FilmEditingPro has a good article on how and where to install Keyboard shortcuts on all the major editing platforms. Most useful for those of us who are constantly on different machines.
Scott Simmons at the ProVideoCoalition is reporting that Adobe has End Of Lifed as of September 8th, 2021. The article also talks about that Bridge remains, and there is Lesspain Software’s Kyno, or maybe Hedge which was bought by Divergent Media and could be merged with EditReady.
Now I hate to see the creative suite having less apps, and I hated when they removed SpeedGrade (and am still hoping for a return as Lumetro Pro), but while I have opened Prelude I can honestly say I have never used it.
Honestly I think Prelude should have been upgraded and made free instead of killed. Adobe Premiere could use a full metadata system and they could learn a lesson from Final Cut Pro X and it’s metadata super powers. And if they made Prelude free and easy to use anyplace including on iPad and iPhone to be able to metadata footage quickly and easily and pass it to Premiere it would be beyond useful.
I am happy that Adobe seems to be really big on new features in Premiere right now, but axing apps from their suite doesn’t seem like a good start.
Oliver Peters at his digitalfilms blog has written 2 article son Audio Plug-ins for Editors. Parts 1 & 2 focus on categories, such as equalizers and compressors, part 3 is on the audio plug-ins from FabFilter Software Instruments and 4 is on Free Plug-ins.
You should go to his blog and check out parts 1, 2 , 3 and 4.
Sound is my worst part of editing. So often of late I am working for companies that expect me to mix, when an audio guy can add so much to a mix. Maybe this can help a little with audio if you want to dive into it.
Toolfarm, the plug-in seller has posted it’s top 5 plug-ins for under $99 for various software. For Premiere Pro, Davinci Resolve, AVID, Final Cut Pro X, Audio and various 3D packages.
Always good to see lists of inexpensive plug ins.
I learned about this excellent video from an article by Jakub Han at CineD, which goes into the differences between the 2 formats.
It is well worth checking out the differences. And it seems that ProRes RAW does seem better, but it doesn’t work in DaVinci Resolve, and BRAW works better in DaVinci Resolve. So it depends on how you are finishing, and I would assume ProRES RAW works better in Final Cut Pro X.
Lisa McNamara has written an article with the help of Zack Arnold ACE on the Best practices for Adopting a Remote Post-Production Workflow at Frame.io, and it is well worth a read. It goes into the challenges and security concerns, managing media, communication, collaboration, and even morale, well being and sanity. It is of course also selling Frame.io, but it is an article by them, and the article is great and very in depth including other companies solutions.
Every post supervisor or producer overseeing a team working from home should read this article.
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.
So I have been a user of the other Digital Rebellion tools, Post Haste, Preference Manager, and Pro Maintenance Tools, but I have never actually used it’s Pro Media Tools available for $99. It does have some tools that I would use on occasion if I had them.
Particularly it’s Batch File renamer with full support for Frame Numbers, it’s ability to manage markers, the ability to manage clup metadata, and especially it’s Timeline Tricks, where you can collapse tracks, remove disabled clips, strip filters and markers (this could be useful in emergencies and the collapse track would be quite useful at times. And it’s ability to scan for broadcast safe on files.
Again a batch of useful tools that if you need them it is good to know about them in the case that you do need them.
So I have talked about Digital Rebellion before and Post Haste and Preference Manager, but they have 2 packages of programs to repair and I have been a user of Pro Maintenance Tools since Final Cut Pro 7.0.
This suite of tools has a tool to Analyze Crashes, Repair Corrupt Files in a project (or at least help you see which ones are corrupt), Look up error messages, Manage Plugins, Schedule clearing of caches and preferences and a plug in installer.
It has a huge amount of tools (though of course Post Haste and Preference Manager are free), and most you don’t need until you do. This has saved me on a few projects where some media got corrupted, so it is a great tool to have around just in case, or to get in an emergency.
Corrupt Clip Finder also has often shown me bad JPEG’s, though I have had the problems a lot less since I stopped using JPEG’s due to corruption issues.
If you are having issues the $129 is quite worth the price of admission.
Now this has been one of the great things about Final Cut Pro X, if you bought it once you own it for good, and that is how DaVinci Resolve works, but Premiere Pro from Adobe is a subscription service.
The question does Apple just subsidize Final Cut Pro X with computer sales, or do they want it to make some money and make it subscription. I understand wanting it to pay for some of it’s development costs, but if they are going to do that I expect updates, and fixes.
Honestly I think a better idea is to have upgrade fees to new versions, not full price, but pay for the upgrade how things used to be. I can justify the subscription to Adobe as I make my living using it, as very few companies edit in Final Cut Pro X. I think they should update the App store to allow upgrades instead of just subscriptions, or full priced new versions.
And with a subscription Apple has better take a long hard look, and start looking into the many issues the program has as I have posted about before. If they go subscription I want them to seriously be developing, and it would be nice to have forums that the developers actually read and work on issues that professionals are having.
It is funny to see so much outrage, and how everyone will now move to DaVinci. Well as a professional, since both AVID and Premiere are subscription, I am totally used to it. I will get a month to month as needed and it won’t bother me, but I won’t keep the subscription around because I see it having too many problems that I just don’t think they will every fix or even care about. If I need it I would get it basically.