant crashes and hang-ups, and I don't like the interface as much as FCP. People cite native DSLR support as an advantage, but you have to sit there and wait for Premiere to "conform" every clip, which can take 45 minutes for large projects...probably the same amount of time it would take to convert to ProRes!
 
The quality of a blu ray film is superior to all forms of digital distribution over the internet, like iTunes for example and it is a huge improvement over DVD. I can't understand why people still stick with DVD. Like Apple! Macs have no blu ray disc tray, only DVD. I can not understand that!
When you have all these great HD Camcorders and great movie editing software on a Mac why you should burn a DVD and loose most of the quality. Sure, you can upload HD movies to YouTube or Vimeo directly from iMovie, but it is not the same quality as, if you would burn a blu ray. At least the Mac Pro should have an option for a blu ray disc tray and DVD Studio Pro should support blu ray authoring.
I hope Apple will do a step in this direction with the new FC Studio.
 
Of course your not taking in to account all the fragmentation issues relating to "cross-platform" applications.

All software has bugs, especially programs ported to different operating systems and machines. The the bottom line is that FCP is popular with the editors.



BBC Broadcast Engineer.... living in the real world of media production!
Of course, all software has bugs. I was just trying to find out which bugs the OP was speaking of, and pointing out ways to report bugs.
 
Blu ray schmoo ray.

Blu Ray is great for the wedding shooters and cutters.

Most corporate videos are being delivered by file or laid back to tape.
 
I would try out Premiere on your Mac before jumping to PC. I edit on Premiere for Windwos at one of my part-time jobs, and it is terribly unstable on every machine I've used. Constant crashes and hang-ups, and I don't like the interface as much as FCP. People cite native DSLR support as an advantage, but you have to sit there and wait for Premiere to "conform" every clip, which can take 45 minutes for large projects...probably the same amount of time it would take to convert to ProRes!

Constant crashes on a Windows machine, eh? I don't see that from feedback I've been hearing. I'm wondering about the specs of those Windows machines you are speaking of (unsupported video card, or not enough RAM perhaps?). Drop by our forum with your issues. Let's see if we can help you troubleshoot your issues: http://forums.adobe.com/community/premiere/premierepro_current
 
I don't believe the mercury engine works on anything but nVidia cards.

Close, but not quite right.

The Mercury Playback Engine is composed of 3 things:
1. 64 Bit Application
2. Multithreaded Application
3. Processing of some things using CUDA (an NVIDIA card)

If you don't have a CUDA based video card, you still have the Mercury Playback Engine (software) available. What you probably meant to say is that hardware acceleration for the Mercury Playback Engine is not available unless it's a CUDA card.

More info: http://blogs.adobe.com/premiereprot...y-playback-engine-and-adobe-premiere-pro.html

Best,
Kevin
 
There's something I don't get. Doesn't DVD SP allow you to author non-commercial (non-DRMed) bluray discs, with the same feature set as DVDs (but in HD)?
If it does, that should be good enough for many. I doubt that the big houses that produce commercial DVDs (Warner, Sony, etc), use Adobe Encore for their titles anyway... They likely use high end solutions from another league entirely.
 
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