Final Cut Pro X draws mixed reactions from users, professionals - Page 6

Remember when the iPhone first came out. People complained about what it could not do. Did Apple scramble to add those features simply because people complained. Or has Apple been systematically and methodically adding features over time?

People complained about MMS and copy/paste from the beginning. Apple did not add those features until two years after the launch of the original iPhone. Was that because of people complaining or was that because Apple felt they those features were ready?

People have been complaining about pop up notifications for years. Apple is just now providing a better notifications UI four years after the launch of the first iPhone. Is this simply because people complained. Or because Apple feels the feature is ready?

FYI - My apologies... I know my comment was a bit immature and sarcastic. I do not wish to resort to negativity like that.

Understood... BUT... imagine if iPhone 5 came out and it did NOT have MMS, FaceTime, MultiTasking, Maps or even simultaneous voice/data... People would (just like now) have a sh*t-fit about it... and rightfully so. Why can't you see that perspective?

My first Avid system cost $75,000. It was expensive, but that is what it took to get into a highly skilled position with good $ compensation to go with it. It kept the amateurs out of the biz. Now, the line between serious pro and pro-sumer has been blurred. I find myself competing for work against talentless computer geeks, who have highly refined computer skills that pass as artistic talent and confuse clients. Then I get calls from creatives who complain the editor they chose can't tell a story. Hmmm.

I'll give you a better example.

When Apple transitioned form OS 9 to OS X. Apple was abandoning support for OS 9 and forcing everyone to buy all of their apps all over again for OS X. People were very upset about that.

OS X 1.0 performance was sluggish it was buggy. Apple wasn't transitioning OS 9 API's and Apple was breaking many of the old OS 9 protocols and implementing new protocols in OS X. Many of the newer OS X API's and protocols were not yet complete for software developers to work with.

That transition was far far messier and far more disruptive than what is going on with FCP X right now.

From my time as an Apple user. I've seen it over and over. Apple will force these admittedly disruptive and aggressive transitions. In the short term it makes people really angry. But in the long term everything end up working out for the better.

Its the same story on the production side of things. Ten years ago the two primary options were to shoot on film or $100,000 HD gear which still did not match the quality of film. That barrier of entry kept the amateurs out and really helped separate the talented from the talentless.

Today every kid out of film school has a Canon 7D, MacBook Pro, FCP, and a dream. Talent may be optional. Its just the way things are.

You misunderstand. The reference was to Coca Cola's changing of the Coke formula in 1985 (OK, I had to Google the date). They changed the recipe simply as a change for change's sake and the backlash was enough to force them to own up the debacle and reissue normal Coke as Coke Classic.

Also, everyone who is giving the obvious advice of using FCP7 instead as the answer misses the point. Editors are not saying "OMG! We can't work anymore!" They're saying "The team behind this product has no idea what goes into a pro edit job. Do I feel like sticking with these guys to see what else they come up with?"

There is no reason on God's green earth why audio assignments could not have been written into this overhaul except that it wasn't on the list of priorities. It has nothing to do with the task of creating a new 64 bit program. If you talk to someone who does audio for video in a large facility they'll say there can be no audio sweetening by them for a FCPX project (since there is also no more EDL,XML or OMF support, which *possibly* one can point to some valid reasons for killing), which rules out, well, the whole upper strata of video production.

No one is panicking they can't work. They just have no use for this version as is currently is and would like a 64 bit FCP with 2011 features that would be useful to them.

It may seem so...

But, the iMovie Project/Event structure is a subset of the FCPX structure -- so relatively easy to import.

FCP structures as we know them can be very complex -- to name a few:
-- multiple tracks
-- multi-layer compositing
-- many supplied and 3rd-party filters, effects, etc.
-- different overall structure (Project, Sequences, Bins)
-- loosely defined and enforced structure
-- much more granular control

FCP as we know it is much more flexible -- but this has costs.

I suspect that Apple and/or 3rd parties will provide tools to migrate many FCP projects to FCPX.

One of the exciting things about FCPX is its performance -- use of all CPU/GPU cores, top priority UI with background importing, transcoding, analysis. The background pauses/resumes as needed to maintain a consistent UI experience -- avoiding the beach ball if at all possible.

This is accomplished by very savvy design and implemented using OpenCL and GCD to exploit the OS and hardware to deliver the best possible user experience.


FCPX is the first Apple app (that I have seen) to do this -- it may be the poster child for a new type of app.


