Another one of Steve Jobs lessons. Know when to say no and be prepared to walk away.
But he didn't teach walking away with no REASON. There is no reason for Apple to take a flourishing product like FCP and flush it, but that's effectively what they've done. As others have said, they could EASILY have continued to make FCP a high-end product and also produced FCExpress. That makes FCE a "gateway" to get up & coming producers into Macs and FC, so they can graduate to FCP at the pro level. The same gateway that is used by putting Macs in elementary schools and by getting PC users to buy iPhones. But somehow Apple and Jobs thought this wasn't working in video?
Let us remind ourselves; not everything Jobs did was genius. I was a big fan, but he liked the round puck mouse, Ping, and the cube Mac too. I think we are remiss (and biased) if we don't acknowledge that the demise of FCP is another (admittedly rare) flub in the Jobs legacy.
Creative adaptation of Avid PR, but "troubling trend"?
I'm wondering about that phrase more because I don't recall seeing a flood of articles about all the editors that have ditched Final Cut over the whole FCPX change.
This is the future of the mac line if Apple doesn't step up their game for the professionals.
yeah they have traded limited sales to a small group that tends to wait to use their stuff to death for more vast sales to a much larger group that is more inclined to 'repair' via replacing and so on
Yes, Apple can and will continue to make a killing in the purely consumer market; but there are synergies between the markets and it seems unwise to focus on just one market segment.
Over the long run it is important for Apple to own the professional space in the audiovisual arts. Yes, the sales volume is low, but ownership of this space has in many ways defined the brand. We have all seen the "making of" documentaries of various films and TV shows and noticed Macs all over the place. Likewise with animated features and music editing and production.
If you care about visual arts and design, it feels good to know you own the same machine a creative professional uses. What happens when the pros start using Dells?
I have no idea the extent of awareness or involvement Jobs had with the culling of professional products. His time was very limited. The move has the smell of an efficiency mentality, meaning Tim Cook. I believe it is a blunder.
Granted, it will have little short-term impact. But once perception becomes widespread that Apple is not the platform for creative professionals, the notion that the company stands at the crossroads between liberal arts and technology falls, and all that is left is a gadget-maker with no core identity. This is especially true with Jobs gone.
What are they thinking? Apple could afford to develop these products when it had 1/10th the revenue it has today. Would it kill them to keep doing it? Of course not. The products were profitable, just not iPhone profitable.
FCP X is a very innovative app. It does some core things MUCH better than conventional editors, and many missing features can/will be added with some time. Its real issue is performance -- it slows down to a crawl as projects expand beyond a couple of minutes, and that's on top-of-the-line gear.
The bigger issue is Apple's commitment to anything that's not a mass market consumer product. From high-end workstation users getting the boot to iWork Mac users going 2+ years without any kind of update to Apple shipping buggy, slow software in Final Cut Pro X, you can see Apple treating anything but the iPhone, iPad and maybe the Macbook Air with benign neglect.
I think this will come back to haunt Apple. It's losing a lot of people who loved it and who were great evangelists for the company. When Apple's competitors start to catch up (they always do), those people and their passion will be missed.
There is no reason for Apple to take a flourishing product like FCP and flush it,
They had a reason for every change they made. They just haven't bothered to tell you what it was. Any more than they told you why the newest iPhone was a 4s and not the 5, why they took storage out of the Apple TV, why they don't have a matte screen on the iMacs etc.
You can do in FCPX a good 90% if not more of what you can do in FCP7. THe method is different in some cases but it is there. Which begs the question, is the issue really FCPX or that some people (including perhaps yourself) just don't like change
Over the long run it is important for Apple to own the professional space in the audiovisual arts.
In your opinion. You, it seems, believe that Apple has to do whatever the pro market demands or they are stupid, trash and going to go bankrupt by the end of the year.
Apple disagrees. And the sales figures and $400+ stock value appears to strongly disagree
Apple probably looked into just how much return on investment they get from creating professional video software. Maybe Apple would prefer to put their software developers on other more profitable projects. I get that impression from the way they treat the Mac Pro that they're doing it with their top of the line desktop too.
