The NEW Final Cut Studio announced today!

Andy Mees · July 31st, 2009, 09:02 PM

>Why was Compressor given multi core support many years ago?

Because Compressor was written as a Cocoa native application ie specifically coded to leverage the advantages of the (modern) OS X operating system. FCP was, and still is, fundamentally based on its legacy (Carbon) code which was developed under and for OS 9.

>Are you saying FCP7 will support multi core as soon as you install Snow Leopard or are we going to have to wait another 2 years for the next version of FCP?

Snow Leopard is designed to offer a significant boost to any application, however the real show ponies, post release, will be those apps that are developed specifically to take advantage of the new OS architecture. FCP 7 as is, is not one of those apps ... but nonetheless there will still be advantages.

Undoubtedly the release of a Cocoa native rewrite of FCP is inevitable sooner or later, but whilst many fervently believed that "sooner" was the order of the day, and what's more that FCP 7 would be the first incarnation of such a rewrite, I think folks have to face the reality that "later" may be more realistic.

Heath McKnight · July 31st, 2009, 09:39 PM

I was rocking FCP 1 on OS 8 and OS 8.5, but you're right--it's definitely built on Carbon.

heath

Pete Cofrancesco · July 31st, 2009, 10:07 PM

I find when a software company receives any significant degree of success in the market place, they lapse into complacency and try to wring every last dollar out of the code base. Reminds me how Premiere opened the door for FCP by holding on to its old code too long. Apple's trade in program sealed Premiere fate. Although Adobe has rewrote Premiere's code from scratch in 2003, they're still playing catch up.

The one shining example of the right way to do things is Adobe Photoshop. Every version they exceed my expectations. The interface is so intuitive, cutting edge, and yet doesn't destroy the continuity of the past. What their incentive? There isn't any photo editor that comes close and yet they aren't satisfied. FCP is by no means horrible but over the past few years they seem conservative compared to their competition. I get the feeling that FCP success has gone to their head.

Chuck Fadely · August 1st, 2009, 09:12 PM

Just wanted to say that the new ProRes 422 Proxy is terrific. The quality is great considering how low a bit rate it has. You can put three layers of HD on the timeline without rendering. It's good enough for pretty much any web video and maybe, if you're not too picky, for news broadcast, too.

Transcoding AVCHD to ProRes 422 Proxy is a little quicker than real time and the files are much smaller than before, too. Maybe 2x or 2.5x bigger than the original AVCHD files. This is compared to 8x or 10x bigger in Final Cut 6.

This one thing makes the upgrade worth it to me.

Cole McDonald · August 2nd, 2009, 01:58 PM

Just for the record... Let's keep in mind that Apple didn't write Final Cut Pro... Macromedia did. Apple bought it from them. So to expect them to successfully complete a 5 year development project while also completing updates every year to placate the user base is a little much. So if you can convince the whole user base to forego updates for the next 2 years, I bet they can get it all done without much problem.

For the record... I want both a full new version rewritten from the ground up, and updates every 6-12 months... I just don't think it's realistic.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pete Cofrancesco

I find when a software company receives any significant degree of success in the market place, they lapse into complacency and try to wring every last dollar out of the code base. Reminds me how Premiere opened the door for FCP by holding on to its old code too long. Apple's trade in program sealed Premiere fate. Although Adobe has rewrote Premiere's code from scratch in 2003, they're still playing catch up.

The one shining example of the right way to do things is Adobe Photoshop. Every version they exceed my expectations. The interface is so intuitive, cutting edge, and yet doesn't destroy the continuity of the past. What their incentive? There isn't any photo editor that comes close and yet they aren't satisfied. FCP is by no means horrible but over the past few years they seem conservative compared to their competition. I get the feeling that FCP success has gone to their head.

Floris van Eck · August 2nd, 2009, 02:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cole McDonald

Just for the record... Let's keep in mind that Apple didn't write Final Cut Pro... Macromedia did. Apple bought it from them. So to expect them to successfully complete a 5 year development project while also completing updates every year to placate the user base is a little much.

