Apple looking into re-offering Final Cut Pro 7 volume licenses after FCP X backlash

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  • Reply 141 of 202
    What the real story here is Apple's attitude toward the Pro community. if you have noticed over the last few years the Macs are no longer considered just for Pros. Apple went after the consumer community. they have succeed and are sitting on some hefty profits. Final cut does not fit in their dna anymore. FCPx reminds me of Aperture when it first came out. i wanted to love it but it would not read my cameras Raw files when they finally upgraded it to read my camera I was onto a newer model and had already moved to lightroom. Adobe keep up with upgrades much faster. Every new camera that came out they had an update with in a month. Apple took 6 months or more to upgrade Aperture's camera base. Thou Aperture was geared toward the Pro market, just the reverse of what happened with Final cut Pro 7. Apple is very arrogant now and maybe headed down the same path as MS and others with a very entrenched corporate culture where no one talks to anyone they just develop these projects without much feed back from the people who would actually be using the product, the jury is still out on FCPX. We will see how long it takes for them to update or not. they may just want to scrape having a pro app and be happy selling a semi pro app. then they can tell the consumer what he wants and not have to listen to their customers.
  • Reply 142 of 202
    thepixeldocthepixeldoc Posts: 2,257member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by JeffDM View Post


    It sounds like Pixelmator could be a fighting replacement for a lot of Photoshop uses. It uses the Core frameworks and it isn't held back by being multi-platform.



    I've recommended and "pumped" Pixelmator a number of times here and on other forums, especially for Mac users, for just those reasons.



    @bulk001 - you missed "probably" in my original statement. I have no concrete evidense to back up my statement.



    However since using PS 1.0 until the present CS5, and witnessing the "bolted on factor" first-hand with Adobe's foray into 64-bit for Mac... let's just say, "it's just a hunch at 10x".



    I think other's have experienced that hunch as well. Check out Adobe's own forums.
  • Reply 143 of 202
    z3r0z3r0 Posts: 238member
    A good analogy here would be that FCP 7 is like driving a stick shift and FCP X is an automatic (minus features). Pro's don't want to be babied, or want any hand holding.



    If software had a bunch of buttons that did everything for you it wouldn't be considered pro. Becoming a pro takes time and dedication to learn complex software and the craft. Adding cheap buttons and tricks that offer limited control takes away from that and devalues the craft.



    There is no make an "incredible video button".



    Quote:
    Originally Posted by franktinsley View Post


    Apple didn't make FCPX for fun. They made it to make editing faster and easier. If someone says they're good at video editing and can't use the faster and easier software then how good at editing are they really?



  • Reply 144 of 202
    nvidia2008nvidia2008 Posts: 9,262member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by sternapples53 View Post


    What the real story here is Apple's attitude toward the Pro community. if you have noticed over the last few years the Macs are no longer considered just for Pros. Apple went after the consumer community. they have succeed and are sitting on some hefty profits. Final cut does not fit in their dna anymore. FCPx reminds me of Aperture when it first came out. i wanted to love it but it would not read my cameras Raw files when they finally upgraded it to read my camera I was onto a newer model and had already moved to lightroom. Adobe keep up with upgrades much faster. Every new camera that came out they had an update with in a month. Apple took 6 months or more to upgrade Aperture's camera base. Thou Aperture was geared toward the Pro market, just the reverse of what happened with Final cut Pro 7. Apple is very arrogant now and maybe headed down the same path as MS and others with a very entrenched corporate culture where no one talks to anyone they just develop these projects without much feed back from the people who would actually be using the product, the jury is still out on FCPX. We will see how long it takes for them to update or not. they may just want to scrape having a pro app and be happy selling a semi pro app. then they can tell the consumer what he wants and not have to listen to their customers.



    Yes, I think this will be the trend. Nothing diabolical though certainly frustrating IMO. Apple has been beating their heads against the enterprise and pro market for a long time with some success. But the iConsumer opportunities are so juicy and so vast, for Apple to focus on it they have to make compromises in the pro and enterprise space.



    Some people may not like it and some people may not like to acknowledge it but this is happening.