The Mac Mini took a year and a half to update back in 2008. I thought they had given up on it and decided to buy a Mac Book instead. I still like the Mac Mini but it costs too much for the features they provide.
Over one year ago I said that Apple would in two and a half years switch to all tablet computers. They're on track with the merging of OS X and iOS. They'll then find a way to connect the powerful tablet with their TV sets. Those two will merge to become the home computer system.
If a company can earn more money with its engineers by putting them on consumer product development they will. High end video editing probably isn't worth the effort these days. Apple is using the iOS devices to expand their business. They don't need prestige anymore by being the choice of editors on motion pictures.
The pioneering TV studio that effectively invented the reality TV genre with MTV's "The Real World" series has switched from Apple's beleaguered Final Cut Pro video editing software, instead choosing a workflow produced by rival Avid.
In a press release on Wednesday, Avid announced that reality TV giant and former Final Cut Pro user Burnim/Murray Productions is now operating the company's professional editing suite, saying that Apple's software is unable to handle the increasingly rigorous demands of professional video production.
?Due to the large volume of media generated by our reality shows, we needed to re-evaluate our editing and storage solutions. At the same time, we were looking for a partner who would understand our long-term needs,? said Mark Raudonis, senior vice president of Post Production at Bunim/Murray.
The Emmy Award-winning production company behind "Keeping up with the Kardashians" and "Project Runway" will use Avid Media Composer 6 and Avid Symphony 6 editing software, and plans to employ an Avid ISIS 5000 server to store and share data across its multiple workstations.
Burnim/Murray won't need to swap out its existing computers as the Avid software operates in both Windows 7 and Mac OS X environments.
?With the Avid Open I/O, we won?t need to change out any of the hardware from our existing editing stations. Instead it?s just a software install," Raudonis said. "In addition, we?ve always used Pro Tools, so we?re looking forward to saving time and gaining added efficiencies through Media Composer and Pro Tools interoperability,?
Avid Symphony sample system | Source: Avid
The latest news reflects an overall migration away from Final Cut Pro for the professional video community as many editors find that the newest Final Cut Pro X iteration simply can't compete with the tools other non-linear editing (NLE) workflows offer.
When Apple killed Final Cut Server after axing the Xserve and Xserve RAID range of storage products, the future prospects of the editing suite as a professional-level solution were essentially extinguished.
Apple released the completely re-built Final Cut Pro X in June 2011, and was met with controversy as professional filmmakers voiced their discontent with the significant changes made to the software. The outcry was such that an update was quickly rolled out in September to add highly requested features like Xsan and Rich XML support.
The updates were subsequently followed by refunds for dissatisfied customers, while others were given the option to buy the previous generation Final Cut Studio bundle for $999.
The loss of professional business may be expected, however, as AppleInsider reported in 2010 that Apple was rebuilding its video editing software to be more attractive for prosumers. Evidence that a new demographic was being targeted was Final Cut Pro X's $299 price tag, which was a fraction of what previous generations of the software cost.
As a prosumer product, Final Cut Pro X delivers an affordable package that includes some pro-level features like the ability to handle 4K resolutions. By taking familiar attributes from iMovie and interfacing them with 64-bit operations and a cohesive rendering pipeline, the product is more than enough for the conventional consumer.
The software is no doubt cost-effective when compared to "professional level" NLE setups that can easily run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars, and makes for a compelling option for independent filmmakers when combined with the relatively inexpensive camera kits from RED Digital Cinema.
Apple probably looked into just how much return on investment they get from creating professional video software. Maybe Apple would prefer to put their software developers on other more profitable projects. I get that impression from the way they treat the Mac Pro that they're doing it with their top of the line desktop too.
The Mac Mini took a year and a half to update back in 2008. I thought they had given up on it and decided to buy a Mac Book instead. I still like the Mac Mini but it costs too much for the features they provide.
Over one year ago I said that Apple would in two and a half years switch to all tablet computers. They're on track with the merging of OS X and iOS. They'll then find a way to connect the powerful tablet with their TV sets. Those two will merge to become the home computer system.
If a company can earn more money with its engineers by putting them on consumer product development they will. High end video editing probably isn't worth the effort these days. Apple is using the iOS devices to expand their business. They don't need prestige anymore by being the choice of editors on motion pictures.