And, therein lies a problem -- how do you migrate FCP projects with a lot of stuff that doesn't even know about multiple CPU cores, let alone OpenCL and GCD?


For example I have a 3rd-party Karaoke plugin that does synchronized subtitles (optional bouncing ball).

How is FCPX supposed to import a project using that filter?

Even if it could import it, how does it present itself in the timeline vis-a-vis other FCPX clips?

Will this plugin force a render and wait for completion -- and destroy the UX?

Worse, will the clip just sit there as an unplayable/scrubbable slug?


I have another sequence that has a five-layer video composite using FCP built-in masking constructs -- same questions as above.


Now, you might say "AHA, FCPX doesn't have the compositing capability of FCP7".

Maybe so, and maybe no...

FCPX provides some basic compositing, but relies on the new $50 Motion for any heavy lifting!

Why? Because Motion has compositing capabilities well beyond anything that FCP ever dreamed of -- and no constant re-rendering.

The new Motion has a much closer relationship with FCPX than the FCP7-Motion combination.

The new Motion has all the OpenCL GCD stuff designed and built-in.

Aside: Some have complained that FCPX doesn't handle Adobe multi-layer .psd files. This is true -- but it doesn't need to Motion handles them quite well and very efficiently. ping


I don't know the correct approach, here:

-- Should Apple supply a best-effort FCP7-FCPX project migration tool?

-- Other than point out "won't migrate" slugs, what should Apple do about things that it can't handle.

-- Should they leave legacy projects to be processed by legacy apps running on legacy OSes on legacy hardware?


This is a tough question for "Pros" or anyone with a library of Projects (of whatever app).

Some day you will move to the Latest/Greatest app -- be it FCPX, Avid, Adobe, whatever.


What do you do about your library of projects -- that suddenly, are now "Legacy Projects"

Do you spend your own time to convert them (at your expense)?

What do you do to compensate for features/filters/plugins that are not available on the new system?

Do you try to maintain those legacy apps/plugins, OSes, hardware -- so you can go back in a few years and update a client's animated logo (or somesuch)?

If you do, will you even remember how to use those "Legacy Tools" that you haven't touched for years?

What do you tell the client?


Interesting questions!


Maybe, some thought and effort needs to be spent finding a way to "encapsulate" your work so you can move forward without the shackles of "Legacy Tools".

The New Coke story is actually a lot more complicated. But just a brief summary.

In the early 80's Pepsi was doing these blind taste tests they called "The Pepsi Challenge". During the Pepsi Challenge, most people actually preferred Pepsi. Coke performed its own blind taste test and discovered the same results. Most people preferred Pepsi.

Coke freaks out - over reacts and creates New Coke.

What they did not realize is that in just a limited sipping of the drink. The sweater taste of Pepsi was preferred because it was just a limited sip.

But over the course of normal soda drinking people overwhelmingly preferred Coke. That is why there was such a visceral backlash against New Coke.

I'm liking your commentary Teno,
actually a fair few of us were expecting exactly this kind of release or much worse from at least a year ago, as it dawned on us the work involved. we thought for a long time it it would be QT based- but the thinking changed here too- with it being driven by another engine altogether. AV Foundation / Core Audio/Core Video/Core Animation.

It's a bold move that will pay off over time- but Apple will take a kicking for a bit and people will panic but thats life.

don't know if you saw my earlier post
http://forums.appleinsider.com/showp...&postcount=181

Over the past 10 years the film/television industry has gone through this problem with the transition to High Definition. Prior to this everything was either shot of finished for Standard Definition. Which for the most part looks terrible on high definition television. With the emergence of web streaming/downloading standard definition is pretty much to the point of unacceptable for the web.

So now movies and shows that have been finished for standard definition are "legacy" and pretty much useless for the future. Sometimes this problem is easily solved and sometimes it cannot be so easily solved.

I don't remember how or where I saw it, but I think you can!

Something like:

1) import the new clips -- likely to a new Event

2) drag the new clip into the project above the old

3) copy from the old clip and paste effects to the new clip

4) disable the old clip

5) replace the old with the new if desired (drag and drop)

When you think about it...

