Thoughts on new FCP X Sneak Peek

[Jeff Krepner]

Cool, thanks Heath. I think allowing both version will increase the switch-over rate to the new software and for $299 I think it is a "must have" for no other reason than to test.

Now if they would just figure out a way to save a project so it can be opened in older versions of FCP and we'd be all set. I guess that is where XML comes in but haven't tried that.

Thanks
Jeff

Originally Posted by Heath McKnight

Jon Chappell says this:

"As it is an App Store app, it won't overwrite the old version of Final Cut Studio so you can still go back if anything is missing."

So I guess we'll be okay.

My thoughts on Final Cut Pro X - Digital Rebellion Blog

heath

[Ron Evans]

The problem for Apple is that Adobe have a fully integrated product, Premiere and Photoshop Elements 9 for $120 in this prosumer space on the MAC. Features are not the same but in some respects is more capable than FCPX. I know the Apple fans will not look closely but maybe Apple are a little concerned.

On the PC at this price range there are lots of products. Most companies have this range as a subset of the pro models. Adobe has Elements, Sony have the Vegas Studio range and Grass Valley have Edius Neo 3, AVID/Pinnacle Studio. All will edit native files and have Bluray disc authoring built into the product and range in price from $80 to $195.

FCPX looks like a really nice product very well presented in true Apple style but in some respects may be expensive and lack functionality when compared to its PC equivalents at this price point.

Ron Evans

[Nigel Barker]

If we are now talking about consumer products don't forget that each & every Mac ships with the very functional iMovie at no extra cost so the average Mac user has no need to buy a consumer oriented video editing product.

[Michael Liebergot]

Originally Posted by Floris van Eck

I have been thinking about the $299 price announcement and the absence of the other apps. I think Apple is monitoring our reactions to the price. The overall opinion is that it is too cheap, not a professional price et cetera. I think it is a safe bet that they will price the other apps in the current suite accordingly. Smart move by Apple. They now also know how Adobe and Avid are pricing, so they can adjust their strategy accordingly. If they had revealed the other app's prices, they couldn't do so anymore.

Just my thoughts on this matter. Otherwise it makes no sense to me.

First off I think everyone has to remember that this was a sneak peek at FCP only and not the other apps. I have no doubt that Apple will be releasing the other Apps separately as well.
This is my reasoning.

I think that while $299 is a good prince for FCP (I will be first inline to buy it) when you stop to think about it, $299 is not exactly as cheap as you would be led to believe.

Remember that FCP came bundled in a suite (FCP, Motion, Color, Compressor, DVDSP, STP) which goes for $999, new. Bundled software is always cheaper than ala carte.

So with this in mind, figure that FCP, which seems to have elements of Motion, Color, STP, Compressor in the app itself goes for $299. But if you want/need further functionality then you will wind up buying all or some of the other programs in the suite (Ala Carte).

There are many out there who probably don't use much of the other apps at all, and some who use all of them. So one's total needs will vary.

Now, as I said it's very that likely Apple will be selling all of the other apps separately as well.
Which is nice, becasue now one can build his/her own suite.

So figure if you were to pay $299 an app, then that would be a in the neighborhood if $2,000.
If they let you buy FCP for $299 and get additional suite programs for $199, then you would spend something like $1,500.

Remember that FCS right now is $999, so in the long run you could wind up actually paying more for your overall needs. Personally, while I do have a background in 3-D suing Cinema 4D, I don't really use Motion that much, as I haven't had the time to learn it. I don't use Color that much, as I use Magic Bullet Colorista in FCP itself. DVDSP I use because I have to on the Mac Side (I don;t want to spend the extra money on Adobe CS suite and Encore). I do use Compressor for most of my encoding and use STP often for cleanup needs (if PCF has greatly improved audio then I might not have need for it).

So my total cost might be FCP, DVDSP, Compressor, STP=about $900.
Is this a deal, well compared to $99 for the entire suite, no.

So in the big picture of things Apple might wind up making more money on the selling of separate programs. Now what kind of discounts they give you is unknown at this point. But it has to be something, right?

[Caleb Reynolds]

Originally Posted by Thane Silliker

Any talk of native import of Panasonic MXF files? Is this already in FCP?

Second step/conversion to ProRes 422 before application to the timeline? How is this handled now?

This is not already in FCP. Though I think it will be in the new one. I thought I read that they said there will be more file recognition in this one. From a competitive standpoint they almost HAVE to include some type of compression. Even my CS3 can recognize .mxf and play it in the timeline.

To Greg Harris:

I thought that no matter what program you use, if you undercrank such a low frame rate (30p) it all will look choppy?

[Michael Liebergot]

Originally Posted by Nigel Barker

If we are now talking about consumer products don't forget that each & every Mac ships with the very functional iMovie at no extra cost so the average Mac user has no need to buy a consumer oriented video editing product.

Nigel, while we haven't really seen much of FCPX, as this was just a sneak peek at some features. I really find it hard to believe that this will be anything but a professional product.

Just because it might look like iMovie, doesn't mean that it functions like iMovie.

I also work in Sony Vegas Pro and have used Sony Vegas Studio as well. The look, functionality and interface are the same, but the feature set are different. Vegas Pro is much more powerful and has many more pro features on it that Vegas Studio.

I think one of the reasons that they look alike, is that only 1 app has to be developed, but can have a different feature set. This makes it easier on the developers as well as the end user who might want to upgrade and not have to worry about a whole new layout or workflow.

So why can't FCP be the pro version with more pro features and power and iMovie be the lower consumer version. They both have the same look and engineering, but the pro version (FCP) will have a much greater feature set and ability. So if someone who works in iMovie want to step up to more functionality, they can do it almost seamlessly.