    The FCPX team's mistake was thinking that they could still serve some of the high-end editors with this first release.
  • Reply 145 of 202
    z3r0z3r0 Posts: 238member
    This pretty much says it all: http://digitalcomposting.wordpress.c...6/28/x-vs-pro/



    Apple needs to get it @ss in gear and fix things. I hope the release a new version of Final Cut Server or a replacement that out does the original. If not they should open source Final Cut Server along with Shake and Color.



    Quote:
    Originally Posted by sternapples53 View Post


    What the real story here is Apple's attitude toward the Pro community. if you have noticed over the last few years the Macs are no longer considered just for Pros. Apple went after the consumer community. they have succeed and are sitting on some hefty profits. Final cut does not fit in their dna anymore. FCPx reminds me of Aperture when it first came out. i wanted to love it but it would not read my cameras Raw files when they finally upgraded it to read my camera I was onto a newer model and had already moved to lightroom. Adobe keep up with upgrades much faster. Every new camera that came out they had an update with in a month. Apple took 6 months or more to upgrade Aperture's camera base. Thou Aperture was geared toward the Pro market, just the reverse of what happened with Final cut Pro 7. Apple is very arrogant now and maybe headed down the same path as MS and others with a very entrenched corporate culture where no one talks to anyone they just develop these projects without much feed back from the people who would actually be using the product, the jury is still out on FCPX. We will see how long it takes for them to update or not. they may just want to scrape having a pro app and be happy selling a semi pro app. then they can tell the consumer what he wants and not have to listen to their customers.



  • Reply 146 of 202
    bulk001bulk001 Posts: 764member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by franktinsley View Post


    Apple didn't make FCPX for fun. They made it to make editing faster and easier. If someone says they're good at video editing and can't use the faster and easier software then how good at editing are they really?



    They made it for the mass market. It does not necessarily make it easier or faster depending on what you need to do. As for those of us who make money with FCP 7, we just need to accept the fact that Apple is now a consumer focused company (and there is nothing wrong with that), find an alternative and move on. For now the hardware is good, the OS is good and there are viable alternatives from Adobe, Avid and probably some others.
  • Reply 147 of 202
    bulk001bulk001 Posts: 764member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by ThePixelDoc View Post


    I've recommended and "pumped" Pixelmator a number of times here and on other forums, especially for Mac users, for just those reasons.



    @bulk001 - you missed "probably" in my original statement. I have no concrete evidense to back up my statement.



    However since using PS 1.0 until the present CS5, and witnessing the "bolted on factor" first-hand with Adobe's foray into 64-bit for Mac... let's just say, "it's just a hunch at 10x".



    I think other's have experienced that hunch as well. Check out Adobe's own forums.



    I probably "didn't". I have used it for almost as long as you have and don't see a "bolted on factor". What exactly are these "bolted on factors" anyway that you don't like? If you are arguing for less features, by all means use Pixelmator but I am glad to see Adobe innovating and adding to Photoshop and think it is overall a fantastic product. As for your hunch I would disagree - the program is fast, it is stable and it is feature rich.
  • Reply 148 of 202
    bulk001bulk001 Posts: 764member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by JeffDM View Post


    Quite true, it depends on the use. Photoshop started out as a less sophisticated program, and look what you can do with it now. I imagine a few years can make a big difference in the breadth of uses Pixelmator can serve. It already easily exceeds Elements in my opinion.



    I am sure in a few years it could and I think that competition is good and will make Photoshop a better program. The problem for is that as they add new features there will be people who start complaining about bloat, stuff "bolted on", speed etc.
  • Reply 149 of 202
    addaboxaddabox Posts: 12,665member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by ThePixelDoc View Post


    Staaaanley and the rest of you with similar posts:



    WE GET IT! Many of us have read the above post or similar 1000 times or more over the last couple of weeks! Everybody and their grandma knows what's missing... what's coming "soon"... and what's likely never to come, because it will no longer be needed... or because Apple no longer sees the need to cater to the pros.