This thread represents one of the things I really love/hate about Apple:

Every few years, or so, Apple comes out with a "New Thing" that cuts the cord with the "Current Thing":

-- Apple ][ vs Mac
-- minifloppy vs microfloppy
-- DTB vs USB
-- floppy vs dvd
-- OS 9 vs OS X
-- PCC vs Intel
-- MultiTouch vs Mouse/KB
-- DVD vs nothing

And now, the challenge du jour: FCPX vs FCS/FCP7

Apple is telling us:

Here's where Apple is going! We'd like you to come with us -- but you can stay where you are -- or you can move away.


Damn!

I'm still here...

Now, if there were only a way to load that cassette of AppleSoft BASIC on my iPa2 2 -- I have this neat database app written by Mike Markkula's 13-year-old son's father...

With FCPX you can save your files on any drive you wish:

-- the files must be in Folders name Final Cut Projects and Final Cut Events
-- the above folders must be at the root level

This is so FCPX knows where to look for files.

There are different (but similar) requirements for FCP -- so this is a non-issue. ping

Trying to stay on topic here. I never believed that new Coke was a real effort to "improve" the product. They merely pretended to be seriously changing it to show people how a Pepsi-like taste is cloyingly sweet, and then exaggerated the reaction against it, and rebranded the original as "classic" so everybody could see that the original was preferable to Pepsi all along. The whole thing was a fake PR operation. No proof, just suspicion. But whether it was a mistake, like they tried to pretend, or a devious PR scheme, it ain't what we're talking about here.

In Apple's case, we could only wish they would at least allow the Final Cut Classic to stay on the shelves, out of respect for all the work the pros have to deal with right now that involves the old architecture. It's the pulling of the plug on them that smacks of the Jobsian/Apple ruthlessness. Do that to your professional user base, the heaviest-weight users you have, and you lose a tremendous amount of good will from people who matter.

It's a PR disaster so far, and it's not whining from the pros just digging in their heels this time.

Yes thank you Graeme. I also do appreciate you bringing some measured thoughtfulness to the discussion.


Yes exactly. Apple has totally rewritten the foundation of FCP and will have to rebuild everything on top of that. Apple isn't saying exactly what this all means. But I think its pretty clear what they are doing and where this is headed.


Yes this is typically the way Apple always does these types of transitions.

It is a PR disaster -- but it sure gets all the issues out in the open!

Maybe a good way to handle this would be for Apple to:

1) continue support (bug fixes) for "classic" for 1 year
2) supply a software update to all the apps to allow multiple "seats" per copy
3) sell new "seat" serial numbers at the online store or the Mac App Store

You could install new seats from your existing disks, then update the registration with the new seat serial.


Here's a question we may want to ask ourselves, though:

Would we rather have Apple supporting "classic" or using those resource to make FCPX all that it can be (more than FCPS could be) as quickly as possible.

If a year's support of FCPS delays FCPX upgrades for a year would it be worth waiting?

If not, knowing that FCS is EOLd, should you stay where you are, should you move ahead or should you move away?

How long will whichever move you choose take? A year?

When do you start?

When Apple transitioned from OS 9 to OS X they were not nearly has popular or as strong in the market as they are now. That was by magnitudes a much bigger transition and caused far more disruption than going from FCP 7 to FCP X.

There was such upheaval that there were those at the time who predicted that people will just abandon the Mac altogether and move to Windows. There were those at the time who declared it a disaster. But it seems to have all worked out OK.

Other Apple PR disasters that went away as quickly as they came.

• Apple's abandonment of the floppy disc
• Mac transition from Power PC to Intel
• Apple's abandonment of FireWire 400
• Antenagate
• iOS global positioning database

Leave it as is, don't waste an ounce of resources fixing bugs, but sell new copies or serial numbers to people stuck in the old environment for the indefinite future.

In return, we all start cheerfully adapting, just as before. But like with iMovie 6, only this is ten times more significant because we're not talking about home movies here, acknowledge your customers' past loyalty and/or preferences by saying something or doing something to help them with the transition.

Maybe I've been living in L.A. too long, but I see this huge reservoir of good will and creative capital built around Final Cut being tossed away cavalierly. It seems like a slap in the face, like someone here said. Apple has great public relations, but sometimes not so great customer relations. All they have to do is say a few words and not round up the old stock for shredding, or whatever they do with it. I know, too emotional . . .

I think David Pogue sums it up well. Essentially keep things in proper perspective - have some patience. If you don't like where FCP X is going you have alternatives.

Professional editors should (1) learn to tell whats really missing from whats just been moved around, (2) recognize that theres no obligation to switch from the old program yet, (3) monitor the progress of FCP X and its ecosystem, and especially (4) be willing to consider that a radical new design may be unfamiliar, but may, in the long term, actually be better.