Makes no sense. I expect that Apple didn't buy the software alone but also hired many if not all the people that were working on it at Macromedia.

But hey, Final Cut is far from broken so it's not that people are unhappy. I just think everyone expected a little bit more after a two year wait and 10.6 around the corner. But you can't complain about Apple's update plan. People who believe the new FCS is not for them can just wait and update to whatever comes next for $299. Now that's great customer service.

Harrison Murchison · August 2nd, 2009, 02:51 PM

I see a lot of requests that show there's a chasm between those who use Final Cut Studio and those who understand the basic architecture of the underlying OS.

"Where's the 64-bit support?" would never be asked by anyone that knows that OS X Leopard doesn't support 64-bit throughout. Snow Leopard brings the first 64-bit kernel through GUI to OS X

Multiprocessor support is in Leopard but Apple has spent "considerable" effort to work on a new way of handling multicore computers without extensive coding effort from developers in Snow Leopard.

We certainly haven't seen the last of Final Cut Studio updates. Once Apple got to jettison the PPC support they gained more ability to leverage a single codebase tailored for Intel.

Heath McKnight · August 2nd, 2009, 09:00 PM

FCP 7 is just like OS X Snow Leopard: Instead of cramming in a ton of new features, they're perfecting the existing ones. Sure there seems to be a few things that are less than perfect, but I like that they are strengthening the core items.

Heath

Pete Cofrancesco · August 2nd, 2009, 10:40 PM

Its difficult divine their development decisions behind the scenes but I must say I've become skeptical about what they can and can't do, after watching how they handled Blu-Ray authoring. I'm judging them from an end user stand point and comparing their development progress to their peers to their own past updates. I believe that is a fair way to look at things.

If you're selling 8 core cpu computers targeted at video editing, I don't think its unrealistic to expect their software to utilize the hardware they are selling. Multi core has been around for awhile, in fact I don't believe they even currently offer a single core computer.

From a user interface stand point, they have done little to innovate FCP. The handling of text and in particular credits is truly awful. I'm just left with the impression they started off with a nice product and added nice features over the years but really haven't broken out of the initial mold. I didn't realize FCP was acquired from Macromedia but it makes more sense why they haven't done anything out of the box with it.

I know it sounds like I hate FCP, that's not the case. I'm just exerciser my dissatisfaction after waiting 2 years for this update.

Martin Chab · August 3rd, 2009, 10:52 AM

I did upgrade to FCP3 the same day of the release mostly for one reason, to be able to use the Tangentdevices Wave control surface. I´ve got it some month ago because the manufacturer wrongly claimed support for color (but the version 1 of color had no support for it, later they corrected the info in their web site).
Anyway, even if the control surface mapper plugin is in beta and they need to fix some small things that will make the device much more flexible, it is a pleasure to work in color with a control surface that cost peanuts compared to other models (still not cheap). Overall color upgrade came with no big new things but some small and welcome fixes. For example: in version 1 if you make a new project and forget to change the frame rate in the setup room and import some footage to the timeline you are in big trouble since you cant change anymore (it happened to me to work for two days to realize that the frame rate was wrong). Now in version 1.5 it continue to be the same, you cant change FR but when you import the footage, the same as final cut, the system ask you to set the parameters if some is mismatched.
I have to try to see if they fixed another big issue: if you install a second graphic card the scopes doesnt work anymore.
The issue with Gzip hanging it seems better but not completely fixed.
Compressor seems to be the same, heavy and slow to respond on a mac pro 8 processors, but overall working.
The show waveform in FC seems to be way much more responsive and faster.
The better markers is a good new feature as well as a better time remap.
I will report as i gain more knowledge about the new bugs (or old not fixed)

Martin Chab · August 3rd, 2009, 11:21 AM

Confirmed!! The issue with the double graphic card and Color is solved!!!!
Now i can use the Cintiq tablet with other applications and even in color to draw masks!!!!

Floris van Eck · August 3rd, 2009, 12:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Heath McKnight

FCP 7 is just like OS X Snow Leopard: Instead of cramming in a ton of new features, they're perfecting the existing ones. Sure there seems to be a few things that are less than perfect, but I like that they are strengthening the core items.

