FCE or Premiere Pro - Any suggestions?

[magicnigel]

Hi,

I'm looking some advice on whether to get Final Cut Express or Premiere Pro? I'll mostly be doing short videos, editing HD res footage from a Canon hf200, however as a student I'm able to avail myself to student editions of each.

I'm familiar with FCE, I've been using it on and off for a year or so, but the student edition of Adobe CS4 Production Premium is £250ish compared to £118 for FCE, and includes After Effects which could come in handy

I'm wondering is there any great advantage with FCE over Premiere, or is it purely a preference issue? I've been told Final Cut Pro is used more than Premiere but are they wildly dissimilar?

Neither of them are eligible for upgrade to later editions as a result of them being student ware. I'm leaning towards the CS4 option (possibly CS5 if its likely to be out soon) but I feel like i'd miss something in FCE.

Any suggestions would be great, I'm in no rush to buy, just interested in others views.

Cheers

Gary

 

[FSMBP]

That's tough one.

I would always recommend FCE because it runs smoother than Premiere and gives you less headaches (my experience). However, Premiere handles AVCHD footage natively - which is a plus. And, you do get After Effects which is a very very powerful tool.

It comes down to one thing; do you plan on just editing video with little visual effects? If so, go with FCE. FCE can handle green screen footage, matting, and has built-in effects as well.

If you plan on doing some elaborate visual effects, like extensive keying, blowing people up, 3-D text animation effecting the original video etc.., than the Premiere/AE way is a good deal.

I would say in the end, Premiere/FCE is MOSTLY a preference thing - but AE may seal the deal if you want VFX.

 

[Sdashiki]

Premiere doesnt usually come with AE does it?

And since its a separate program altogether (and their connection isnt as solid as it should be when opening a project from one into the other) you can still use FCE along with it.

In fact, thats how I thought alot fo FCE and FCP users worked: using FCP for the editing and AE for the compositing and effects? Because one can not deny how much faster and easier compositing is in AE.

 

[FSMBP]

Premiere doesnt usually come with AE does it?

And since its a separate program altogether (and their connection isnt as solid as it should be when opening a project from one into the other) you can still use FCE along with it.

In fact, thats how I thought alot fo FCE and FCP users worked: using FCP for the editing and AE for the compositing and effects? Because one can not deny how much faster and easier compositing is in AE.

Premiere does not come with AE normally, but the OP's school apparently offers it at a killer deal.

Ideally, you mentioned, you'd want to edit in FCE (or Pro) while doing your visual FX in AE.

However, I forgot to mention, AE is not at all user-friendly. You will definitely need to watch tutorials or get a book to really take advantage.

 

[Sdashiki]

If you understand the idea of layers in Photoshop, then working inside AE is like mixing PS with FCP.

It takes a LOT of experience to know everything that AE can do, but only one project to learn how to do anything.

 

[lucidmedia]

However, I forgot to mention, AE is not at all user-friendly. You will definitely need to watch tutorials or get a book to really take advantage.

I found it just the opposite. I have been teaching AE for more than 15 years now and find it one of the easiest programs to teach.

Given a classroom of students who use photoshop, I have found that a 45 minute tutorial on AE is all they need to understand the basics and be able to get to work on their projects.

I think this is because the interface metaphors are so consistent (i.e. if you learn how to in-between the transparency of an object over time, you now know how to in-between almost EVERY property of that object over time). This is in stark contrast to, say, teaching animation in Flash.

Compared to other adobe software, i feel AE's interface is one of the most user friendly... this is why it has not really changed since 1995.

 

[Sdashiki]

This is in stark contrast to, say, teaching animation in Flash.

Compared to other adobe software, i feel AE's interface is one of the most user friendly... this is why it has not really changed since 1995.

Damn right. FLASH sucks for animation, yet people use it all the time...I praise them for their ability to use the P.O.S. unchanging Flash interface, backwards-ass keyframing and inbetweening.


The fact AE hasnt changed over the years, much, but Premiere has changed wildly from version to version (skipping some on the mac side because compared to FCP is sucked THAT badly) tells you alot about how good it is.

 

[FSMBP]

I found it just the opposite. I have been teaching AE for more than 15 years now and find it one of the easiest programs to teach.

Given a classroom of students who use photoshop, I have found that a 45 minute tutorial on AE is all they need to understand the basics and be able to get to work on their projects.

I think this is because the interface metaphors are so consistent (i.e. if you learn how to in-between the transparency of an object over time, you now know how to in-between almost EVERY property of that object over time). This is in stark contrast to, say, teaching animation in Flash.

Compared to other adobe software, i feel AE's interface is one of the most user friendly... this is why it has not really changed since 1995.

All I meant was, it would extremely hard to just dive right in on your first try. It's not like a drag-n-drop method of placing built in "Explosions" etc.

But yeah, about 10-20 minutes of tutorials would get most people started.

 

[magicnigel]

Thanks for the quick replies, I was expecting at least a few days wait on something.

I've fiddled about with AE a bit, it didn't even occur to me that it didn't depend on Premiere for video, pretty silly i suppose. I think i might go the FCE route, it's half the price, I'm not going for anything michael-bay-lets-blow-stuff-up-esque with VFX and even if i do need AE and the rest of the suite, it's still pretty cheap and it can't hurt to have both. I'm just wondering now whether Apple are going to release an updated FCE soon or not. Looks like its been 2 years since any major updates, before that it's been once a year or so.

If anyone's interested (and in the UK), the student software is at software4students.co.uk, but Adobe need proof of your course before they'll send you serials.

cheers for the help,

Gary

 

[FSMBP]

Thanks for the quick replies, I was expecting at least a few days wait on something.

I've fiddled about with AE a bit, it didn't even occur to me that it didn't depend on Premiere for video, pretty silly i suppose. I think i might go the FCE route, it's half the price, I'm not going for anything michael-bay-lets-blow-stuff-up-esque with VFX and even if i do need AE and the rest of the suite, it's still pretty cheap and it can't hurt to have both. I'm just wondering now whether Apple are going to release an updated FCE soon or not. Looks like its been 2 years since any major updates, before that it's been once a year or so.

If anyone's interested (and in the UK), the student software is at software4students.co.uk, but Adobe need proof of your course before they'll send you serials.

cheers for the help,

Gary

I'd say that's a good choice; FCE really does give the best of editing and you can do a lot with. However, since you brought it up, Apple is most likely going to update Final Cut Express soon, my guess is by April.

So if you CAN, I would wait. If not, FCE4 is an amazing piece of software that's hard to out-grow in its current state.

My guess is that FCE5 will have a tweaked interface akin to FCP7 and most likely bring in a "stabilizer" plugin seeing as how iMovie has one.