New User to FCP

[aquafilmmaker]

Hi there

I know this is an Apple forum so the answers may be slightly bias but:

I am a (wait for the death threats lol) PC user and have been editing on PC with Premier and latley Avid Pro.

I have been asked to spec a new filming studio and the new Sony EX1 XDcam seems to be the weapon of choice. As I have been going through the quotes it seems that most of the broadcast suppliers are saying that although im asking for Avid I should take a serious look at an Apple with the FCP suite.

This is due to cost compared with Avid and more and more people are switching to it. NOT being an Apple user I am obviously worried about switching and re-learning. what are the thoughts out there?

Please help

Thanks

 

[bigbossbmb]

I'm going to simplify this as much as possible....


Will you need multiple people working on the same project at the same time?

Yes -> Avid
No -> FCP

That is definitely the first question I would ask, but there is definitely a lot more to it than just this.

 

[aquafilmmaker]

Good point

My bad, no its just gonna be one edit station and editor. I know Avid is leagues ahead with the unity workflow and the going between other apps. just worried about the transition. I have seen fcp briefly and it looks quite similar to premier, that is in the way it edits. Avid is great but my god its a learning curve and very fussy sometimes and over complicated. im a compatant editor so do you think I will be able to pick up mac and fcp fairly easily?

thanks

 

[prestonkd]

I am a new Mac switcher coming from the PC using Avid XPro for about five years. I have had my Mac Pro and FCP for a couple of weeks now. I am still doing basic stuff with the Mac just rying to figure everything out. It may be because Avid had such a learing curve or it may be all the different programs I've used at this point however I would say that the word that describes FCP and related software the best is "intuitive." I have been able to very easily figure out the basics by just messing around with it. That is compared to my first several days with Avid, I just stared at the screen a lot. I still like Avid and will probably get the Mac version for Leopard when they release it becasue I use Pro Tools also - even though I also bought Logic and am really liking the "send to" between all the different programs. The point is that for an experienced editor I think that basic usage is easy to pick up between Avid and FCP. Naturally there are more advanced levels to get to that I am sure will require some reading to figure out but everything I have learned so far has been pretty smooth. At this point I would say to not let any learning curve that may exist be your decision maker. Hope that helps.

 

[matperk]

I use FCP fairly often. I'm not a pro or anything. I do work in a student television network and we use Avid there, and I must say, when I do have to support it, when i need to find something in either program, it's usually not hard to hunt down--basically the ideas of how you accomplish tasks are similar.

The one thing I have found, and that makes me prefer FCS, is that things just seem to work more reliably. I've run into a lot of issues with Avid, mostly in export, that are solved by quitting and reopening the program. And while it is a simple fix, it's pretty damn annoying.

 

[Willis]

I use FCP2 at home and Avid express 3.5 at college, and I have to admit, I prefer FCP.

it just seems easier to edit on, even though Avid is fairly straight forward once you get going. I think FCP has better integration into other programs in the suite than what Avid offers.

just my opinion though

 

[slybeans]

I use Final Cut Pro on my mac and Adobe Premiere on my windows

They're very similar.