Heath

True. But Snow Leopard is 64-bit and totally rewritten. This new FCS isn't. So unless Apple releases a major free update in the near future, your comparison doesn't hold.

Heath McKnight · August 3rd, 2009, 12:51 PM

I don't think you quite understand what I'm saying/comparing... Snow Leopard is 64-bit but Apple for the most part focused on strengthening existing features in the next version of OS X, and I think that's what Apple did with Final Cut Pro 7--take what's strong and make it better, like ProRes, etc. Plus add some cool new features.

Now, 4-bit and FCP 7 is a whole different story, and we don't know what Apple has up their sleeve. And they aren't talking.

Heath

Floris van Eck · August 3rd, 2009, 03:46 PM

We are talking about the same thing.

What I tried to say was that if Apple release Snow Leopard without the 64-bit architecture, grandcentral and Open CL... everyone would be upset and dissapointed.

And that is what happened with this new Final Cut Studio. Weird timing, nobody did see it coming before Snow Leopard's release and the improvements are subtle, welcome but not groundbreaking or game changing.

I do like the new FCP 8. The new markers alone are worth the upgrade for me!

Harrison Murchison · August 3rd, 2009, 04:03 PM

Think about this in terms of home renovation.

Would you paint at the same time you are putting up drywall?

Apple is taking things in step. Leopard has had 7 point release updates
and is stable and running millions of Macs. It's the proper test bed for delivering
a new Final Cut Studio. That way any bugs that creap up are likely due to FCS
code and not OS X.

Apple has multi core support in Leopard and that's what Compressor and other apps use.
Snow Leopard though has Grand Central Dispatch and where the "magic" comes in GCD is
in its ability to handle multi core computers with very little management by the developer.

Basically the developer defines the dependencies between data and with a little code here and there the app is now tapping into the "brain" that GCD is. The beautiful part of this seems to be that Apple should be able to tweak GCD making it smarter without the developer having to change any code.

Apple has a few options now. They can hold off and let Snow Leopard mature a bit and work on a sizable update to FCS which taps into GCD and OpenCL and brings forth 64-bit support. I think these "engine" updates will keep most happy. I expect the UI to get polished up for FCS 4. Why?

Well because Apple has been working towards making OS X "Resolution Independent" which means all UI widgets scale to user defined settings. The problem is that the dominant forms of icons and other stuff don't lend themselves to smooth resizing...yet.

FCS 4 will likely have a new UI and will (will future updates) tap into 10.7 which should be here in a couple of years and usher in a more unified UI overall.

Heath is correct. Snow Leopard fixes the engine and the next OS will fix the sheetmetal.

FCS 3 fixes the engine and FCS 4 will fix the sheetmetal.

July 31st, 2009, 09:39 PM	#167
Heath McKnight MPS Digital Studios Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: Palm Beach County, Florida Posts: 8,531	I was rocking FCP 1 on OS 8 and OS 8.5, but you're right--it's definitely built on Carbon. heath __________________ My Final Cut Pro X blog

July 31st, 2009, 10:07 PM	#168
Pete Cofrancesco Inner Circle Join Date: May 2004 Location: USA Posts: 3,005	I find when a software company receives any significant degree of success in the market place, they lapse into complacency and try to wring every last dollar out of the code base. Reminds me how Premiere opened the door for FCP by holding on to its old code too long. Apple's trade in program sealed Premiere fate. Although Adobe has rewrote Premiere's code from scratch in 2003, they're still playing catch up. The one shining example of the right way to do things is Adobe Photoshop. Every version they exceed my expectations. The interface is so intuitive, cutting edge, and yet doesn't destroy the continuity of the past. What their incentive? There isn't any photo editor that comes close and yet they aren't satisfied. FCP is by no means horrible but over the past few years they seem conservative compared to their competition. I get the feeling that FCP success has gone to their head. Last edited by Pete Cofrancesco; August 1st, 2009 at 10:58 AM.