    I personally think that Apple and it's engineers are looking out well beyond 2 years time. I also believe the rewrite that they are releasing now can and will benefit early adopters if they give it a chance. Those are the pro editers of tomorrow... OK... in 2 years.



    We keep getting posts like that because we keep getting posts from people who clearly have no idea how professional editing works and assume that the backlash has something to do with anti-Apple sentiment, or an unwillingness to adapt to the New Shiny, or lack of patience, or some kind of unseemly old person's clinging to outmoded tech, or some fundamental inability to Trust Apple and Embrace the Future.



    Since all of those things are insultingly misinformed, we're going to keep getting folks going back over the fundamentals as long as other folks insist on getting the narrative completely wrong.
  • Reply 150 of 202
    addaboxaddabox Posts: 12,665member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by bulk001 View Post


    I am sure in a few years it could and I think that competition is good and will make Photoshop a better program. The problem for is that as they add new features there will be people who start complaining about bloat, stuff "bolted on", speed etc.



    Not necessarily. Pixelmator has the advantage of being modern code with no legacy cruft, plus they've seen the results of years of Photoshop feature creep and what it does to the interface.



    If Pixelmator were to keep adding features to the point that it achieved Photoshop parity for, say, 80% of use cases (not saying it ever will, but just theoretically) I'd wager it would deliver that 80% in a much easier to use, much faster, much more streamlined package.



    The big disadvantage for even a so empowered Pixelmator is that while they might get some percentage of Photoshop functionality, everybody may want a different subset. Similar to the "how many apps are enough" argument-- if the app you want isn't available on your platform, the answer is always "not enough." More apps = more likely that the specific tool your looking for is available. Photoshop is the App Store of image processing functionality-- if you don't need a particular process it might seem unwieldily, needlessly complex and pointlessly elaborated. But if you do need that process it's the only game in town. And, I would wager, every Photoshop jockey has a slightly different set of tools that they rely on.
  • Reply 151 of 202
    flaneurflaneur Posts: 4,526member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by addabox View Post


    We keep getting posts like that because we keep getting posts from people who clearly have no idea how professional editing works and assume that the backlash has something to do with anti-Apple sentiment, or an unwillingness to adapt to the New Shiny, or lack of patience, or some kind of unseemly old person's clinging to outmoded tech, or some fundamental inability to Trust Apple and Embrace the Future.



    Since all of those things are insultingly misinformed, we're going to keep getting folks going back over the fundamentals as long as other folks insist on getting the narrative completely wrong.



    I'm going to copy this and paste into every thread where it applies from now on. Hope you don't mind.
  • Reply 152 of 202
    fearlessfearless Posts: 138member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by addabox View Post


    We keep getting posts like that because we keep getting posts from people who clearly have no idea how professional editing works and assume that the backlash has something to do with anti-Apple sentiment, or an unwillingness to adapt to the New Shiny, or lack of patience, or some kind of unseemly old person's clinging to outmoded tech, or some fundamental inability to Trust Apple and Embrace the Future.



    Since all of those things are insultingly misinformed, we're going to keep getting folks going back over the fundamentals as long as other folks insist on getting the narrative completely wrong.



    Dead right, we are. During the Platform Wars, Apple was always about emotional connections with things and Microsoft was all about doing what business needed. I could note how those tables have turned, but they haven't really. They're both on the same side of the table now - except Apple just let down a chunk of business customers. Indeed that generates emotion.



    For all that Apple needs to "focus" or whatever, they're a multi billion dollar company with room for the odd Skunk Works, which is what Pro Apps became. OS X wasn't built by the marketing department, it was built by NeXT, which was a bunch of geeks. When the iPod then the iPhone became big, we all applauded because future development of the apps on which we relied depended on a healthy Apple bottom line. Instead, the tail wagged the dog so hard the dog died.



