I don't think I said that Adobe didn't follow through because they are big...I said the communication to the customer base isn't as intimate as CineForm, and that is a reality with any company that size.

I'm also not apologizing for the issues with CS4...they are there and there are users who paid for a product that had issues.

I guess I'm saying that while dissatisfaction is understandable, and criticism is warranted, the flames are unproductive.

I think you summed it up very well Tim.

So far as Adobe's responsiveness is concerned, you could make an argument that their size does get in the way. That issue is compounded when the focus becomes appeasement of potential customers, ie; Final Cut users, rather than support of existing users and third party developers.

Indeed, Cineform followed that same approach which led to the shelving of what many CS4 users were gnashing their teeth over in anticipation of.

You have to do what you have to do to survive. The difference is that Cineform has an open door. They take the slings and arrows, all while developing some invaluable products.

It's ironic to think that I would have left Adobe for FCP years ago, were it not for Cineform. Gee, maybe I'll call Adobe and tell them that the next time I have 3hrs 45mins to waste being on hold.

I still say that there would be fewer headaches all around if Cineform developed their own NLE. At least in a few months, CS4 users will have TWO upgrade options..... CS5 or CS3!

"At least in a few months, CS4 users will have TWO upgrade options..... CS5 or CS3!"

LOL!

Hilarious...and unfortunate...

Just how we feel Marty! We'd have dumped Premiere years ago if it wasn't for CF. AE is the only other thing that kept them in the game, and Encore would have gone the way of the dodo bird if not for them bundling it with "Production Premium" (oxymoron).

Sorry, I'm flamish today, so I better stop...(and that's WITH CS3 working fine on two machines, but stuck with CS4 on an almost-useless-workstation).

Stephen.... it is the dedicated band of disillusioned producers (Graham, Adam... and the rest know who you are) that gather here every once in a while that keeps my spirits afloat.

If it weren't for this board, we would certainly be seated in a circle of cheap folding chairs, standing one at a time,......"Hello, my name is Stephen... and I own CS4".


ps I'll give you 20 bucks for your "almost useless" workstation..... but only if you take CS4 OFF.

Everything I do isn't based on CineForm, so I've been functioning with XDcamEX native workflow and P2 native workflow in PPro CS4 without much problem. In fact, I would have to say that it seems more stable than CS3, even on 32 bit XP systems. I miss having the CineForm capabilities I had before, but I'm looking forward to getting them back in CS5 as I have some projects that would be best handled in a 10 bit intermediate workflow in the queue.

Every time I work on an FCP system, I find myself looking at the text screen that tells me I need to render whenever I have to insert a clip that isn't native to the sequence settings...and I feel OK about using Premiere Pro.

I'm not sure what issue you've had with Encore that would render it extinct (...not that I think it has no issues). My Apple-using friends need me to do any BluRay output, so that and the fact that I've been trying to help an FCP-using friend trouble shoot some ridiculous scaling issue with getting DVCProHD non-square 960x720 to encode to regular old MPEG2 for DVD...make me feel OK about using Encore.

Final Cut Studio is a fine set of tools, but they're not flawless.

Two years ago or so, the issue of Premiere was not so much function as it was stability. The memory leaks were horrendous and nerve-wracking. Credit where it's due... CS4 is more stable. Whether that is due to my running it on Win7/64-bit, or a little more RAM.... I don't know, but the fact of the matter is, I have yet to suffer a Premiere crash.

You are absolutely correct about the limitations of FCP... but back when I was at that particular fork in the road, the greener grass was in the form of something other than "Crash-O-Matic".

Are there better, not crazy expensive, alternatives to Encore/AME on a PC with the CS4/PHD combo?

Have a look at TMPGEnc Xpress (encoder) and DVD Author ... perhaps not as fully featured, but rock solid and high quality.

Ditto on TMPGEnc Xpress being good. Very flexible and fast. Don't know about DVD Author, but if their encoder software is proof of having good products, it should be very good, at least for DVD.

Tim, to offset my flamish post from yesterday, Encore CS4 is certainly more stable than any previous editions (I've had them all and some were absolutely horrid), but it is awkward, unintuitive, and weak in some crucial areas (poor, limited subtitling support, designed for simple projects, with weak import/export features).

To Adobe's credit, they did improve Encore's stability (which would definitely have killed it if they hadn't) , but have not really added many useful features, other than BR support and a few smaller things. It is quite "clunky", not user friendly, and in need of a bottom-up, modern redesign. If a person only does simple menu's, subtitles and basic designs, it's ok, but it fails as PRODUCTION software, in a multi-format, cross platform, multi-lingual world.

I guess the problem is, it's bundled in a program suite called "Production Premium", which would lead a person to believe they are getting something designed for, well .... surprise, surprise...PRODUCTION!...which it certainly isn't...and most certainly not very premium!

Having said all that, it works for the normal user, in non-production, non-complex workflow environments. Most probably it's due to their marketing decisions (so Adobe doesn't invade higher end solutions markets), but they should re-think that now that they seem to be wanting to take CS5 to "higher ground".

If Adobe does have that as their goal, they need to replace Encore with something better, bundle an updated version of Audition with CS5 (instead of their castrated Soundbooth), and make AME more powerful than TMPGEnc.

Then they might be entering "Production Premium" territory...

Okay thanks for the advice.. im surprised at TMPGEnc Xpress's price. Especially compared to something like Sorenson. I guess i'm still in the mindset of cheap price, cheap product.... is the workflow the same for that product?? Or is there an extra step?? Im assuming it works well with prospect

With XPress you essentially load a file (CFHD files from Prospect work fine), specify encode settings, and encode. It does have a batch tools option, but batching is not quite as central to the workflow as it is in Procoder or Sorenson.

Being a pragmatic and seat of the pants person (I sold my house to finance the movie I am working on at the moment). I have no loyalty or bias to any product. I use CS3 with CF to ingest material because it works in RT. I use AE CS4 because its better than CS3. I only used Cineform because it gave me a cost effective and good result in real time. If that is no longer the case then I simply move on...

And if real time were the only need met by Cineform, many of us would move on as well.

Ray, for many of us with multiple output targets for our master videos, a very high quality intermediate codec like CF, offers us many benefits, including: resizing and conversions to other video formats (NTSC<>PAL, BR, DVD, Flash, WMV, etc.), multi-platform format ingest, long-term archiving, non-destructive color corrections and metadata additions on outputting, etc.

If you can find something else that does this as well as CF, please share it with us!

Your needs may not be met with CF's codecs and software, but many thousands of others find it still serving quite nicely in today's fast moving world, and even looking quite strong for handling the 3D world coming our way.

That is not blind product loyalty, it's hard, cold, seat-of-the-pants, mega-user experience with a quite unique and highly useful product.

Loyalty is good if it's based on solid facts...and those are the facts.