August 2nd, 2009, 09:00 PM	#173
Heath McKnight MPS Digital Studios Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: Palm Beach County, Florida Posts: 8,531	FCP 7 is just like OS X Snow Leopard: Instead of cramming in a ton of new features, they're perfecting the existing ones. Sure there seems to be a few things that are less than perfect, but I like that they are strengthening the core items. Heath __________________ My Final Cut Pro X blog

August 3rd, 2009, 12:51 PM	#178
Heath McKnight MPS Digital Studios Join Date: Apr 2003 Location: Palm Beach County, Florida Posts: 8,531	I don't think you quite understand what I'm saying/comparing... Snow Leopard is 64-bit but Apple for the most part focused on strengthening existing features in the next version of OS X, and I think that's what Apple did with Final Cut Pro 7--take what's strong and make it better, like ProRes, etc. Plus add some cool new features. Now, 4-bit and FCP 7 is a whole different story, and we don't know what Apple has up their sleeve. And they aren't talking. Heath __________________ My Final Cut Pro X blog

July 31st, 2009, 09:02 PM	#166
Andy Mees Major Player Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Posts: 645	>Why was Compressor given multi core support many years ago? Because Compressor was written as a Cocoa native application ie specifically coded to leverage the advantages of the (modern) OS X operating system. FCP was, and still is, fundamentally based on its legacy (Carbon) code which was developed under and for OS 9. >Are you saying FCP7 will support multi core as soon as you install Snow Leopard or are we going to have to wait another 2 years for the next version of FCP? Snow Leopard is designed to offer a significant boost to any application, however the real show ponies, post release, will be those apps that are developed specifically to take advantage of the new OS architecture. FCP 7 as is, is not one of those apps ... but nonetheless there will still be advantages. Undoubtedly the release of a Cocoa native rewrite of FCP is inevitable sooner or later, but whilst many fervently believed that "sooner" was the order of the day, and what's more that FCP 7 would be the first incarnation of such a rewrite, I think folks have to face the reality that "later" may be more realistic.

August 1st, 2009, 09:12 PM	#169
Chuck Fadely Major Player Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: United States Posts: 306	Just wanted to say that the new ProRes 422 Proxy is terrific. The quality is great considering how low a bit rate it has. You can put three layers of HD on the timeline without rendering. It's good enough for pretty much any web video and maybe, if you're not too picky, for news broadcast, too. Transcoding AVCHD to ProRes 422 Proxy is a little quicker than real time and the files are much smaller than before, too. Maybe 2x or 2.5x bigger than the original AVCHD files. This is compared to 8x or 10x bigger in Final Cut 6. This one thing makes the upgrade worth it to me.

August 2nd, 2009, 02:51 PM	#172
Harrison Murchison Major Player Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Seattle Posts: 243	I see a lot of requests that show there's a chasm between those who use Final Cut Studio and those who understand the basic architecture of the underlying OS. "Where's the 64-bit support?" would never be asked by anyone that knows that OS X Leopard doesn't support 64-bit throughout. Snow Leopard brings the first 64-bit kernel through GUI to OS X Multiprocessor support is in Leopard but Apple has spent "considerable" effort to work on a new way of handling multicore computers without extensive coding effort from developers in Snow Leopard. We certainly haven't seen the last of Final Cut Studio updates. Once Apple got to jettison the PPC support they gained more ability to leverage a single codebase tailored for Intel.

August 2nd, 2009, 10:40 PM	#174
Pete Cofrancesco Inner Circle Join Date: May 2004 Location: USA Posts: 3,005	Its difficult divine their development decisions behind the scenes but I must say I've become skeptical about what they can and can't do, after watching how they handled Blu-Ray authoring. I'm judging them from an end user stand point and comparing their development progress to their peers to their own past updates. I believe that is a fair way to look at things. If you're selling 8 core cpu computers targeted at video editing, I don't think its unrealistic to expect their software to utilize the hardware they are selling. Multi core has been around for awhile, in fact I don't believe they even currently offer a single core computer. From a user interface stand point, they have done little to innovate FCP. The handling of text and in particular credits is truly awful. I'm just left with the impression they started off with a nice product and added nice features over the years but really haven't broken out of the initial mold. I didn't realize FCP was acquired from Macromedia but it makes more sense why they haven't done anything out of the box with it. I know it sounds like I hate FCP, that's not the case. I'm just exerciser my dissatisfaction after waiting 2 years for this update.