After seeing the FCPX episode, I'm really afraid of investing in any of the Apple's pro apps. I'm using Aperture 3 now, and I fear that Aperture 4 will be just iPhoto Pro. I already see some trouble signs in Aperture 3: faces (which slow down processing a lot), places (which many top cameras don't support due to lack of GPS chip), requirements for HFS volume (why??? Lightroom can work with any disk format). But Aperture has excellent asset management capability, which is the only reason I'm still using it.
Pro markets don't generate a lot of profit, especially when compared to iPhones, iPad, etc. What they offer in return for the low margin is extreme loyalty. A pro using a Mac is much more attached, professionally and emotionally, to the Apple products they use. I wanted a Mac Pro for its expandability, but it's priced out of range. The next step down, the iMac, offers similar performance, but lacks severely in expandability. A Mac Pro will the performance of the iMac 27", for about $2000 was all that I'm looking for, and unsatisfied by Apple.
So that's why they completely rewrote FCP for years and bring us FCPX?... Sounds they should have quit FCP altogether.
Personally I think Apple didn't expect this criticism looking at how they f*cked *p the transition phase. It was kinda arrogant.
What is weirder is the Apple could have launched the program now called FXPro X with another name such as FinalCut Xpress 2 and kept selling FCPro 7 with updates continuing and no one have been upset. Every FCPro 7 user would have played around with the new application I guarantee and those that wanted to could have transitioned while full blown production houses could have kept going the way they were. None of this had to lead to a mass exodus from Macs in the very places they were so loved. Imagine if at the peak of the DTP revolution Quark and PageMaker (I am talking way before InDesign) had simply been dropped on the Mac platform!
In your opinion. You, it seems, believe that Apple has to do whatever the pro market demands or they are stupid, trash and going to go bankrupt by the end of the year.
Apple disagrees. And the sales figures and $400+ stock value appears to strongly disagree
Two things stand out from your reply to my comment:
1. You don't understand the meaning of the phrase "little short-term impact". I never said anything about Apple going bankrupt, much less by the end of the year.
2. You think the stock price and the last quarter's sales are solid leading indicators of future performance, or current wisdom of the leadership. This is wrong on so many levels...
Were you buying RIM stock in 2007? If that's your philosophy, you should have been. RIM hit 150 in 2008, one year after the iPhone came out and it was clear they didn't even understand the threat. Worse, their peak revenue was in 2010, when it was even more obvious (but not to their management) that they were in deep trouble.
I don't think Apple should "do whatever the pro market demands". It never has. Apple should, however, value the pro market, which it used to do, because it is valuable far beyond its direct sales.
What is weirder is the Apple could have launched the program now called FXPro X with another name such as FinalCut Xpress 2 and kept selling FCPro 7 with updates continuing and no one have been upset. Every FCPro 7 user would have played around with the new application I guarantee and those that wanted to could have transitioned while full blown production houses could have kept going the way they were. None of this had to lead to a mass exodus from Macs in the very places they were so loved. Imagine if at the peak of the DTP revolution Quark and PageMaker (I am talking way before InDesign) had simply been dropped on the Mac platform!
You are right!
But if you want to change the world, you don't present alternatives and call for a vote...
They would have done this if they were interested in competing directly against Avid. Which clearly they are not.
Quote:
Originally Posted by digitalclips
What is weirder is the Apple could have launched the program now called FXPro X with another name such as FinalCut Xpress 2 and kept selling FCPro 7 with updates continuing and no one have been upset.
Comments
Another one of Steve Jobs lessons. Know when to say no and be prepared to walk away.
But he didn't teach walking away with no REASON. There is no reason for Apple to take a flourishing product like FCP and flush it, but that's effectively what they've done. As others have said, they could EASILY have continued to make FCP a high-end product and also produced FCExpress. That makes FCE a "gateway" to get up & coming producers into Macs and FC, so they can graduate to FCP at the pro level. The same gateway that is used by putting Macs in elementary schools and by getting PC users to buy iPhones. But somehow Apple and Jobs thought this wasn't working in video?