I take your point, and this will work out okay in time too. But I'd say this is different, because of the slice of Apple's customer base that's being affected.

I'd like to have figures, don't, can only speculate from my L.A. centric point of view, but I would venture that Apple gets more credibility out of their NLE customer base than from any other slice of their market. Sound and graphics are also huge, but nowhere near the weight of the movie biz.

But I'm not on the inside. Maybe there's way more Avid and Premiere out there than I know about.

Edit: just saw your post above, thanks, I'm taking it under advisement. And I will be following FCP X, of course.

Been doin' some sleuthin' and thinkin'

1) Both The FCPX Project file and the FCPX Event file are SQLite db files -- this is not the case for either FCP7 or iMovie.

2) All the FCPX Event Analysis files (Color, People, Stabilization) are XML files.

3) FCPX knows if Motion is installed, or not.

4) FCPX has some plugins built-in -- media transformers like AVCHD, Compressor and Motion -- Motion is within a folder named MediaProviders


This suggests a couple of things:

1) FCPX is using SQL where possible for storage and processing efficiency -- a lot smaller files than XML files and a lot easier/quicker to search, parse, etc.

2) FCPX is using XML files where it expects external interfaces

3) Supporting apps, like Motion can bind themselves more tightly to FCPX than to FCP. Motion almost appears as a popup function in FCPX rather than a separate app.

You don't really round-trip to Motion -- rather you invoke and dismiss it as a tool or a sub-app.

Aside: if you like multiple track editing, you'll love Motion.

4) I suspect a more powerful Color (if needed) will act the came way.

5) I've never used FCP tape output, but I have used Log and Capture. Thinking about it -- it would be pretty easy for Apple (or a 3rd-party) to write a Tape Input Log and Capture app that integrates with FCPX (right along side Motion as a Media Provider)

5) I suspect that most of the missing "Pro" features could be implemented as separate apps for those who need them (willing to pay for them). Done properly, these would closely bind themselves to FCPX -- and become an integral part of the workflow.


To me, FCPX looks like a glass half-full!

Just for perspective the transition from OS 9 to OS X affected Apple's entire customer base and Apple's entire third party development base.

To be honest what Apple is doing with FCP isn't any different that what they've done with other software products. Its just FCP turn for its slash and burn upgrade cycle. People aren't happy about it. In the long run they will be alright.

Love it!

It is an opportunity!

You go to your clients with the "Bad Cop / Good Cop" routine:

"Damn Apple! They're coming out with this great new video editor that's going to revolutionize everything... In the future we'll be able to create better results for you, quicker and at lower costs... But (bad) Apple hasn't given us a way to upgrade your/our legacy projects -- it's that revolutionary."

"I (the good guy) can help you to review your projects for things that you may want to access or change in the future. Why don't we pick a small completed project as a proof of concept to show the advantages of the new solution."

If the client is reluctant, a really good cop might offer to do the job gratis* as a demo of future benefits to the client.

Ha! Gratis! You are going to need to learn the system sometime -- might as well do it with a real project and the client goodwill as remuneration.

P.S. There are so many very good posts to this thread -- even some that appear to be B&M have valid concerns. I can't read and type fast enough to give justice in a reply to many posts -- and +++QFT replies would just clutter the thread. It has been a very informative discussion -- I've gone back and re-read quite a few posts several times. I wan't to post "right ON", "exactly", "Wish I'd said that" to many posts.

These are indeed reassuring discoveries, especially the last part about tracks. What the heck, maybe the glass is at three-quarters.

Off to the Apple store to check it out.

If you've got FCPS, it contains Motion (replaced by the new Motion from the app store). The new motion is compatible with both FCPX and FCPS -- just better integrated with FCPX.

Anyway -- either the old or new motion can work as a standalone app. It is great for compositing, titling, and effects generation.

Maybe save you a trip -- unless you just want to play.

Dick,

What's the performance like of the new 'X' apps?

With them utilizing both GCD and OCL, I'm curious if those technologies live up to their promise of helping to usher in a new era of multi-core performance improvements.

In short, fantastic!

I kinda' addressed this at the end of a long-winded post:

http://forums.appleinsider.com/showt...44#post1888144

But here is the performance part.



To put it in other words:

I started an import of 2GB * compressed AVCHD video including transcoding analyses for people, color, stabilization and sound:

* I misread the size of the input on the original post.