August 3rd, 2009, 10:52 AM	#175
Martin Chab Regular Crew Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Malmo Sweden Posts: 103	I did upgrade to FCP3 the same day of the release mostly for one reason, to be able to use the Tangentdevices Wave control surface. I´ve got it some month ago because the manufacturer wrongly claimed support for color (but the version 1 of color had no support for it, later they corrected the info in their web site). Anyway, even if the control surface mapper plugin is in beta and they need to fix some small things that will make the device much more flexible, it is a pleasure to work in color with a control surface that cost peanuts compared to other models (still not cheap). Overall color upgrade came with no big new things but some small and welcome fixes. For example: in version 1 if you make a new project and forget to change the frame rate in the setup room and import some footage to the timeline you are in big trouble since you cant change anymore (it happened to me to work for two days to realize that the frame rate was wrong). Now in version 1.5 it continue to be the same, you cant change FR but when you import the footage, the same as final cut, the system ask you to set the parameters if some is mismatched. I have to try to see if they fixed another big issue: if you install a second graphic card the scopes doesnt work anymore. The issue with Gzip hanging it seems better but not completely fixed. Compressor seems to be the same, heavy and slow to respond on a mac pro 8 processors, but overall working. The show waveform in FC seems to be way much more responsive and faster. The better markers is a good new feature as well as a better time remap. I will report as i gain more knowledge about the new bugs (or old not fixed)

August 3rd, 2009, 11:21 AM	#176
Martin Chab Regular Crew Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Malmo Sweden Posts: 103	Confirmed!! The issue with the double graphic card and Color is solved!!!! Now i can use the Cintiq tablet with other applications and even in color to draw masks!!!!

August 3rd, 2009, 03:46 PM	#179
Floris van Eck Major Player Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: The Netherlands Posts: 993	We are talking about the same thing. What I tried to say was that if Apple release Snow Leopard without the 64-bit architecture, grandcentral and Open CL... everyone would be upset and dissapointed. And that is what happened with this new Final Cut Studio. Weird timing, nobody did see it coming before Snow Leopard's release and the improvements are subtle, welcome but not groundbreaking or game changing. I do like the new FCP 8. The new markers alone are worth the upgrade for me!

August 3rd, 2009, 04:03 PM	#180
Harrison Murchison Major Player Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: Seattle Posts: 243	Think about this in terms of home renovation. Would you paint at the same time you are putting up drywall? Apple is taking things in step. Leopard has had 7 point release updates and is stable and running millions of Macs. It's the proper test bed for delivering a new Final Cut Studio. That way any bugs that creap up are likely due to FCS code and not OS X. Apple has multi core support in Leopard and that's what Compressor and other apps use. Snow Leopard though has Grand Central Dispatch and where the "magic" comes in GCD is in its ability to handle multi core computers with very little management by the developer. Basically the developer defines the dependencies between data and with a little code here and there the app is now tapping into the "brain" that GCD is. The beautiful part of this seems to be that Apple should be able to tweak GCD making it smarter without the developer having to change any code. Apple has a few options now. They can hold off and let Snow Leopard mature a bit and work on a sizable update to FCS which taps into GCD and OpenCL and brings forth 64-bit support. I think these "engine" updates will keep most happy. I expect the UI to get polished up for FCS 4. Why? Well because Apple has been working towards making OS X "Resolution Independent" which means all UI widgets scale to user defined settings. The problem is that the dominant forms of icons and other stuff don't lend themselves to smooth resizing...yet. FCS 4 will likely have a new UI and will (will future updates) tap into 10.7 which should be here in a couple of years and usher in a more unified UI overall. Heath is correct. Snow Leopard fixes the engine and the next OS will fix the sheetmetal. FCS 3 fixes the engine and FCS 4 will fix the sheetmetal.