Future Features of FCP X

[Mathieu Ghekiere]

Larry Jordan - Future Features in Final Cut Pro X | Larry's Blog

Finally R3D Support!

Hoping that these come soon, and are handled well. Glad to see Apple correcting a lot of their mistakes.

[Craig Seeman]

Big thing is they're now talking about their roadmap. Not doing that was one of their biggest marketing mistakes.

[William Hohauser]

I am getting the impression that they didn't have a road map a year ago, just a new idea for editing that wasn't quite field tested.

[Thomas Smet]

That or the massive new features of CS6 freaked them out.

[Nick Gordon]

Originally Posted by William Hohauser

I am getting the impression that they didn't have a road map a year ago, just a new idea for editing that wasn't quite field tested.

I think something different - that Apple is changing its approach to this. Historically, Aple has never provided roadmaps for any product, nor released details of forthcoming products prior to release. Earlier this year, Apple ran some very targeted sessions about Mountain Lion and ist future release strategy for OSX - something it had never done before. I think this pre-elease info on FCPX is another example.

It seems to me that Apple might be very carefully, a step at a time, evolving this area of marketing. Apple often does things modestly at first - products with basic features taht get prgressivley added to or enhanced - and it wouldn't be ridiculous to think it's adopting an analogous approach to this roadmap thing.

Could very well be that FCPX got picked for this because of the brouhaha over its original launch.

Having said all that, I could very well be utterly wrong - after all, I'm only speculating

[Nigel Barker]

I suspect that Apple is shaking off Steve Job's extreme control-freakery & will be behaving more like a normal company in the future.

[Nick Gordon]

Originally Posted by Nigel Barker

I suspect that Apple is shaking off Steve Job's extreme control-freakery & will be behaving more like a normal company in the future.

So long as "normal" doesn't extend to overall design quality

[Richard Cavell]

This is silly. Apple is adding significant features in .0.5 of a release that should have been in the .0.0 release. Just admit it, FCP X was a disaster. They released an inferior product, probably didn't anticipate the backlash, and now they're scrambling to regain parity with Adobe Premiere.

Richard

[Mathieu Ghekiere]

Completely agree that they are adding things in dot releases that should have been in the first release.
Nobody argues that the launch (and the product that FCP X was at launch) was awful.

But saying that it's silly... I don't know. Multicam was added, but now that's in, it's maybe the best implementation of any NLE. So is that silly?
Yes, they will make dual viewers work. But if they do as great of things with that as with the multi cam, I'm very curious.

And don't forget what a product iOS was at 1.0. And what kind of product FCP 1.0 was...
Just saying.

I was a big of a critic of FCP X 10.0.0 as anybody. Began using it after 10.0.3, and I had to admit that I was plain wrong in saying that the whole thing was a mistake AFTER using it (and LEARNING how to use it).

Ow, and BTW: Apple does have a lot of features to add, but they also added a LOT in not even 12 months, AND they are showing that they care and listen (Guys, Apple is really listening! : Apple FCPX or Not: The Debate , I had a similar experience), AND don't forget that FCP X also has some big features and fundamental changes (how good it works with metadata as a database, the Roles Feature, the magnetic timeline that is sometimes annoying, but sometimes a really new way of editing, ...) that Premiere Pro also doesn't have.
I agree that Adobe is doing a lot of good things, but don't be too quick or too narrow to dismiss FCP X.

We'll see where FCP X lands. When it launched, a couple of companies, and Larry Jordan said: nobody will make big productions on FCP X now. But in 12 to 18 months, a lot of people will.
At this update schedule, maybe they were right.

[Craig Seeman]

I think using certain terminology leads to some wrong conclusions.

This is a completely new application. These features were not ready. The XML is still under development. The plugin architecture is still under development. I also think Apple is still developing/expanding the underlying database (MySQL I think) so that some features won't happen until that progresses.

That FCS was kills and FCPX released when it was may not have been primarily due to FCPX being "ready."
FCPX is dependent on AVFoundation as Quicktime is EOL and is dependent on changes in the OS (more than any other NLE on the market I'd guess) which, itself is undergoing some significant changes.

Apple is also not a software company so much as a company that makes software and offers services designed to sell hardware. This is why FCPX is tightly integrated with AVFoundation and the OS. Some things will happen as those other areas are also developed by Apple.

[William Hohauser]

After using FCPX from version .0 to now for test edits and the past few months for real money business, I have to say that going to FCP7 or Premier Pro now seems like going backwards. Learning to use to database should be the number one priority with learning the program, even more so than the initially confusing magnetic timeline. There are problems but they are mostly surmountable now.

[Geoffrey Cox]

Been following the FCPX debate with great interest since the outset and the upgrades and future plans certainly look good. But I have a decision to make in the not too distant future of what to buy for an educational establishment (55 or more seats) and am still pretty unsure, though with Premier top of the list at present, but compared to the cost of FCPX.... The main issue is that audio will be very important and FCPX still seems lacking in that department. I should say I have as yet never used either, being a FCP classic user almost exclusively.

[Brian Drysdale]

Perhaps not just at the moment if you're running on macs (although some people are using boot camp), but the upcoming release version of Lightworks could be an interesting educational option in a time of decreasing budgets. For a very low annual educational subscription you get the latest version. plus the usual codecs.

The costs are low enough for students to get their own NLE (free with codec limitations) and once the mac version is available Lightworks could be used on either OS. It can be used at many different levels; the drag and drop functions are increasing on the release version, but, even now, the on screen console controls are surprisingly simple and efficient, making full use of the mouse - why drag and drop when you can use the scroll wheel. I've got Vegas and it uses timeline editing, but this method is quicker. You can also use FCP or AVID keyboard inputs.

For the teaching aspect, students will learn the principles of editing, including building up the audio.

[Craig Seeman]

Apple has said audio mixing coming this year for FCPX but no date.
My hunch is that they may be in tandem with Logic Pro X but Apple didn't mention that specifically.
They did say there would be another application coming.

[Mathieu Ghekiere]

The extra application isn't confirmed, it's just a feeling Larry Jordan had from the talk with them.