AppleInsider reports that Mac OS 11.4 has added support for AMD Big Navi 6800, 6800XT and 6900XT

 Wesley Hillard at AppleInsider is reporting that MacOS 11.4 adds support for AMD Big Navi graphics cards 6800, 6800XT and 6900XT.

This is great news, Big Navi are what are in the new Xbox Series X and Playstation 5, are more powerful than anything in the current MacPro. It would be awesome if these cards were to be released for the MacPro and even better if they were to be added to an Pro variant of the M1 with PCI card and hopefully thunderbolt eGPU support.

There is the possibility that the M1 cards will never support PCI based graphics cards, and that would really be a shame, but this keeps the possibility alive.

Big Navi should be great for both Premiere Pro and DaVinci Resolve. I would still prefer the addition of NVIDIA, but that is unlikely to ever happen.

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.

Harry McCracken article on the iPad Pro needing Pro Software and my thoughts

 

Harry McCrakken at Fast Company has an article about how the iPad Pro just got way more Pro, but now it needs more Pro Software.

And I wholeheartedly agree. There is no overall user interface, everyone does it differently, and for me at least I don’t see the stability to use it in a work environment. Like Final Cut Pro X apps on iPad are supposed to just save and, but every time I have tried to really use art software on an iPad it crashes and I end up losing not a small amount of work, but most of my work, admittedly the same thing has happened to me with Final Cut pro X and it’s auto save with everything you do, if you are forced to use autodave and on the iPad have no way to backup your save definitively, then it can’t be used in a work environment and feel safe.

Now I hate windows, but I have an old Surface and even though it is far slower and doesn’t have an impressive touch interface, being able to use a full version of Photoshop is far superior to anything on a much more powerful iPad. It is too slow to edit on, but photoshop if far superior.

And while I have tried some editing on the iPad, and it works for simple stuff, it just isn’t pro. Even though an iPad can play back H.265 footage better than any Mac I have ever seen, the software on the iPad is not conducive to the Pro Work that the hardware is capable of. Of course again I kind of feel the same about Final Cut Pro X, it has some amazing high level technology, but it just isn’t put together how it should be or how an experienced editor would want to use it.

And programs just crash on an iPad, there is now way to see the memory used or how it is being taxed. Even the simplest apps like web browser crash and I lose all my tabs all the time.

And since every palm pilot had a way to store the pencil securely within the device, why can’t apple figure this out? The Apple Pencil is only useful if it is charged and attached. Having to keep it safe separately is not ideal.

I love my iPad because of convenience, but I have to say I would rather have a mac equivalent of a Microsoft Surface Book. A laptop with a touchscreen and a graphics card in the keyboard for editing work, but that I can take off and use as a tablet. And now that they both use the same chips this certainly should be possible. That would be ideal, though it would need to add Thunderbolt External GPU support to M1 Macs.

New Apple TV announced with new remote and color balancing feature

 

3 days ago Apple announced a new Apple TV 4k with a new remote and A12 Bionic Chip. It supports higher frame rate HDr, Dolby Vision and 60 fps.

The coolest feature which should at least hit some previous models is part of tvOS 14.5 according to 9 to 5  Mac, is color balancing using your iphone. 

This will not color balance your tv, but instead the output of your Apple TV to correct for your TV’s color balance! Wow! Apple needs to make an SDK for this feature, as I would love to have it in Adobe Premiere and DaVinci resolve on my Mac!

It still doesn’t account for Apple’s weird color shifts on the Mac. Be interesting to see how this balances for your own clips played back on an Apple TV from Premiere or Resolve, but for streaming and purchased movies this should be a godsend.

Patently Apple on Frame.io’s CEO on the new 2021 iPad Pro’s display being the ideal viewing solution

 

2 days ago Apple announced the release of the new iPad Pro with the M1 chip (not as big an upgrade as it is for Macs since it is based on previous iPad chips, but still an upgrade). 

Well the 12.9 model (all are $100 more expensive than previous models) has an upgraded display that includes apple XDR mini-LED display with IPS tech, and that may be more important than you think. It includes P3 color space and could support HDR 10, 10+ and Dolby Vision.

Patently Apple has an article about how Michael Cioni the VP of Onnovation at Frame.io told the Hollywood Reporter that this could be the perfect viewing display, since it can display work as it was originally intended.

I would actually like to see the original interview. I question the iPads viability because I know just how weird Apple’s color science is. Maybe it would work well with footage from Final Cut Pro X that has Apple’s weird color science baked in, but with footage from Premiere and DaVinci, I will bet it will be just as messed up as a Mac is even if it could show the correct colors. Unless maybe Frame.io is working on a solution in it’s app to bypass Apple’s funky as Color Science. If Frame.io figured out how to bypass the wonky color science or read what machine it is on and display correctly that would make Frame.io even more worthwhile.

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 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.

Why is Mac OS Finder iOS Sync so inferior to the previous iTunes Sync

 I have said this before and I am sure I will it again, but why when Apple split up iTunes to make Music, Podcast and TV apps and moving iOS music sync to the finder did they make it so far inferior to the previous sync?

Now I know they want you to pay for Apple Music to get your music there, but they were already getting you to pay for music through them. I think they just don’t want you to sync your own music libraries anymore, they want you to just stream your music.

