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When can we expect Final Cut Studio 4?

M

Mr-Stabby

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Sep 1, 2004
341
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There's been little tidbits of information about the new Final Cut Studio, with even Steve Jobs giving out little hints, but has anyone given any indication as to when this new version may appear?

Final Cut Studio 3 seemed to me to be a mini-release ahead of a much bigger release, and so i'm not expecting the gap between the next version to be as big as was the time between FCS2 and 3.

Anyone have any ideas?

Usually, i'd just buy into FCS3, but from what i hear this new version is going to have a lot of changes in it.
 
I really hope they don't pull an iMovie '08 or Quicktime X but that's what I can really gather from what I've read. Maybe not to those extremes but close enough.

All negavitivity aside, I would expect native editing in AVCHD. A lot more built-in effects/filters. A UI clean-up (making some features more user-friendly).

I really hope Apple just keeps it 'pro' in the sense that they don't dumb down features or remove ones in favor of adding 'consumer' type features. We'll see...we'll see.
 
In about a year

FCP release cycles have been fairly constant, so I'd say between April and June 2011.

I don't think there's much chance of it being substantially dumbed down, the main thing I hope they'll tackle is rewrite for 64-bit, and fix a lot of architectural problems and related bugs and misfeatures along with it. There are bugs in FCP that have been known for the last 5 years, that haven't been fixed yet, presumably because they're too ingrained in the architecture of the application. Once they fix that, I'd like 10-bit RGB support, LUTs (in, out, and display), proper support for DPX sequences, and a few other things, and I'll be all set.
 
4 months from previous post.
Any news about fcs4 release date?
 
FCS is waaaay behind schedule because it needs to be rewritten for 64bit. Apple dropped the ball on this by diverting most of their resources to iToys.
 
THX1139 said:
FCS is waaaay behind schedule because it needs to be rewritten for 64bit. Apple dropped the ball on this by diverting most of their resources to iToys.
Click to expand...

Have you read the links J the Ninja provided?

I doubt someone writing for the Pro Apps will be used for their "iToys" except iMovie maybe. They have their Pro Apps team and that will be used for those applications.

But you're right, that FCS is behind. Look at Mercury and AMA, FCP needs something similar as it seems.
 
When can we expect Final Cut Studio 4?

Personally i dont give a flying monkeys if a photographer, finds FCP a hard application to use (lets be honest Aperture is hardly challenging)!

I really hope they don't do an imovie8 on FCP. it's now the industry standard for professionals, particularly those working in television (certainly in the UK).

With the xml stuff, and collaboration with other hardware manufactures, FCP is working great on pretty-well anyones server!

What i would like to see, other than the Ui being improved, is more functions taking place INSIDE FCP that currently get shunted out to the supporting applications, like Color and Soundtrack Pro (STP).

Television Professionals work in a very different way to other users...... We just don't have time to leave FCP!
Sending bad sound for sweetening, or even having time to mix it in STP is totally unrealistic, Some of the features of Color also need to be inside FCP.
 
spinnerlys said:
But you're right, that FCS is behind. Look at Mercury and AMA, FCP needs something similar as it seems.
Click to expand...
If your reffering to AMA ala Avid, I feel Avid dropped the bomb on that one as far as XDCAM is concerned :p
Here's hoping that FCP handles it better.
Were moving to Red and DSLR thanks to Sony and Avids inability to get along :p
 
FSMBP said:
I really hope Apple just keeps it 'pro' in the sense that they don't dumb down features or remove ones in favor of adding 'consumer' type features.

...I would expect native editing in AVCHD.
Click to expand...

Isn't AVCHD a consumer codec, not meant for professionals?
 
spinnerlys said:
Have you read the links J the Ninja provided?

I doubt someone writing for the Pro Apps will be used for their "iToys" except iMovie maybe. They have their Pro Apps team and that will be used for those applications.
Click to expand...
Randy Ubillos, the creator of Premiere and Key Grip (aka Final Cut Pro) moved over and created the last two versions of iMovie, FWIW. I don't think wholesale members of the ProApps teams got reassigned to consumer software but I do think that Apple working on things like the iOS, which delayed work on Leopard, has delayed the work on the ProApps. As Philip mentioned, an entire new A/V architecture is being put in place and until it is in place the ProApps teams are limited in how much they can advance their apps. Also, from what I've read, Apple likes to keep its teams lean and mean and movse them around w/in the company to help meet deadlines instead of hiring in a bunch of outsiders on a temporary basis.


arjen92 said:
Isn't AVCHD a consumer codec, not meant for professionals?
Click to expand...
DV and HDV are consumer as well but inexpensive plus good enough goes a long way. The current crop of computers still aren't beefy enough to edit AVCHD directly in a professional environment, IMO. While you can do it in PPro and Avid via AMA from what I've heard it bogs down pretty quick.


Lethal
 
LethalWolfe said:
DV and HDV are consumer as well but inexpensive plus good enough goes a long way. The current crop of computers still aren't beefy enough to edit AVCHD directly in a professional environment, IMO. While you can do it in PPro and Avid via AMA from what I've heard it bogs down pretty quick.
Click to expand...

