iMovie Vs Final Cut

[rexone]

Hi all,
I've reached a point where I'm pushing iMovie to its limits & need to think about moving to more sophisticated software.
My logical thought is to look at Final Cut.
I suppose my biggest questions relate to ease of use - How easy is the transition & learning curve if you're already pretty across iMovie?
I haven't the time to spend weeks pulling my hair out in frustration & screaming at the screen as I try to get rolling...
Any thoughts or suggestions?

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

It's a relatively big change because it's a big hop from amateur to pro. I found FCPX to be like the old (and great) iMovie '06 had it evolved on and on instead of getting a typical Apple reset and then maybe another reset to make it "simpler" (and work with iDevices).

Apple used to offer a free trial and maybe still do. Why don't you just give that a try and see if you are able to easily acclimate to FCPX? Else, all the answers here are going to be extremely subjective: "very easy transition for me" vs. "it took me forever to figure out how to do things so simple in iMovie" and everything in between. Some people hate FCPX because they got used to FCP (before X) before Apple decided to do a big reset "to make it easier to use" and other people think it's incredibly great.

My own answer: having been pretty good at iMovie '06, I found the adoption pretty easy. I did have to learn new menu locations and some new ways to do some things but again, iMovie '06 Pro. After adopting, I think FCPX is TERRIFIC. I'd never go back to iMovie (even '06) and hope Apple won't decide to "reset" it someday "to make it easier to use"... or to align it with "the new FCPX for iOS" (please Apple, don't do it).

 

[rexone]

It's a relatively big change because ...

Thanks Darryl.

Yes, I'm not too 'frightened' about the changing to a new app. Just don't want to have to relearn everything from a time perspective.
I'm finding now that there are things I need iMovie to do that are just beyond its abilities, I find work-arounds to get it do stuff but it takes way too long & I really need improved colour grading tools too.
I'll have a look at the trial when I have a few spare days.

And yes, Apple seems to have decided now that everything should be iOS friendly (code for dumbed-down really).
You only have to look at what they did with photo management & editing - drop iPhoto & Aperture and instead of releasing something halfway inbetween release that dog of an app, Photos, that's of a lower standard than iPhoto.
Photos is more like throw-away shareware that used to come with a MacAddict cover CD circa 2000 than a quality Apple app...

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

30-Day Free trial does appear to still be available: http://www.apple.com/final-cut-pro/trial/

 

[Bending Pixels]

If you're looking for a good free (yeah...free) tutorial on FCPX, IzzyVideo has his entire basic FCPX tutorial online.

Having played with iMovie a bit, I found FCPX to be a bit more...logical in how it handled stuff.