Final Cut Express ran on the same old code and layout that FCP used to use.
iMovie had the newer more advanced code as well as interface. So it's no wonder that Final Cut Express goes away and FCP is redesigned with newer code and the newer IMovie interface.

This is fine in my book, as coming from Vegas, I always felt that FCP was rather clunky and archaic in it's design. While it was ground breaking in the past, the current version was lacking and in need of a make over.

Again coming from Vegas, I never liked the traditional linear A/B editor, and preferred working on the timeline. So I find the current layout, at least what was shown to be quite refreshing and cleaner in it's interface.

[Thomas Smet]

I think Michael pretty much hit it on the head here. FCP was only one small part of the package for $999.00. If you were you breakdown the cost per application now then perhaps FCP would also be about $299.00.

Just look at the current Final Cut Express. This is almost identical to FCP except a few features here and there. The interface is the same, the engine the same and the core editing features the same. About the only thing missing is 24p support and more cinema based features. FCE is still $199.00 however which is a killer price if you don't need 24p support or multi-cam editing. Take on those extra features and you may be pretty close to the $299.00 price point.

My only concern with this method is that people tend to not know about creative tools unless they really need them. With the Studio package people got a bunch of tools they not typically cared to use. Because they had them however they were opened up to new ideas and they learned how to make use of these funky extra tools. Could sales of Motion, DVD Studio Pro and Soundtrack Pro suffer with this new purchase method? If that happens will Apple eventually have to give up on developing them? A lot of people that did use Motion used it for fairly basic stuff like photo montages. If a lot of it can now be created directly in FCPX then who is even going to bother buying Motion ala carte? Only the hardcore users that use it on a regular basis will bother buying it which could really end up hurting the program.

Finally I sure the heck hope Compressor is not an ala carte item. I am assuming there may be little need for it but if there is then I think it would be pretty sad to expect people editing to have to buy another tool just to encode to popular formats. Again I'm going to kind of assume there may be no need for a separate encoding program anymore since all the encoding features could be built in.

[Phillip Palacios]

Originally Posted by Robert Lane

My advice to anyone who's a current FCP user: Wait a few months after release and let those with time to kill suss out the kinks which will definitely rear their ugly head as they always do with re-written pro applications.

Precisely.

[Heath McKnight]

That's one gripe I had with all versions of FCP -- even if you upgraded to 7, no other version of FCP could open it. It's backwards compatible, but if my friend is on 6.0.x, he can't open my stuff. I hope they change that.

heath

[Heath McKnight]

Remember that they said, on stage, they're getting rid of Final Cut Express and FC Studio, just one price. I think FCP X will be an all-in-one app, and it doesn't cost Apple as much money just to offer it as a digital download vs. boxed. FCS 3 didn't have user manuals weighing it down (thank goodness, because I just found my old FCS 1 and 2, and they're HEAVY).

I don't think FCP X is any less professional than FCP 7, Premiere Pro CS5, etc. Apple also dropped the price of Aperture from $299 to $199, then to $79 on the Mac App Store. People were saying Aperture 3 would be iPhoto Pro, and while it has some features, it certainly isn't iPhoto Pro.

heath

[Ron Evans]

Originally Posted by Nigel Barker

If we are now talking about consumer products don't forget that each & every Mac ships with the very functional iMovie at no extra cost so the average Mac user has no need to buy a consumer oriented video editing product.

iMovie is better than Moviemaker in Windows but no match for the consumer products I mentioned that I believe are competitors for FCPX. Have a look at Elements. There are things that FCPX demonstrated that Elements cannot do but there are a lot of capabilities in Elements that are not in FCPX at all. Depends what one needs to do.

Ron Evans

[Heath McKnight]

Keep in mind, FCP X is still being worked on, so I'm sure there are many more features to come.

heath

[Thomas Smet]

We have also only seen a fraction of what it can do. I teach video editing and there is no way I can show everything in even a 4 hour class period. It would take an entire week of events everyday for Apple to show us everything in FCPX. They just showed a handful of the cool stuff to get people drooling. They don't call it a sneak peak for nothing.

[Heath McKnight]

Some more thoughts from Gary Adcock via Macworld:

Final Cut Pro X stays in the picture for pros | Video | Creative Notes | Macworld

I'd forgotten about this announced feature, which Gary discusses:

"Users will additionally get access to the OS-level ColorSync for color management—which, fingers crossed, will squash the QuickTime gamma issues that have plagued the Final Cut software for years."

I think we're in for something great!

heath

[Ron Evans]

Originally Posted by Thomas Smet

We have also only seen a fraction of what it can do. I teach video editing and there is no way I can show everything in even a 4 hour class period. It would take an entire week of events everyday for Apple to show us everything in FCPX. They just showed a handful of the cool stuff to get people drooling. They don't call it a sneak peak for nothing.

Do you know that to be true ? I spent my working life in marketing and certainly I don't think Apple will hid the best till last. If there is anything left its what will be expected of an editor. I think we saw the "new for Apple stuff:" already. What remains is if its a usable program other than the presentation. We will of course see other modules all at $299??

Looks to be a very nice program if it works as presented. But not new or great. Wonderful presentation. The presentation covered things that have been available on many PC editors for some time. Apple is playing catchup and will do it in a way advantageous for Apple of course. For the price most of the features demonstrated are available in many PC programs which also include Bluray authoring/ burning and photoediting at a lower price point. For more complex editing then one would expect to pay more and move into a more pro area. The competition in the pro area will need native file editing ( not background rendering but true native file editing), media management, realtime performace etc etc. We will see what comes.

Ron Evans