In addition, due to the 8-bit, 4:2:0, temporally compressed nature of AVCHD, everytime you render a section of it in the timeline, funadamental parts of it change compared to other parts of the same video that haven't been re-rendered. For example, you may put some circles and arrows on a trimmed clip. Render that and you are rendering more loss into the image: changing the B and P frames, which are only referenced from an I frame anyway, re-jigging which bits of colour information get thrown away, making a decision about which colour of only a palette of 256 to use which can introduce colour banding. Render again, more loss on top of loss, etc)

ProRes 422 is a 10-bit, 4:2:2 visually lossless codec that's good for more than 10 generations of transcoding. Avid has a codec of similar quality.
 
spinnerlys said:
I doubt someone writing for the Pro Apps will be used for their "iToys" except iMovie maybe.
Click to expand...

I distinctly recall Steve mentioning something about the iPhone team being able to get back to work on FCP. I thought it was odd, too, but not being a programmer, I have no idea how that blackmagic works.

Makes sense if they went back to OS development.
 
martinX said:
I distinctly recall Steve mentioning something about the iPhone team being able to get back to work on FCP. I thought it was odd, too, but not being a programmer, I have no idea how that blackmagic works.

Makes sense if they went back to OS development.
Click to expand...

Actually, I can see some real advantages to ipad style touch in Final Cut.
Using the mouse is arm breaking, and even a tablet is no panacea. Touch and swipe in FCP would be fantastic, and save thousands of editors from repetitive strain injury!
 
martinX said:
In addition, due to the 8-bit, 4:2:0, temporally compressed nature of AVCHD, everytime you render a section of it in the timeline, funadamental parts of it change compared to other parts of the same video that haven't been re-rendered.
Click to expand...

You could set rendering to high-precision. And it could work in a ProRes timeline, a la AVC Intra. But...

LethalWolfe said:
The current crop of computers still aren't beefy enough to edit AVCHD directly in a professional environment, IMO. While you can do it in PPro and Avid via AMA from what I've heard it bogs down pretty quick.
Click to expand...

Perhaps people owe Apple half an apology here. I know people work in different ways, but I'd rather spend the time getting everything into a conducive state at the start of an edit, than have it increasingly feel like I'm editing in a vat of molasses just as I should be hitting my stride.

LethalWolfe said:
As Philip mentioned, an entire new A/V architecture is being put in place and until it is in place the ProApps teams are limited in how much they can advance their apps.
Click to expand...

Hodgetts makes some pretty outlandish suggestions at times and I'm not sure about this one. With Quicktime X taking the mantle as media player is there an opportunity for Quicktime 7 to become exclusively the pro apps' architecture? Regardless, it would be a mistake on Apple's part to not update the FCS until 2012. What with the End of the World and all that, what'd be the point?

martinX said:
I distinctly recall Steve mentioning something about the iPhone team being able to get back to work on FCP.
Click to expand...

Was Steve cracking a funny?
 
KeithPratt said:
You could set rendering to high-precision. And it could work in a ProRes timeline, a la AVC Intra. But...
Click to expand...
Interestingly, in order to get 4:2:2, you need to shoot AVC Intra-100 which is captured at 100 mbps. This is approaching the data rate of ProRes 422 ... :)

but I'd rather spend the time getting everything into a conducive state at the start of an edit, than have it increasingly feel like I'm editing in a vat of molasses just as I should be hitting my stride.
Click to expand...
Bingo.
I remember when Adobe CS4 was released and supported native AVCHD editing. Nifty feature, I thought. But the forums filled with amateur editors complaining that their high end machines (and they were top of the line PCs at the time) were always having to render everything, every time they did anything.

And yet Apple's iMovie could edit HD movies on cheap iMacs...

Two things I'd want for the future: iMovie be able to edit AVCHD files natively (it will happen as the hardware gets faster on iMacs) and the ability for FCP to import MTS files easily. I know why FCP doesn't (hint: there's a lot of information about the file in the other folders on the card) but sometimes it'd be handy to just grab a clip.

Neither are dealbreakers for me.

Was Steve cracking a funny?
Click to expand...
Steve doesn't crack funnies. But if he did, they would be awesome. And revolutionary. Woz is the comic relief.

Although I may have gotten the wording wrong, I got the distinct impression from what he said that since the release of iPhone4, programmers were freed up to work on the Pro Apps for the Mac.
 
Angelo95210 said:
I am more and more thinking about switching to Premiere...
Click to expand...

That is what I did, after experimenting with the fiasco that is iMovie '09. Even basic tasks are now hidden under a plethora of buttons and "shortcuts". Working with it reminds me more of trying to trim a movie on my phone (Pre). It is more like a game than a tool, creative potential is stifled; everything is so "cookie cutter" polished, the experience of experimentation is ruined.

However, I just downloaded the demo of Premiere CS5, and it works just like I remember (from the OS9 days), with a few tweaks that bring it closer to FCP 4/HD, which is the last version I had. Some tweaks are just brilliantly modern, (for example, the rendering engine's integrated pause for video work, what Compressor should have been!)

I suspect the iOS and OSX versions of iMovie will eventually merge, and FCP, similar to the way Garageband UI elements moved into the latest Logic "Pro" version, will follow suit, which is both exciting for a younger generation and very frustrating for long-time power-users who want to concentrate on artistry, not relearning a new UI every few years!
 
Megadooomer said:
That is what I did, after experimenting with the fiasco that is iMovie '09. ...[/B]
Click to expand...
I dont get it, did you even use FCP? Im not sure you can even match iMovie with FCP let alone FC Express.
Just in case, I use em all from Avid, FCP to Premiere Pro.
 
FCP gets shakey...

It could just be the expertise from the ex shake team is being integrated with motion... Sounds like a small team struggling for direction in a company more about media distribution than creation.
 
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