And why is it worse. Well first off if you plug in your iOS device and go to it in the finder, and try and sync any local music (going to the Music tab and selecting any songs or playlists the sync button switches from blue and and press-able to grey and not press-able).

Before any changes it has a sync that you could hit, but not if you make any changes.

This makes the whole iOS thing seem broken, but there is still a way to sync, but you have to get through the whole syncing process once, which can take a very long time. And all it shows for status bars, is a little circle in the sidebar and a syncing thing on the bottom, but both are extremely slow.

The sidebar shows the whole process.

And this is just showing the backup stage, but no indication of how much of the synching this is.

Of Course in some steps you get this wheel, which is pretty much as unhelpful as you can get.

And this process can easily take 30+ minutes.

One it has done a full backup and finished. You can then go into music and select what music you sync and hit sync (it will not be grayed out this time) and only then will your local music sync. And it has to do a whole other sync to get your music over.
Honestly What the Absolute Fuck??!?!?
And even worse sometimes it doesn’t work after 1 sync and you have to do another sync before you are able to move your music over. Really?!?!??!? FUCK YOU APPLE!!!
iTunes never did this.

And with iTunes I could use Wifi Sync. Now I am sure you are saying that you can use Wifi sync with Music, and yes you can, but you can’t stop it.

With iTunes if you had to stop any iOS sync you could force quit iTunes. Sure not an ideal solution, but it worked, and say you could restart or shutdown your computer.

With Music if you have WIFI sync on, you can’t restart or even quit the finder to get it to stop. The only way to get it to stop is to hard reset the computer, which is beyond not ideal.

You can least stop the cable based sync by unplugging the iOS device!

And don’t even get me started with Apple Music. If you sync your library with Apple Music you can get into tons of trouble. There are more forum posts about what this can do to your library than you can read in a lifetime. It has been known to overwrite all your music, replace it with lower quality music, or even different music. And without syncing Apple Music, you can never save any of their music, other than marking it as liked.

Honestly you should be able to keep your streaming music separate from your local library and not be forced to commingle them. And if they do commingle there should be no way that Apple can mess up your local library (which is why they should be kept permanently separate). 

The best solution would be able to have local music and streaming music apps that are separate. So nothing can screw each other up. I want to keep my music that I have ripped higher quality and not have anyone touch it or screw it up!

And Apple could now care less about people who have their own music all they care about is people who buy or rent music (yes paying for streaming music is renting music).

My favorite keyboard launcher, LaunchBar will speed up everything outside of your editing and graphics software

 

So I have written about LaunchBar in the past, but now I am writing about it as something to speed up your workflow when using editing or graphics software. I have been using the amazing LaunchBar from Objective Development for years, and whenever I am in an office using a computer there I feel stunted by not having it.

Now LaunchBar is a tool that does so many things, but my favorite is to the ability to launch application using keyboard shortcuts, and it will learn your shorcuts quickly to speed things up. You hit a quick keyboard shortcut, which brings up LaunchBar and then you type your keys and if the application shows up hit return or push to the down arrow and select what you want to launch. After selecting the thing a few time LaunchBar learns and moves your choice to the top of list.

So to launch I hit Command-Space and the last app I launch shows up, if I want to launch it, just hit enter and it launches.

Or more powerfully you type the initials of an app, and LaunchBar will give you a list, and you select what app you want.

If I want Word, I try Wo or MW.

Then select the App and return and it will learn your initials and move the app up the list and eventually to the top.

This way I can launch any application without ever touching the mouse, and this is HUGE! IT WILL SPEED UP EVERYTHING YOU DO ON THE COMPUTER OUTSIDE OF YOU EDITING OR GRAPHICS APPLICATION!
And Launchbar does so much more. You can do calculator functions, instant web searches, go to web sites, create e-mails from contacts, merge files, check your ClipBoard History, and it is all customizable.
LaunchBar is the so worth $29 or $49 for a family license. It speeds up everything I do on the computer and it can speed things up for you as well.

So Apple killed the iMac Pro, now it is all about seeing what video options M1 Macs have

 

So I got an iMac Pro because my old Mac Pro 4,1 died, and there was no new MacPro out as of yet. It was obviously a stop gap machine, and it’s only ugprade was removing the lowest multi-core version and an upgrade to the Radeon Pro Vega 64x 16 GB from the Vega 64 16GB, which is just a slight speed increase.

And the latest 27 inch iMac can in fact beat the performance for the iMac Pro. The top of the line can be upgraded to a 3.6GHz 10 Core Intel-Core i9 with turbo boost to 5.0GHZ, it can have up to 128GB of RAM, up to an 8TB internal SSD, an the top video card is a Radeo Pro 5700 XT  with 16GB of GDDR6 Memory. This machine should smash the 10 Core iMac Pro in performance, and the Xeon’s never really added anything to the Mac except multi-core and the ability to have dual processors. And you can even get the Matte finish from the MacPro displays for half the price, which is impressive, but they need a second display like that to match the price and look.

It is likely that the next M1 or it’s follow up chip will be an iMac, but the first M1 machines not only share video memory with the main memory, but also stop at 16GB of total RAM. And sure the performance of them has been impressive, but for heavy pro work Apple had better be doing some form of video card to really push the video end and GPU performance, and we have seen no sign of it, but I would hope that a high end iMac, MacBook Pro, and Mac Pro would have it to push the video performance.

Video editing software needs a separate GPU with it’s own memory, lets hope Apple agrees.