Let us remind ourselves; not everything Jobs did was genius. I was a big fan, but he liked the round puck mouse, Ping, and the cube Mac too. I think we are remiss (and biased) if we don't acknowledge that the demise of FCP is another (admittedly rare) flub in the Jobs legacy.
Creative adaptation of Avid PR, but "troubling trend"?
I'm wondering about that phrase more because I don't recall seeing a flood of articles about all the editors that have ditched Final Cut over the whole FCPX change.
This is the future of the mac line if Apple doesn't step up their game for the professionals.
yeah they have traded limited sales to a small group that tends to wait to use their stuff to death for more vast sales to a much larger group that is more inclined to 'repair' via replacing and so on
Yes, Apple can and will continue to make a killing in the purely consumer market; but there are synergies between the markets and it seems unwise to focus on just one market segment.
Over the long run it is important for Apple to own the professional space in the audiovisual arts. Yes, the sales volume is low, but ownership of this space has in many ways defined the brand. We have all seen the "making of" documentaries of various films and TV shows and noticed Macs all over the place. Likewise with animated features and music editing and production.
If you care about visual arts and design, it feels good to know you own the same machine a creative professional uses. What happens when the pros start using Dells?
I have no idea the extent of awareness or involvement Jobs had with the culling of professional products. His time was very limited. The move has the smell of an efficiency mentality, meaning Tim Cook. I believe it is a blunder.
Granted, it will have little short-term impact. But once perception becomes widespread that Apple is not the platform for creative professionals, the notion that the company stands at the crossroads between liberal arts and technology falls, and all that is left is a gadget-maker with no core identity. This is especially true with Jobs gone.
What are they thinking? Apple could afford to develop these products when it had 1/10th the revenue it has today. Would it kill them to keep doing it? Of course not. The products were profitable, just not iPhone profitable.
The bigger issue is Apple's commitment to anything that's not a mass market consumer product. From high-end workstation users getting the boot to iWork Mac users going 2+ years without any kind of update to Apple shipping buggy, slow software in Final Cut Pro X, you can see Apple treating anything but the iPhone, iPad and maybe the Macbook Air with benign neglect.
I think this will come back to haunt Apple. It's losing a lot of people who loved it and who were great evangelists for the company. When Apple's competitors start to catch up (they always do), those people and their passion will be missed.
There is no reason for Apple to take a flourishing product like FCP and flush it,
They had a reason for every change they made. They just haven't bothered to tell you what it was. Any more than they told you why the newest iPhone was a 4s and not the 5, why they took storage out of the Apple TV, why they don't have a matte screen on the iMacs etc.
You can do in FCPX a good 90% if not more of what you can do in FCP7. THe method is different in some cases but it is there. Which begs the question, is the issue really FCPX or that some people (including perhaps yourself) just don't like change
Over the long run it is important for Apple to own the professional space in the audiovisual arts.
In your opinion. You, it seems, believe that Apple has to do whatever the pro market demands or they are stupid, trash and going to go bankrupt by the end of the year.
Apple disagrees. And the sales figures and $400+ stock value appears to strongly disagree
The Mac Mini took a year and a half to update back in 2008. I thought they had given up on it and decided to buy a Mac Book instead. I still like the Mac Mini but it costs too much for the features they provide.
Over one year ago I said that Apple would in two and a half years switch to all tablet computers. They're on track with the merging of OS X and iOS. They'll then find a way to connect the powerful tablet with their TV sets. Those two will merge to become the home computer system.
If a company can earn more money with its engineers by putting them on consumer product development they will. High end video editing probably isn't worth the effort these days. Apple is using the iOS devices to expand their business. They don't need prestige anymore by being the choice of editors on motion pictures.
The pioneering TV studio that effectively invented the reality TV genre with MTV's "The Real World" series has switched from Apple's beleaguered Final Cut Pro video editing software, instead choosing a workflow produced by rival Avid.
In a press release on Wednesday, Avid announced that reality TV giant and former Final Cut Pro user Burnim/Murray Productions is now operating the company's professional editing suite, saying that Apple's software is unable to handle the increasingly rigorous demands of professional video production.
