Here is another great article on the whole Final Cut Pro X fiasco. At his blog Richard Harrington responds on a point by point basis to Dave Pogue’s article on FCP X in the New York Times.He really hits almost everything, so this article is a must read.
A good friend informed me that Randy Ubillios actually worked on the original final cut pro while at Macromedia when it was called Key Grip, and before it was sold to Apple. So the man should know better and should know what people want in professional editing software. It just has to mean that they have given up on the professional market and only want the consumer market, in which case they should have made the program iMovie Pro and just end of lifed Final Cut Pro and killed the name off, since this program has nothing to do with Final Cut Pro 7.
What I think happened with Final Cut Pro X, though this is of course only my opinion.Randy Ubillos created early versions of Premiere, which worked, but was too low end to do anything powerful, and never became huge like AVID. He was brought on by Apple to change iMovie, and his version was seen as a huge step backwards and Apple had to back track and re-release the previous version that had more features. People who were new to editing liked the simplicity of the new iMovie, but previous users didn't like it. Somehow that version of iMovie kept going and got more features, and Ubillos was given the task of updating final cut. I can only assume Steve Jobs liked what he did with iMovie, and got sold on his idea of making an iMovie Pro that would make it easier for everyone to edit.The thing is, Ubillos is obviously not an editor, and didn’t consult with any professional editors in the production of Final Cut Pro X, which is really iMovie 10, made to be 64 bit, and have some new Pro features like 4K support (and yet no Native RED support?!?!?!?!?). Steve must have gotten sold on Ubillos’s ideas of how he could revolutionize editing and how they could make it ‘easy’ for anyone to edit amazing high end videos, but Ubillos has no idea what a professional editor needs, he really only knows how to make a program easy for the masses, with some high end features.This product should have been iMovie Pro and been for the masses!I think Ubillos convinced Steve, and they call it Final Cut Pro to cash in on the cache in the name that they had built up over the years, even editing features. Everyone has now heard of Final Cut Pro, and they would cash in on that name and make a program for the average Joe, who would now think since they could use this program that they could even edit features, of course this ignores the fact that the program is so constrictive that almost no professional editors will use it, and with this feature set, it will never be used on another feature, or TV show, but it will be used for web delivery, which seems to be all it is suited for.If Apple really wanted to revolutionize editing they should have also consulted with a high end professional editor, Walter Murch comes to mind. He and his first assistant Editor Sean Cullen were really the first editors to start using Final Cut Pro to edit features. They know what professional editors need, and what Final Cut needed to move from Final Cut Pro 7 to a 64 Bit Final Cut Pro 8. Including how to make it have better multi-user abilities and what high end features would make their lives easier, and every professional editor’s lives easier.Now they still would have needed a good engineer to figure out new features they could add, but those would…
Larry Jordan has written a scathing article about the new Final Cut Pro X, and it really echoes what I feel about the program.In FCP X, Apple got some things amazingly right. But they also got key features amazingly wrong. And if they don’t change course, this software, which has significant potential, is going to spin further and further out of control. At which point, its feature set is irrelevant, its reputation will be set. We’ll be looking at another Mac Cube.And what they need to do immediately1. Immediately return Final Cut Studio (3) to the market. If it is not compatible with Lion (and I don’t know whether it is or not) label it so. But put it back on store shelves so consumers have the ability to work with the existing version until FCP X is ready for prime time.2. Fund the development of a conversion utility – either at Apple or thru a 3rd-party – and announce the development with a tentative release date.3. Publicly announce a road-map for FCP X that just covers the next 3-4 months. Apple needs to be in damage control mode and the best way to defuse the situation is to communicate. Answering the question: “What features will Apple add to FCP X, and when?” will go a long way to calming people down.And his conclusion:This launch has been compared to Coca-Cola launching New Coke – resulting in a humiliating loss of market share.With Final Cut Pro X, however, the situation is worse — with New Coke, only our ability to sip soda was affected. With Final Cut Pro X, we are talking losing livelihoods.Thanks for getting this out there Larry, I really appreciate you saying what needs to be said.
Wow, I am still trying to wrap my head around the fact that Apple has basically killed Final Cut Pro, my favorite editing program and the program that I make my living off of.For years we have been waiting for a true 64 bit version of the program, but instead they kill the old suite including Color and Soundtrack, and released what is basically iMovie Pro.Final Cut Pro X can’t open old Final Cut Pro sequences, only iMovie sequences.It’s magnetic timeline doesn’t allow for any track organization. It doesn’t import or export XML so you can’t finish in anything else. The viewer window is gone, and has not been well replaced. It is not designed for dual monitors. The organization is awful. You basically have to do titles in Motion now, and it doesn’t even have a build int drop shadow!You can do text in templates created in Motion, but have to go to Motion to do anything like you could previously.It has no XML import and output, so you can’t leave the program to color correct, or finish in another program. In fact to get the Audio out, you have to buy a $500 Automatic Duck plug in, and you have no control over where all the clips go.It also is not made for versioning, as it autosaves, and basically has one sequence per project, or event as they are now called, so you will have lots of Events.The lack of Multi-Clip is insane, and sure it can sync audio to one track, but won’t work with multiple tracks.The loss of a dedicated viewer monitor makes less room for organization, and means you see the audio waveform much smaller than you used to. Also if you want to move your Events to a second monitor, your scrubbing of the clips moves to, so it is very far away from what you are seeing in the one Viewer. This was not thought out well at all. And it really seems setup for a single monitor, sure you can move one segment to another monitor, but not how you want.For organization, it is all geared toward keywording, which is great, but you lost so much of the old organization that you could do with tabs.The new in Timeline Trim feature feels like old Premiere 4.2.1 where you had to A B roll clips, and is a huge step backwards.The fact that you can’t make chapter markers for Quicktime movies and DVD’s is a huge step backwards!The auto color matching works terribly, the clips come out looking pretty awful!I tried it with Canon 60D raw H264 and it was as sluggish as can be, as though it can play it back it is basically a ProRES only app. Going back to AVID which converts everything, now you must convert to ProRES to get the real speed out of the program.No drivers for AJA or Black Magic video cards!The forced organization is not made for multiple drives.There is no way to share projects…