2 Applications to keep your Mac apps up to date

 

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So I have been a longtime user of MacUpdate, a web site that keeps a library of more than 32,000 Mac Apps in an easy to find interface, where you can search by Free, paid, on sale, or top rated, or recently updated. So it will update your existing applications as well as help you find new apps.

The problem is the use the MacUpdate Desktop app, it is a $20 subscription for 6 months, and I have had a subscription for a long time, but it is not without it’s issues.

First off I have a long standing re-occuring issue with my login, where the app freezes and stops getting updates, and you have to log out, but when you try to log back in your login does not work. And the only solution I have found is to contact support and have them reset my password to a generic, and then you can change the password and it works for a little while before the problem occurs once again.

Another issue with MacUpdate Desktop is Mac OS Big Sur, because MacUpdate Desktop does not run at all on Big Sur, which is on version 10.16.3 already, so a new version seems a long time coming, especially for a subscription app.

An alternative to MacUpdate is MacUpdater 2 from CoreCode. Unlike MacUpdate it is a one time purchase (at least for version 2, as there is an upgrade from versions 1), and can be had for $14.99 to $35.00 depending on the version.

It also has a Priveleged Install Helper tool so you can install apps that require a password with a single click, and you can have it make app backups of recently installed apps in case one doesn’t work.

It is also Big Sur and Apple Silicon native, which is a big plus. And it has as dark mode unlike MacUpdate. As is the price, which is certainly better.

So I would recommedn MacUpdater from CoreCode and it is what I will be using from now on.

Cinemontage from the editors guild has a great article on Parenting, Post-Production and the Pandemic

 Su Fang Tham’s article on Parenting, Post Production and the Pandemic is a must read. It really goes into some of the pitfalls of parenting and working in post from home. 

I hope it also brings up issues that could be very important in the future of editing. Will work from home be more allowed, what about commute time, because personally I think it should be counted in your work day especially when we are talking 10+ hour workdays, and we are talking hour+ commutes each way.

Now we don’t have any children as of yet, but i love working from home and being able to see my wife and dogs. I wouldn’t mind some in person meetings (with proper safety protocols), but am hoping that the future will be much more inclined for work at home, with more ability to write off the expenses that come with it, like broadband, computers and software that is so much harder to write off thanks to bills like AB5.

Motion Blur on text or motion graphics in Premiere Pro with the Transform Effect

 I have to admit I didn’t know about this until fairly recently. I have always been disturbed by the lack of Motion Blur in Premiere Pro, when it was in Final Cut Pro 7 and so easy to turn on (though the render time was brutal). And likely that is why I missed it here, because I always just used the standard Transform effects within every object.

And the standard Transform effect does not have a motion blur, to get a motion blur on text or a shape in Premiere you need to use the Transform Effect in Video Effects, Distort Category.

The Transform effects add these controls.

If you use the Transform effect to move objects you can turn off Use Compositions’s Shutter Angle and change the Shutter Angle to get a motion blur.

0 is no motion blur and 360 is max motion blur, but 180 is normal motion blur (a 180 degree shutter on a film camera).

I am in a 23.976 sequence and created a simple Essential Graphics text object.

I created as simple animation with it coming from the top and moving to this position over 12 frames within the Transform Effect.

This is half way through the move with 180 degree shutter.

This is with 360 as the shutter angle.

And this is with a 90 degree shutter:

So it is very easy to have motion blur on a moving object in Premiere Pro using the Transform Effect.

Now if this effect is in here, I don’t see why Adobe can’t just add the same controls into the normal move controls, so you can get motion blur without using this effect, and make it as easy as it was in Final Cut Pro 7, you just switched it on in the timeline window.

I am assuming they would have to rewrite all the normal transform controls, but hell it would be worthwhile, as it should just function like this.

Still at least Motion blur is here and is able to be used within Premiere without having to go to After Effects.

Adobe Announced Creative Cloud pro with unlimited access to Adobe Stock

 

Adobe has announced Adobe Creative Cloud Pro Edition at it’s Adobe Blog. This is just like the normal version of Creative Cloud but the with the addition of unlimited access to over 200 million assets from Adobe Stock.

The price is the same as Creative Cloud for teams at $79.99 a month for a year and $89.99 a month after that.

For individual users this only makes sense if you use a lot of stock and templates, but for businesses this could end up being a huge money saver, and well worth it.

The Hidden cost of Apple changing it’s hardware architecture for editors and motion graphics artist is plug-ins

 

So of course Apple is moving to the M1 processor for all of it’s computers, moving away from intel. This is the 3rd hardware switch Apple has made, from it’s initial motorola processors, to power pc, to the ARM based M1 processors. And while the current M1 is very fast, but not a pro processor, especially with shared graphics and normal ram and a limit of 16 GB of total RAM. 

For everyone sticking with Apple this will eventually mean new hardware to move to M1 from Intel, though for a few years at least Apple will continue to support Intel hardware.

The hidden cost though, that is something different, and for a professional editor or motion graphics artist the hidden cost is plugs-ins.

Plug-ins can be an expensive investment, but can really help your workflow and speed things up and let you do things that couldn’t do without them. And the move to M1 will certainly be a paid upgrade, even for those still on Intel hardware. And those plugs in upgrades can cost hundreds, and over the upcoming period there are going to be a lot of upgrades to M1.

And while DaVinci and Final Cut Pro X already run on M1’s and the Premiere Pro Beta runs on M1, to get your old plug-ins to run you have to run them via Rosetta 2, which means running the Intel based versions of the host software to get the plug-ins working. And that is going to mean running the software slower through emulation, and could cause many issues and add more stability issues.