Normally this would take 5-10 minutes on iMovie (which has a similar import) before you could do anything else and it would max both CPUs on Activity Monitor.

I immediately closed the import window and started editing the clips -- just as if all the processing and analysis had already competed.

I never saw a beach ball or experienced a delay in the UI. I had the background tasks window open and could see the progression of the tasks -- any time I did something in the editing window it would pause/resume tasks as needed.

I never saw a render!

But, admittedly I didn't have enough experience to do anything but edit clips and apply some effects

Oddly, the imported original files were the same size as the compressed originals -- Apple has done some magic here! Normally, compressed to expanded AVCHD has a 1::7 ratio.

The transcribed ProRes 422 were slightly smaller.

I have to look into that.


It's a funny experience -- no waiting!


If you use iMovie or FCP you kinda' get used to where there are delays and adjust your workflow to compensate -- take a coffee break, lunch, go to bed. But FCPX always seemed to be waiting for me.

Unsettling!

I plan to spend some time this weekend working through the tutorials and should get a better feel for performance when doing "Real Editing" things.

What good are all those iOS devices without content to play on them? If 'pros be damned', who is going to create the content which people see on TV and pay movie tickets for, and that Apple sells on iTunes?

Thanks for sharing DA, very informative.

Thanks. Thats good to hear.

I hope that Apple listen to the valid concerns of their user base and bring in the features needed to restore this app back to what it was.

Apple doesn't need to listen to anybody. Apple always knows what's best, what features to release, and when to release them. And if Apple happens to release features that people were demanding, it's pure coincidence because the users had nothing to do with it. But in the meantime, we will keep telling people to send feedback to www.apple.com/feedback knowing that there is no point in doing so.

Good question!

AFAICT. FCP was successful because it provided a solution that cost 1/10 of the competition and produced output that was "good enough".

I wouldn't be too surprised if today's FCP "pros" were outliers who couldn't afford to compete with the "pros" of their day until FCP came along.

All to the discomfiture of the establishment "pros".

Funny, how that works.

Anyway -- it ain't the tools so much as it is the talent of the storyteller/editor.

We'll get a lot of truly mediocre output -- but we'll get some true gems.

Everything old is new again!

We have been creating new HD Whataburger spots from their original SD spots. We load the SD spots as a reference and then load the original SD dailies. We do an eye match or if we are lucky we have the old Avid project to pull from. Then something interesting happens. We generate an EDL from this cut and send it to a transfer house that pulls new selects from . . . wait for it . . . FILM! Yep they pull the original LEGACY 35mm film and create DPX selects that we then put in our Autodesk system to color with Lustre and finish with Smoke in HD.

So legacy project files can be important. Of course it only helps you if you have software that can read the old files (hint, hint). Another lesson here is that film is a near perfect archival medium.

Thanks DA for a better reply than I was going to write

Also for taking the dive and letting us know the inside scoop from a "normal* everyday" user, and a peek into your life. Your grand kids you're always talking about I suspect... good bunch!

*Not to pin you as "normal" whatever that means... but ya know what I'm sayin'

-- Apple ][ vs Mac - a document you had saved to an apple 2 was still accessable from a Mac no?
-- minifloppy vs microfloppy - ? mini to micro? so...5.25 -> 3.5? the whole industry did that in the 80s...you could still get at the data with external drives.
-- DTB vs USB - you can or could in the olden days buy USB adapters for any and just about all older legacy interfaces so a computer without a serial port or other bus didnt make hardware devices useless.
-- floppy vs dvd - External floppy drives gave access to legacy code
-- OS 9 vs OS X - Apple gave us built in emulators/VMs for years (Classic)
-- PCC vs Intel - See above (rosetta)
-- MultiTouch vs Mouse/KB - u can still plug in a usb mouse to any apple computer and the KB is still included IIRC
-- DVD vs nothing - External DVD drives are cheap now a days and I would rather have it external and have either a lighter laptop or a bigger battery.


With FCP7->FCP X the problem is no legacy support and no support for a lot of gear...you cannot build any new seats or bays on 7 any more so that means any new bays wont be able to open projects that were created yesterday on existing bays...that is absolutely unacceptable, if there were a bridge device or middleware to make this all work, the problem would not be a problem...

I've only found flexibility to save costs in the past. The complexity it introduces is usually something that can be dealt with easily.


You gotta have the ball.


