Personal assessment of Final Cut Pro X

Last week I attended a free FCPX workshop given at the Efti school (what memories from when I studied photography there more than 10 years ago, glupsss). The workshop lasted four hours during which the teacher Paloma Guillem gave us a quick flight through the program explaining some of the differences with the missing one (at least at the FCP7 sales level)

I intend to express here some of my feelings with the program in the form of brief comments without pretending to be Taliban or extremist (although of course you can not avoid comparing the new Final with the previous one or with other programs). Sorry if I make any wrong comment due to lack of knowledge of the program, as I said I have only attended a short course and I have personally tested it, so if I say something wrong I ask you to correct me.

First of all, I would like to thank Paloma for her great class, given with clarity and knowledge. The only thing I would add as a “but” is that attitude (which is probably part of the training given by Apple) of selling along with the training. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind them telling me the price of the program and telling me about its virtues, but I don’t like that they treat me (and the rest of the professionals that may be there) like fools saying that “now Apple Color is integrated in FCPX”. Anyone who has ever used Color knows what can and can’t be done (I’m not only talking about correction, I’m talking about luts, dpx, edl, color fx, etc) and of course FCPX doesn’t have that by far (correct me if I’m wrong).

I insist that I know that it is the result of Apple’s traning, I am also a certified trainer although it is by another company and I know what is the style of class that is commanded to teach. But I think we must also be honest and realize that training and sales are two words that should be separated, in the long run the students (professionals too) will see that way of being and surely they will appreciate it and value it positively.

As for the program I have to say that unfortunately I didn’t find many pleasant surprises. It is true that the metadata management is better than in FCP7 but it is also true that Avid also has that kind of tools and that any editor or tidy assistant does not need them desperately (although of course I recognize their practicality).

There is no trim in play (JKL), in general the whole trim tool is based on click and drag instead of frame by frame work (like in FCP7 but on a larger scale), it doesn’t allow manual sync of clips (we’ll have to see how it syncs general shots without clapperboard automatically) and working with a single monitor is a pain when you are comparing several shots with others already in the timeline (I know you can use auditions to have several versions of the shot inside the container in the timeline, but if you have a structure done you don’t want to change the duration of the sequence and auditions do it).

But what surprises me the most from the little I know and that takes me away the program completely from the professional sphere is the fact that when working on a top track the shots of both tracks (up and down) are connected and must be moved together. That and the fact that it doesn’t have a bach to make possible not only a total recapture (or rather re-import) but also part of the sequence. To be able to conform the average of only the sequence for color correction, for example. As well as not exporting/importing edl, omf, etc. These were questions I specifically asked with a negative answer.

In short, FCPX still lacks many things for professionals to be able to do their daily work accurately and comfortably with it (you don’t want to have a headache EVERY day) It is true that it is a first version and that things will be added, but why are we now going to celebrate that they add completely basic things that ALREADY WERE in the previous Final and in other programs for years. Do you want me to jump for joy because a program has multicam?

In my opinion Apple can pretend two things with FCPX (or rather three): the first option is that they are idiots and pretend to revolutionize the professional world with a software in diapers (in which case they have obviously hit a good milk), the second is that they have abandoned the professional sector and target ALL THE MASS of people who daily edit thousands and thousands of videos for Youtube and the like (I have nothing against it, I think it’s great that everything is done but obviously these people are not going to demand conforming tools or edls) In addition now these people will be editing with the famous Final Cut PRO (I think the marketing strategy goes that way).

And the third option (to give Apple a chance with the professionals) is that they are creating a finishing machine (like Smoke or Avid DS) in which you can do a little bit of everything but without being an editor for long jobs. If this is the case in a year FCPX should improve A LOT (and not only adding multi-camera) but also color, effects, sound, graphics, etc. If this is the policy, why is it called Final Cut Pro instead of iFinish (the name is cool, eh, I think I have to go patent it…) and why haven’t they kept FCP7 in the meantime? I don’t know…

Of course, opinions on these poor lines are welcome 🙂