?Due to the large volume of media generated by our reality shows, we needed to re-evaluate our editing and storage solutions. At the same time, we were looking for a partner who would understand our long-term needs,? said Mark Raudonis, senior vice president of Post Production at Bunim/Murray.
The Emmy Award-winning production company behind "Keeping up with the Kardashians" and "Project Runway" will use Avid Media Composer 6 and Avid Symphony 6 editing software, and plans to employ an Avid ISIS 5000 server to store and share data across its multiple workstations.
Burnim/Murray won't need to swap out its existing computers as the Avid software operates in both Windows 7 and Mac OS X environments.
?With the Avid Open I/O, we won?t need to change out any of the hardware from our existing editing stations. Instead it?s just a software install," Raudonis said. "In addition, we?ve always used Pro Tools, so we?re looking forward to saving time and gaining added efficiencies through Media Composer and Pro Tools interoperability,?
Avid Symphony sample system | Source: Avid
The latest news reflects an overall migration away from Final Cut Pro for the professional video community as many editors find that the newest Final Cut Pro X iteration simply can't compete with the tools other non-linear editing (NLE) workflows offer.
When Apple killed Final Cut Server after axing the Xserve and Xserve RAID range of storage products, the future prospects of the editing suite as a professional-level solution were essentially extinguished.
Apple released the completely re-built Final Cut Pro X in June 2011, and was met with controversy as professional filmmakers voiced their discontent with the significant changes made to the software. The outcry was such that an update was quickly rolled out in September to add highly requested features like Xsan and Rich XML support.
The updates were subsequently followed by refunds for dissatisfied customers, while others were given the option to buy the previous generation Final Cut Studio bundle for $999.
The loss of professional business may be expected, however, as AppleInsider reported in 2010 that Apple was rebuilding its video editing software to be more attractive for prosumers. Evidence that a new demographic was being targeted was Final Cut Pro X's $299 price tag, which was a fraction of what previous generations of the software cost.
As a prosumer product, Final Cut Pro X delivers an affordable package that includes some pro-level features like the ability to handle 4K resolutions. By taking familiar attributes from iMovie and interfacing them with 64-bit operations and a cohesive rendering pipeline, the product is more than enough for the conventional consumer.
The software is no doubt cost-effective when compared to "professional level" NLE setups that can easily run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars, and makes for a compelling option for independent filmmakers when combined with the relatively inexpensive camera kits from RED Digital Cinema.
Whah, Helloo Dere!
I'm not denigrating anyone in the video community but rather just laying it out there. Video editing isn't coming close to paying the bills.
So that's why they completely rewrote FCP for years and bring us FCPX?... Sounds they should have quit FCP altogether.
Personally I think Apple didn't expect this criticism looking at how they f*cked *p the transition phase. It was kinda arrogant.
Apple probably looked into just how much return on investment they get from creating professional video software. Maybe Apple would prefer to put their software developers on other more profitable projects. I get that impression from the way they treat the Mac Pro that they're doing it with their top of the line desktop too.
The Mac Mini took a year and a half to update back in 2008. I thought they had given up on it and decided to buy a Mac Book instead. I still like the Mac Mini but it costs too much for the features they provide.
Over one year ago I said that Apple would in two and a half years switch to all tablet computers. They're on track with the merging of OS X and iOS. They'll then find a way to connect the powerful tablet with their TV sets. Those two will merge to become the home computer system.
If a company can earn more money with its engineers by putting them on consumer product development they will. High end video editing probably isn't worth the effort these days. Apple is using the iOS devices to expand their business. They don't need prestige anymore by being the choice of editors on motion pictures.
After seeing the FCPX episode, I'm really afraid of investing in any of the Apple's pro apps. I'm using Aperture 3 now, and I fear that Aperture 4 will be just iPhoto Pro. I already see some trouble signs in Aperture 3: faces (which slow down processing a lot), places (which many top cameras don't support due to lack of GPS chip), requirements for HFS volume (why??? Lightroom can work with any disk format). But Aperture has excellent asset management capability, which is the only reason I'm still using it.
