Apple Is Listening

Posted on June 29, 2011 by Larry

I’ve been inundated with comments on my two most recent blogs on the release of Final Cut Pro X:

Late last night, Apple published an FAQ answering some of the questions that have been raised during this discussion. Notice that for the first time, they are using words like “not yet” and “coming this summer.”

I recommend you read this.

http://www.apple.com/finalcutpro/faq/

Also, yesterday I heard a reasonably substantial rumor that Apple has decided to re-release Final Cut Studio (3) back into the market. I checked with my sources at Apple and was told this was NOT true.

I still think this is a serious mistake and urge Apple to reconsider – it does not hurt the launch of FCP X to also sell Final Cut Studio (3).

By the way, I want to reiterate something I said last night at the LAFCPUG meeting – it is way too early to make any final decisions on Final Cut Pro. FCP X is in its infancy. Apple IS listening to the discussion. To my way of thinking, Apple totally blew the launch of FCP X and needs to move quickly to fix things. Before you make any final decisions for yourself or your company, wait a bit. My suggestion is a month.

At the end of that time, passions will have cooled, Apple will have time to respond, and we will all have time to think. It is always better to make decisions with a cool head after thinking about it for a while.

The situation many editors find themselves in is difficult, but not hopeless. Give this a little time to play out.

I’ll have more later this week – still trying to wade through all the email — thanks to everyone for writing.

I am always interested in your comments.

Larry

P.S. By the way, I read every email and every comment, but I am just buried in trying to answer them all. I’m sorry if I haven’t gotten to yours yet.

36 Responses to Apple Is Listening

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Michael Liebergot says:

June 29, 2011 at 1:06 pm

I too am happy that Multicam will be implemented. But, am very bummed that it won’t be until the next major release, whenever that is.

Also, I certainly hope that the next major release doesn’t mean that those of us that purchased FCPX 1.0 won’t have to have to purchase or even pay for an upgrade for FCPX again.

As multicam and other features should have been addressed in the original launch.

And I am also pleading that APPLE include the placement of markers on the storyline. As it’s really needed desperately by those of us that do music video edits and the like. As we like to place the markers on the storyline (timeline) in order to edit to the beat. Or even plan out shots in advance to live edits, where clips might have to be inserted.

This and the ability to export portions of a timeline (via in/out) would be much more beneficial to us rather than creating multiple Events for each export.
Larry says:

June 29, 2011 at 1:25 pm

Ceasar:

Yes, you can delink audio and video and delete either the audio or the video of a clip.

Larry
Larry says:

June 29, 2011 at 1:26 pm

Michael:

My GUESS is that the next major release will be much sooner than later. Apple can’t wait too long to respond to all the complaints they are getting.

My GUESS is within a couple of months….

Also, I agree on the need for support for chapter markers and better marker placement.

Larry
Ron Priest says:

June 29, 2011 at 1:35 pm

Okay, I have found a reference to the FAQ. It is on the right side of this page:

http://support.apple.com/kb/index?page=search&src=support_site.psp.more&locale=en_US&q=Final%20Cut%20Pro%20X

My bad. I can’t imagine what’s gotten over me lately, to think that I can’t trust Apple anymore. What’s gotten over me, that’s simply ridiculous. Right?
Alex says:

June 29, 2011 at 1:40 pm

Larry,

First of all, I am REALL, REALLY impressed that you’re taking time to read everything and try to respond to everyone, and then apologize for not answering everybody as fast as one would like.. I am not one of your customer, and like most everybody else my reaction has been mostly negative toward Apple, and I haven’t exactly agreed with you on everything (especially your first FCPX article). But your dedication to give us a voice, to provide us with the latest news on the situation and to answer everybody’s concerns is commendable. For that alone your reputation and the respect you’re getting from the people who use your tutorial is well deserved. And maybe Apple could learn a thing or two from you when it comes to public relation. And you don’t need to answer that email when you’ll read. Just take a break instead, you deserve it.

Thanks Larry.
george manzanilla says:

June 29, 2011 at 1:40 pm

Larry, thanks for your updates. I wish they could just go line by line and add in the lost functionality of FCP7. Maybe that’s not a possibility, but we can dream… I do miss video and audio TRACKS. I would love to have the freedom to turn the timeline into a “classic” timeline. I know that would appease 95% of the people here if they could just a timeline in the way that has worked for many years.

Also one glaring omission is the ability to manually choose how to re-connect clips. Is this possible? many times, working with graphics, we need to choose what clips to reconnect to, even if they don’t have the same name. It’s a huge timesaver.

I hope FCPX can get its act together and give us what we need. I am a loyal apple supporter since the APPLE IIe. However , as a video editor, making my living this way, i need to have confidence and trust in my main “supplier” and that trust has been broken for myself and a lot of other people. Let’s hope they do what it takes to gain it back or we’ll really just have to start the transition.
Alex says:

June 29, 2011 at 1:40 pm

About Apple FAQ, I still think Apple should issue an apology for the way they’ve handle things. I know they will never do it, but they should. Personally, they’ve lost my trust. And even now that I have cooled down, the all thing still leaves a bad after taste. Especially when I power my station. I can’t say that my next one will be an Apple for sure (and I hate Windows.)

And their FAQ is really disappointing. If you add, Compressor, and Automatic Duck you’re still paying $850 for FCPX to do some of the work FCP7 used to do. Does that mean that Motion4, DVDsp3, Soundtrack and Color were worth $350 altogether? And there is still missing features. At the end of the day, even if they put XML and multicliping back in (the only 2 features Apple say they’re gonna add), you will still have to spend a lot more money to get it to were FCP7 is today. Like, yeah, if you like the 3 color wheels paradigm, Magic bullet has a plugin for that, but it’s $800, and resolve is $1000. At the end of the day, even if there is enough plugins to make FCPX as good as FCP7 or FCPStudio, it might not just be competitive enough with Avid, and certainly not with Premiere.
Alex says:

June 29, 2011 at 1:53 pm

I guess I lied earlier. I do have a question that needs an answer: How does FCPX deals with timecode? In the broadcast world, we can painfully do without everything, but we cannot do without timecode. Can you specify your sequence… Sorry, project (that re-naming thing will never make sense to me) to be drop-frame or non-drop?

This feature in FCP7 is crucial to time our shows properly and meet the network specs. Even if Compressor can create a drop-QT to use with the Aja VTR tool for output (yeah, for those who don’t know, it the reality tv world, the networks won’t pay you if you don’t deliver your show on tape), we need to know that the show is to time in drop-frame BEFORE we send it to Compressor. Do you know anything about it?

Thank you.
Alex says:

June 29, 2011 at 1:59 pm

@ Michael,

What? There is NO chapter marker? And you can’t just export a section of your seq… Project? Man, this just never ends…

Also, Larry, according to the FAQ, you will be able to organize your audio for export to OMF via tags in the metadata. So are we going to have to enters to tags manually? Some of the show I work on have up to 1500 SFX, are we gonna have to tag them manually? Organizing them by tracks sounds a lot easier.
Larry says:

June 29, 2011 at 2:03 pm

Yes. You can specify drop or non drop Timecode.

Larry