    Apple could have had a bunch of high profile advocates supporting its brand doing stuff you'd go to the movies to see. Instead the links will point to skateboard vids, made by proud young "Pro" directors. Sad.
  • Reply 153 of 202
    flaneurflaneur Posts: 4,526member
    <saved for later>
  • Reply 154 of 202
    MarvinMarvin Posts: 15,309moderator
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by fearless View Post


    Absolutely we will need them. All our legacy material (50 years of it) sits on tape and no one is going to pay to ingest it all onto some uberserver in the Cloud. All international deliverables require tape, some (American distributors actually) still require analogue tape. Geez, to listen to you ardent futurists you'd think we were trying to promote vacuum tube amplifiers. In 5 years, not 2, tape will be a less common output. FCP7 and Avid do tapeless just fine, but they also do tape. I'm not going to wait 5 years for my clients' needs to match some consumer app that's missing what I need now.



    Do you need tape at the recording stage though (putting aside high-end camera design)? Sony's recent issues with their factory don't help reliance on specialised tape:



    http://www.hdwarrior.co.uk/2011/04/0...-short-supply/



    Also, it doesn't have to be Final Cut Pro's job to handle the tape I/O.



    It seems that the best workflow going forward is to record to fast SSD drives (like the RED cameras) in whatever format you choose - don't need to buy a tape per shoot so even expensive SSDs are cost-effective and you can record multiple SSDs simultaneously for some security. This allows very fast, direct ingest without a tape deck. Then you use inexpensive tape for archive and distribution:



    http://www.quantum.com/Products/Tape...O-5/Index.aspx



    Tape is absolutely still required but I don't think it's essential for video editing software developers to be the ones to support it directly.



    Tape/SSD capture -- ingest via 3rd party -- [ digital -> Final Cut -> digital ] ---- Tape/HDD/SSD output
  • Reply 155 of 202
    cloudgazercloudgazer Posts: 2,161member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by fearless View Post


    Instead, the tail wagged the dog so hard the dog died.



    That dog died in 1997.



    FCP users were never the dog. By the time FCP was first released Apple was already re-inventing itself as a consumer driven computer maker with devices in bright candy colours. Pros weren't the target market for those early iBooks or iMacs.



    Quote:

    Apple could have had a bunch of high profile advocates supporting its brand doing stuff you'd go to the movies to see. Instead the links will point to skateboard vids, made by proud young "Pro" directors. Sad.



    This paragraph perfectly exemplifies the emotions at play here. Anybody who isn't a card carrying 'pro' director who invested years in gaining that status immediately sees that young 'skateboard vid' directors will sell more macs than Francis Ford Coppola himself could.
  • Reply 156 of 202
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Marvin View Post


    Tape is absolutely still required but I don't think it's essential for video editing software developers to be the ones to support it directly.



    Tape/SSD capture -- ingest via 3rd party -- [ digital -> Final Cut -> digital ] ---- Tape/HDD/SSD output



    This is wrong. I know everyone is saying that pro film and TV editors can use 3rd party plug ins for missing features like output to tape, but the truth is it probably won't work well enough.



    The truth is output to tape in FCP7 already doesn't work every well. (See the early posting by Welshdog.) And in my experience, 3rd party plug ins usually don't work even as well as features built into the program.



    In film and TV we often use output to tape to make reference tapes for our sound house, vfx guys, color correction, etc... If those reference tapes are off by even 1 frame, that can mean big headaches. In a worst case scenario, a reference tape that is off by 1 frame could actually get some poor assistant editor fired.



    Features like output to tape are actually crucial features that need to function fast, reliably, and accurately. No editor wants to trust a 3rd party plug for that.
  • Reply 157 of 202
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by fearless View Post


    Apple just let down a chunk of business customers. Indeed that generates emotion.



    Most TV and feature film editors that I know are happy that we don't won't have to deal with FCP anymore.



    Feature film and TV editors are not debating whether or not FCPX is a pro editing platform. We KNOW it's not a pro editing platform anymore. So the big question is: How are we dealing with it? The truth is most of are either indifferent or happy.



    Most feature film and TV editors didn't really like FCP all that much to begin with. Most of the time it was not our first choice for an editing platform. We thought it was finicky and unreliable. And the more complicated the project - like a big multi-editor TV show - the harder it was to work with. Usually the producers were the ones who made us use it. They wanted to save money. So they forced us to use FCP instead of AVID.