Pro markets don't generate a lot of profit, especially when compared to iPhones, iPad, etc. What they offer in return for the low margin is extreme loyalty. A pro using a Mac is much more attached, professionally and emotionally, to the Apple products they use. I wanted a Mac Pro for its expandability, but it's priced out of range. The next step down, the iMac, offers similar performance, but lacks severely in expandability. A Mac Pro will the performance of the iMac 27", for about $2000 was all that I'm looking for, and unsatisfied by Apple.
I have FCP Express, FCP 7/Studio and FCPX.
I am a Prosumer/Amateur editor... Mostly for friends, family and my own amazement.
But, what makes Apple different and able to survive and prosper -- is abandoning legacy dead ends...
FCP 7, et all supports a dying breed... There is little future, opportunity or $ in this endeavor.
Quality, Price and Quick Turn-Around are the driving forces of future NLEs...
There will be an exodus to Avid and Premiere.
Five years from now, the bulk of NLE editing will be done on Macs and Mobiles using FCPX...
...just my opinion!
By the same logic F1 racing will be accomplished racing Chevy Volts.
Guarantee you that Avid approached him and offered the house for free. Best PR / best timing.
Got any proof or just random slandering?
I listened to Raudonis advocate an open mind for FCPX, on several occasions...
He did not appear as one who could be (or needed to be) bought.
So that's why they completely rewrote FCP for years and bring us FCPX?... Sounds they should have quit FCP altogether.
Personally I think Apple didn't expect this criticism looking at how they f*cked *p the transition phase. It was kinda arrogant.
What is weirder is the Apple could have launched the program now called FXPro X with another name such as FinalCut Xpress 2 and kept selling FCPro 7 with updates continuing and no one have been upset. Every FCPro 7 user would have played around with the new application I guarantee and those that wanted to could have transitioned while full blown production houses could have kept going the way they were. None of this had to lead to a mass exodus from Macs in the very places they were so loved. Imagine if at the peak of the DTP revolution Quark and PageMaker (I am talking way before InDesign) had simply been dropped on the Mac platform!
In your opinion. You, it seems, believe that Apple has to do whatever the pro market demands or they are stupid, trash and going to go bankrupt by the end of the year.
Apple disagrees. And the sales figures and $400+ stock value appears to strongly disagree
Two things stand out from your reply to my comment:
1. You don't understand the meaning of the phrase "little short-term impact". I never said anything about Apple going bankrupt, much less by the end of the year.
2. You think the stock price and the last quarter's sales are solid leading indicators of future performance, or current wisdom of the leadership. This is wrong on so many levels...
Were you buying RIM stock in 2007? If that's your philosophy, you should have been. RIM hit 150 in 2008, one year after the iPhone came out and it was clear they didn't even understand the threat. Worse, their peak revenue was in 2010, when it was even more obvious (but not to their management) that they were in deep trouble.
I don't think Apple should "do whatever the pro market demands". It never has. Apple should, however, value the pro market, which it used to do, because it is valuable far beyond its direct sales.
By the same logic F1 racing will be accomplished racing Chevy Volts.
You are in the "biz" so I respect your POV.
I am not... But I've watched Apple for years... And learned what it takes to win.
Times and needs change -- it is an art to be in a position to exploit that...
Just as Apple did when they bought Ubillos from Macromedia
Edit: maybe not F1, but FJ...
I knew Jerry Austin who won a few races in D-Jags...
When I drove his 325 vette... I realized that it was too much car for me -- and abandoned any dreams of "pro" driving.
What is weirder is the Apple could have launched the program now called FXPro X with another name such as FinalCut Xpress 2 and kept selling FCPro 7 with updates continuing and no one have been upset. Every FCPro 7 user would have played around with the new application I guarantee and those that wanted to could have transitioned while full blown production houses could have kept going the way they were. None of this had to lead to a mass exodus from Macs in the very places they were so loved. Imagine if at the peak of the DTP revolution Quark and PageMaker (I am talking way before InDesign) had simply been dropped on the Mac platform!
You are right!
But if you want to change the world, you don't present alternatives and call for a vote...
You draw a line in the sand!
What is weirder is the Apple could have launched the program now called FXPro X with another name such as FinalCut Xpress 2 and kept selling FCPro 7 with updates continuing and no one have been upset.