Jobs Reportedly Says Final Cut Update 'Coming Early Next Year'

[Bubba Satori]

Apple can string on the consumer market, holding back features which their competitors have had for years and take for granted, and when they finally add them, they're already out of date. Sprinkle on some 'magic' and consumers eat it up.

The Professional market use their tools to make money and drive their workflow. If a product/solution like FCS becomes uncompetitive, the customer will move on.

Apple probably know that they can't compete in this space, at least profitably. Both Shake and Xserve are gone. The Macpro on price/performance is really poor value. And whilst FCS is brilliant value, it never really leaps ahead in terms of added features or optimisation.

It's possible that Apple in 5 years time will be a purely consumer electronics company, with no 'computers' in the traditional sense in it's line up. If this bears out, Pro Applications and Hardware, don't really figure into that reality.

Agree with everything except the time frame.
iApple will debut in two years.
The iPad Pro 2 will be Apple's last "computer".

 

[PeterMac II]

Don't Try to Re-Invent The Wheel / Apple....

Coming from an Apple / Mac Fan and non iPhone or iPodTouch kind of Guy & Girl, I sure Hope Apple keeps Sharp on Macs... I was at my 1st and 5th Grader's Parent - Teacher Conference at Chautauqua Lake Central School on 11/18/10 and there were 3 or 4 Macs in each Home Room... I got to believe Steve knows that if they get the Kids Hooked on Apple that they'll be an Apple Buyer for iLife.... We are also ProSumer kind of FCP people and Love our Mac versus the Windows world... Get Your Kids Hooked on iKidsFishing and not on Drugs leads to an Apple a Day keeps the Doctor away... Get it...? I hope Steve does.... Cheers & Hang Loose... Peter

 

[ghostlyorb]

It's coming out the same day as the white iPhone

So that means never??

 

[Rowlander]

Also, he's technically correct: Benjamin Button's budget was $150 million.

"Aliens vs Predator Requiem" was edited on Final Cut. But that movie was terrible. Maybe it was Final Cut´s fault.

But in all seriousness: I think a new Final Cut version is clearly overdue. FCS3 was more like a feature-patch for FCS2 than a new version. These days not having any kind of native AVCHD support really slows you down (and uses up a lot of storage space) particularly considering the DSLR-hype since 2009!

I remember a friend of mine who had bought a Panasonic HMC 150 (which is a professional camera) before FCS3 was released and was expecting native AVCHD in the next release. He has been waiting for this feature for almost two years now, while all the other big editing systems have had it for a while, as far as I know!

 

[grue]

it cracks me up that people are making a big deal of 64bit. Sure, it'd be nice, but I'd rather have the software be multithreaded worth a rat's ass, and work properly.

Nothing quite brings the same joy to my heart as starting a render in FCP and having a look at Activity Monitor, and seeing a whopping two cores in use. Or having to export a QT file first because I can't send directly to Compressor.

 

[grue]

These days not having any kind of native AVCHD support really slows you down (and uses up a lot of storage space) particularly considering the DSLR-hype since 2009!

Well to be fair, the camera manufacturers are ****s for recording to a delivery codec in the first place

 

[Hitrate]

Manwhile I've been enjoying Premiere Pro CS5 - and now Avid...Avid seems smoooth playback wise on my MBP - where FCP and PPro needs to render all the time - even for simple crops and transitions (wtf?!), and I might as well get comfortable using what the pro's use - Thing is, if you want jobs as an editor, many companies are using Avid obviously. If we're just talking prosumer or whatever, FCP/PPro is perfectly fine...I don't mind knowing the basics of all three programs though!

 

[TMay]

"Aliens vs Predator Requiem" was edited on Final Cut. But that movie was terrible. Maybe it was Final Cut´s fault.

But in all seriousness: I think a new Final Cut version is clearly overdue. FCS3 was more like a feature-patch for FCS2 than a new version. These days not having any kind of native AVCHD support really slows you down (and uses up a lot of storage space) particularly considering the DSLR-hype since 2009!

I remember a friend of mine who had bought a Panasonic HMC 150 (which is a professional camera) before FCS3 was released and was expecting native AVCHD in the next release. He has been waiting for this feature for almost two years now, while all the other big editing systems have had it for a while, as far as I know!

I'm into the casual AVCHD use like most consumers, and while my opinion doesn't count the same as most of the heavy editors commenting, Steve Jobs does tend to have a liking for "the river coming to us" as the best use of resources.

In that regard, and with Intel popping Sandy Bridge on the CES stage in January, AVC will get some much needed silicon on chip for encode/decode; the only codec to get that treatment. I doubt that this is anything but conincidence, as OpenCL / Grand Central are much more necessary for FCP's overhaul, but it strikes me that any Sandy Bridge processor in any Mac will by definition ease the AVCHD issues in all of Apple's video applications. Since AVCHD is in the core, one can imagine imagine that future Xeon processors should be quite suitable for AVCHD editing (it's my understanding that the AVCHD standard supports division of the frame into 4 chunks for multithreading).