I think everyone understands the need for plugins to be rewritten and the new APIs to be used. The burn comes when they pull the rug out instantly (call it carpet burn) and then expect everyone to pick themselves up. In the mean-time, people are left without options and risk losing money, missing deadlines and so on.

People are generally receptive to change if that change is better and Final Cut desperately needed change. What people don't like is sudden change if it's not suddenly better.


This does open up a lot of possibilities like having animated overlays vs static PSD ones. While having to jump back and forth can still slow down your workflow and may cause clipping problems at times, I can see how it would offer improvements over having it in Final Cut.


It doesn't even have to be a decent effort. FCP exports EDL and XML files, FCPX just needs to import those and it should be good to go:

http://developer.apple.com/appleappl...ns/fcpxml.html

This is one of the most basic, fundamental things they could have and should have done for launch. Still, a plugin developer should be able to make an XML parser in a matter of a couple of weeks.


Wonder if that came from iMovie for iPad - iOS uses SQLite dbs for things.


Yeah but it's half-full of what looks like Apple Juice. That juice ain't sweet though.


Are you able to export a timeline immediately? Someone reported that you have to wait for the full transcode before you can export.


Normally it gets transcoded to ProRes Standard minimum (about 50-150Mbps) but there are 4 versions proxy/LT/standard/HQ. I suspect they are using proxy quality, which should match the bitrates you get with AVCHD cameras except the transcoded files will likely be lower quality as ProRes is an inter-frame codec vs intra-frame codec like AVCHD. You probably won't notice it though because 15-25Mbps is not bad for 720p. If you think about the data per frame: 15Mbps / 8 = 1.875MB / 30 = 60KB per image at 1280 x 720.

ProRes LT would be a safer option IMO and they may be using that. If you open the render files, it will tell you.


It sounds good but I just hope they keep up with the format support. Apparently they don't support mxf files that come from some of the higher end cameras yet, which they used to do in FCP and you still can't open AVCHD files directly. This makes sense when some formats split audio and video but it could even just try to open them - having to rebuild directory structures manually is such a pain.

Thanks for sharing your experiences. If you have time to take any more screenshots of workflows, that would be great e.g the link between Motion and FCPX.

Yes I acknowledged that sometimes this is a fairly easy problem to fix and sometimes it is an impossible problem to fix. Yes when a project was shot on film that makes it a lot easier to solve.

But A LOT of material was shot on video. In the 70's and 80's most of the TV sitcoms were shot on video. Their is no easy way to convert any of those shows for something like Blu-ray. This conundrum was realized in the 90's and most all television shows switched back to shooting on film.

As someone fairly new, and still on that steep learning curve, to editing, I like many was waiting for the release of FCPX. I don't have knowledge of any Pro editing suite apart from FCE4, which I migrated to very quickly.

For the past two days I've read and listened to endless complaints about FCPX, I'm not rushing out to buy it because I can't simply work on projects I'm doing in FCE4 in FCPX, which seems a bit remiss of Apple. However, whilst FCPX clearly as issues of compatibility and Apple should have known better, 48 hours after its release is too short a time period to start condemning FCPX.

Whilst FCPX is completely new, and appears to have many advantages, background rendering being the No.1 benefit for me, Apple for some strange reason are doing everyone a disservice, and I might add, being somewhat arrogant in (1) poor available information, (2) taking a position whereby they seem to be saying 'like it or lump it'. This is not good business and has we have seen FCPX is generating a lot of negativity, which in turn will cause many potential Apple customers from buying Apple products.

The launch of FCPX has been a disaster, and will go down as being 'not one of Apple's finest hours.' I'm sure if those complaining about FCPX just took a time out and objectively looked at the obvious benefits FCPX, they might be surprised to see just where Apple is going with this. It's version 1, which means it's going to have teething problems. But potentially it has the makings of a wonderful product, which is what we should all be concerned about.

Will I buy it? Yes I will, but not now because with the projects I'm working on I need XML, which is not available. Should we be critical for the way Apple have launched FCPX? Yes we should because this is not the way to treat its loyal customer base. There are faults on both sides, but the greatest fault must lie with Apple for the way it has needlessly shot itself in the foot.

I totally agree from a marketing and PR standpoint Apple is doing a terrible job. They are not communicating with their customer base about where they are going with a crucial product that people depend on for their work.

At the same time. I believe Apple is being so arrogant in its stance because they know they have a great product that they know their customers are going to love. But they are not communicating that to the wider community.