Now of course subscription based plug-ins will have the price included in the subscription, but the lack of more money for the upgrade might mean a lot longer before they upgrade to M1, even if it should mean they should upgrade sooner since you are already paying monthly or yearly for the software.

And yes the fact that our Intel Hardware will last a few more years with upgrades means that the upgrades will happen over a few years, so we can pay it, but for me it is a lot of plug-in upgrades, that will be followed by an expensive hardware upgrade to whatever form Pro M1 Macs take.

And of course their will be the exceptions, companies that treat their customers correctly and will upgrade to the new architecture without charging anything. One such company is RE:Vision Effects, which I got an e-mail from and they are developing M1 versions of the current versions of all their plugs ins. And have already released OpenFx and Twixtor M1 betas for FXPlug versions and RSMB for FXPlug is next.

Apple’s new M1 24” iMac is an impressive and beautiful consumer machine.

 

So one of the things Apple released yesterday, was there new 24” inch iMac in up to 7 colors like the iMac was originally. And this is an impressive and thin Machine, at only 11.5 mm thicks, wow!

And with the impressive performance of the M1 chip and a beautiful 4.5 K 24” display thus will be an impressive machine for many users, though it is obviously not meant for pros, and especially the $1299.00 base Machine which only has 2 thunderbolt/ USB 4 ports and unlike it’s bigger brothers doesn’t include gigabit ethernet on the power block (and a pro machine would have 10 GB ethernet).

The higher end machines for $1499 and $1699 have one more gpu core and 2 usb 3 ports as well as the afore mentioned ethernet, and their magic keyboard includes touch id (which are also color matched to your machine), though one with a numberpad is an extra cost.

And the 16GB unified memory for both CPU snd GPU will be further hampered by the larger display, and lack of cooling fan for pro work.

I really look forward to seeing what the pro variant of the m1 chip is and if it has external graphics support, or even pci support. And any pro iMac will need to be thicker and have a fan, and maybe a bigger display.

Strangely this computer is so thin they couldn’t keep the headphone jack on the back and had to put it on the side, which is certainly easier to use.

I like that you can order one with a vesa mount instead of the included stand, since the stand doesn’t have height control. Maybe an iMac pro could include height control as well, as long as it doesn’t cost as much as the stand for the MacPro HDR display.

And with Final Cut Pro X and DaVinci working well on M1 Macs and Premiere having Beta support the future looks bright for M1 pro users, though it isn’t here yet. And an expensive plug in upgrade cycle to M1 support is certainly in our future.

Still for most users this should be an impressive machine, though why the chin? I know iMacs have had it for a while, but I would rather not have it and have the display edge to edge.

The wait to see the M1 Pro Chips is killing most pro users right now, but hopefully Apple is using the time wisely, and going to really blow us away with what they release.

This machine is really quite impressive, and many users will be very happy with it, but does anyone think it is weird to not have an Apple logo on the chin?

I can’t wait to see one, though with the pandemic that may be a while.

The Adobe Support community is an important tool for finding answers to your questions and issues

 

The Adobe Support Community is a huge resource for those who are having issues with their Adobe software. While Adobe isn’t on the forums that often (they are sometimes), other users are very helpful and will do what they can to help you.

And the Premiere Pro and After Effects forums are very useful.

Separately from the forums you should also know about the Feature Request / Bug Report form which is where you should post specific requests or reproducible bugs to Adobe.

You can also try Adobe’s Help page, though I find you get more results from the community.

Color Correct your external monitor using Spear and Munsil

 

After all the talk of gamma shifts and trying to balance the color on your computer monitor, really and truly the only way to really see if your video is right is to be watching it on an external video monitor. An external video monitor is the way to see what the image truly looks like, but you need to adjust your external monitor to correct balance and to really do that to the best that your TV can do you need Spear & Munsil. Of course some people use a computer monitor, but that will never show what TV delivery will look like, you need to view on something that resembles what you are delivering for.

I use a Blackmagic UltraStudio 4K to play my video out, though I wish I had the newer model with Thunderbolt 3 instead of 2, and which is smaller, quieter and cooler, but the Ultrastudio works great.

You should be viewing your video on an external studio video monitor, but for home use that is a pretty big expense. Personally I use a Samsung UHD TV, unfortunately it’s HDR capabilities are fake (I had to get it for a job and it was the right price, and it listed HDR, but unfortunately is not actually an HDR display). It is a Samsung so it has one unique bonus among consumer televisions for getting the color correction right and that is that it has a blue only mode. This helps in the calibration greatly.

The discs no longer include a getting started guide, so you will need to go online and follow the extensive instructions. It will take a little while, and your room should have the lighting that you will use when editing (I have light blocking shades on my office windows to keep a consistent color and lighting).

This is such an important step for television delivery, and should part of every editors home office.

The importance of Monitor Calibration and the datacolor SpyderX

 

As an editor, colorist and motion graphics artist, I of course use dual monitors. And they are 2 very different displays, but even if they were the exact same type of display you need to try and balance them as mush as you can, and that is why I own and us a datacolor Spyder X (and yes the printing is smudged and coming off on mine).


This is the menu bar launcher.

And where you calibrate the displayers, you will then put the device on the spot on the display and turn up the brightness and it will measure your displays.

It measures both displays, has you set matching brightness, and then lets you adjust based on perception. It can be difficult if you have very different displays but is certainly worth it so your 2 displays are as close to each other as can be.

My only complaint is that having bought the device, the software is linked to my computer. And I would love to be able to take it with my to match monitors at work, especially with rental computers, but obviously they want them to buy there own, unfortunately most companies won’t bother.