    I think what Apple did with FCPX will mainly screw over middle-class professional editors who don't work in feature film and TV. And I definitely feel sorry for those guys.



    But in feature film and TV editing, I'd say 95% of my work was already AVID. And no one that I know is going to miss FCP.
  • Reply 158 of 202
    MarvinMarvin Posts: 15,309moderator
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by stanley99 View Post


    I know everyone is saying that pro film and TV editors can use 3rd party plug ins for missing features like output to tape, but the truth is it probably won't work well enough.



    That wouldn't be Apple's fault though but the 3rd party software developers. AJA have products to let you do this sort of thing and not plugins but standalone apps:



    http://www.facebook.com/ajavideo/pos...50678862540354



    They may not work reliably but then it would be their responsibility to sort it out.



    Quote:
    Originally Posted by stanley99


    We thought it was finicky and unreliable.



    Yeah and IMO, that would suggest they should focus on making the core application stronger and not try to take care of everything themselves. For example don't try to support STP, Color, DVDSP, LiveType, FCE etc. Just bring it down to a very small core application and let it be a powerful component in a workflow so that it can be used with Logic, Nuke, Da Vinci, Pro Tools and so on seamlessly.



    They've kinda messed that up a bit so far with the single-user design but they can turn it around in a future revision if they choose to.



    As you quite rightly say though, it doesn't matter. People will make a choice on what works. If Apple doesn't deliver this then they are out. The market decides who wins and who loses and if Apple feel they still want to be in it, they have to realise they can't make the rules all the time.
  • Reply 159 of 202
    fearlessfearless Posts: 138member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Marvin View Post


    Do you need tape at the recording stage though (putting aside high-end camera design)? Sony's recent issues with their factory don't help reliance on specialised tape:



    http://www.hdwarrior.co.uk/2011/04/0...-short-supply/



    Also, it doesn't have to be Final Cut Pro's job to handle the tape I/O.



    It seems that the best workflow going forward is to record to fast SSD drives (like the RED cameras) in whatever format you choose - don't need to buy a tape per shoot so even expensive SSDs are cost-effective and you can record multiple SSDs simultaneously for some security. This allows very fast, direct ingest without a tape deck. Then you use inexpensive tape for archive and distribution:



    http://www.quantum.com/Products/Tape...O-5/Index.aspx



    Tape is absolutely still required but I don't think it's essential for video editing software developers to be the ones to support it directly.



    Tape/SSD capture -- ingest via 3rd party -- [ digital -> Final Cut -> digital ] ---- Tape/HDD/SSD output



    With respect Marvin, you're once again confusing ingest with mastering. Hardly anyone shoots tape any more - we know that. And it's usually not where the pressure is. Of course we use RAID storage and LTO for archiving. That's not the problem.



    Getting a show out on deadline should not require a journey to an external app and if it does, it's a workaround.
  • Reply 160 of 202
    fearlessfearless Posts: 138member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Marvin View Post


    That wouldn't be Apple's fault though but the 3rd party software developers. AJA have products to let you do this sort of thing and not plugins but standalone apps:



    http://www.facebook.com/ajavideo/pos...50678862540354



    They may not work reliably but then it would be their responsibility to sort it out.



    Yeah and IMO, that would suggest they should focus on making the core application stronger and not try to take care of everything themselves. For example don't try to support STP, Color, DVDSP, LiveType, FCE etc. Just bring it down to a very small core application and let it be a powerful component in a workflow so that it can be used with Logic, Nuke, Da Vinci, Pro Tools and so on seamlessly.



    You're just spouting theory. You could, for example, design Microsoft Word to only make pdfs, and insist that printer manufacturers build printing into a kind of printer interface. If it didn't work, it would be something you'd need to take up with Lexmark, or Brother, or HP... no. An app needs to deliver its functions from start to finish, and if it doesn't it's half an app.



    This board is full of apologists for Apple having only done half the job, and finding excuses why it all makes perfect sense. FCP X is not a better app for having shed half the stuff its predecessor could do, its "core editing functions" are not better for losing functionality like track allocation and edls and sequence timecode, it's just a job half done.
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