I hope that this thread is still alive when FCP arrives and that further, there are commenters with with hands on use of the Panasonic AG-AF100 and Sony NEX video cameras supporting AVCHD and dslr lenses.

 

[PeterQVenkman]

it cracks me up that people are making a big deal of 64bit. Sure, it'd be nice, but I'd rather have the software be multithreaded worth a rat's ass, and work properly.

Nothing quite brings the same joy to my heart as starting a render in FCP and having a look at Activity Monitor, and seeing a whopping two cores in use. Or having to export a QT file first because I can't send directly to Compressor.

Amen to that. Nothing like working on an 8 core machine and seeing that happen.

 

[Rowlander]

...
Nothing quite brings the same joy to my heart as starting a render in FCP and having a look at Activity Monitor, and seeing a whopping two cores in use. Or having to export a QT file first because I can't send directly to Compressor.

Well to be fair, the camera manufacturers are ****s for recording to a delivery codec in the first place

I agree 100% with both of your posts. It still bothers me that compressor is the only application that can make full use of both my Mac Pro´s CPUs.

And I really hate the look of low bitrate AVCHD but we have to work with it nonetheless.

 

[Macist]

I think Pros on Final Cut have every right to be worried. While indications are that the pro apps are perfectly profitable it just seems Apple can't be arsed with it all when you can just slap some clever electronics inside a little box, let the sheep lap it up and make a mint.

When Final Cut DID start marching into the fringes of the high end a few years back and Apple started buying and including things like Motion and Shake it did seem like they wanted to own that space. Now? I'm not so sure. Maybe they'll merge Final Cut and Final Cut Express and politely ask pro users to migrate over to Media Composer 5 - perhaps they'll sell it in the Apple store or Mac App store.

Logic, too, looked like ProTools was being increasingly targeted a couple of years back but, again, Apple will probably think keeping the old Emagic AKA Logic operation going as a bit of an anomaly.

Aperture, well, that doesn't really have much of a point with Lightroom around, good though it is.

I just don't think Apple want to be an Adobe or Microsoft anymore, otherwise they would set up a proper semi-independent software division a la Filemaker for the pro apps and give it the resources to grow.

It's all a bit ironic as there's a lot of corporate backing now for iPad and iPhone, which Apple are happy to meet, but they seem to have giving the bird to professionals that kept them going in the lean mid-90s era and more recent converts who thought going Apple meant they were buying into emerging industry standards.

 

[Keebler]

I agree 100% with both of your posts. It still bothers me that compressor is the only application that can make full use of both my Mac Pro´s CPUs.

And I really hate the look of low bitrate AVCHD but we have to work with it nonetheless.

rowlander, you can get compressor to work with more than 1/9th of a core?
That sarcasm is directed at compressor and not at you.

I WISH i could get compressor to work. Oh, sorry....I should clarify, to work beyond 1 frickin' file! If i start a batch, the only thing I'm not sure of is which error I'll get - it's usually 1 of 2.

Yet, I can use Innobits, Bitvice to compress MPEG2 files for DVD (and the ac3s) and well, wouldn't you know, this fine 3rd party apps makes all my cores jump with excitement without me even praying to get on my knees and cry for help

I'm a pretty laid back guy, but man compressor just busts my kahonies. Heck, I even emailed Mr. Jobs about it (although nothing back).

And don't even get me started on having to export to QT first. I do not even come close to understanding the logic behind that considering it's their own software!

BUT, compressor is stopping me from upgrading to an 8core so no more money for Apple in that case. No sense spending a few grand on a machine whose potential won't even come close to being tapped.

I don't drink, but feel like I should have one right now.

ugh

 

[grue]

rowlander, you can get compressor to work with more than 1/9th of a core?
That sarcasm is directed at compressor and not at you.

I WISH i could get compressor to work. Oh, sorry....I should clarify, to work beyond 1 frickin' file! If i start a batch, the only thing I'm not sure of is which error I'll get - it's usually 1 of 2.

Yet, I can use Innobits, Bitvice to compress MPEG2 files for DVD (and the ac3s) and well, wouldn't you know, this fine 3rd party apps makes all my cores jump with excitement without me even praying to get on my knees and cry for help

I'm a pretty laid back guy, but man compressor just busts my kahonies. Heck, I even emailed Mr. Jobs about it (although nothing back).

And don't even get me started on having to export to QT first. I do not even come close to understanding the logic behind that considering it's their own software!

BUT, compressor is stopping me from upgrading to an 8core so no more money for Apple in that case. No sense spending a few grand on a machine whose potential won't even come close to being tapped.

I don't drink, but feel like I should have one right now.

ugh

Have you configured QMaster? It's a bit of a PITA, but worth it once it starts working.