BBC upgrading to FCPX

[Simon Wood]

As noted in a FCPX internet board:

"We first got an inkling of the Beeb's move to FCPX a few months ago, but today we have official BBC confirmation courtesy of FCP.co friend Richard Atherton:

After a successful trial period BBC news cameramen/editors will be upgrading to Final Cut Pro X from FCP 7 for their news gathering field operations. A full roll-out throughout all the English regions is expected next year. The initial ER training was devised and carried out by Richard Atherton (Home page) one of the first Apple Certified Trainers way back in 2003.

Further trials are ensuing within other divisions of the BBC and, aside from it's widespread use on The Culture Show, FCP X is about to be deployed for several other productions within the BBC including several popular daytime shows. Richard Atherton says: "I've had a tremendous response from the BBC editors I've trained, all of whom have expressed surprise at how fast and versatile editing with the system is. Converts within the BBC are growing rapidly”.

News editing back at base will also use FCPX as Quantel now supports ProRes encoding. (Another piece in the jigsaw!) No exact figure on the number of licences for News, but we understand it to be in four figures. Growing rapidly is a very modest way of saying that the FCPX uptake in the BBC is large, we expect it to be adopted by most departments with the possible exception of the editing that happens in the recently equipped Media City facilities.

The breadcrumbs were there, it just needed somebody to follow them. We got very curious a month ago when we we saw an interview on BBC News that was filmed in an edit suite that had FCPX running on a monitor in the background!

So some amazing news which will no doubt be a talking point at the upcoming IBC show. We have heard rumours of other broadcasting and media companies adopting FCPX too, but we have nothing concrete that we can publish at the moment."

[Andy Wilkinson]

Thanks for posting. Very interesting news. As a former FCS2 user (and more recently Adobe CS5.5 & 6) I'm about to try FCPX on my new Mac Pro and see how I get on with it. It'll run alongside Adobe CC for a while but I might well drop that if I get on with FCPX as I'm not wedded to Adobe's rental model and CS6 will do me fine on my other Mac Pro and rMBP for a good while yet.

This is certainly a sign that FCPX has come of age and is being taken very seriously again (at last!) as a professional NLE.

[John Nantz]

Andy - thanks for posting this. That would be interesting news indeed if the BBC winds up using FCPX for their news coverage. Once one gets the hang of editing it, it can go really fast.

A while back there was a web page about a major Canadian TV news company that went to FCPX. This article (disclaimer, from Apple, c 2014) Apple - Final*Cut*Pro*X - In Action - The E. W. Scripps Company isn't the one I read but is similar.

The BBC broadcasts many other programs besides news, and some of them produced by other companies. I'm wonder if any of the other programs (non news) might also be edited using FCPX, either now or maybe in the future.

Andy - [edit]: For what it's worth, I found it really, really helpful to have a reference book. It cost but saved a lot of time.

[Brian Drysdale]

I suspect the BBC is going for it's usual mix of kit, rather than just one brand. With FCPX for the news and magazine shows, they've currently also got a lot of Premiere Pro seats and AVIDs for their long form productions. The BBC's other national regions may go for a different mix.

Given the number of options, the BBC should able to make future NLE selections depending on the strengths and weaknesses of each NLE and their intended use.

[Brian David Melnyk]

I am only now making this transition, and I really like the program so far.
Now, if the XML workflow to/from fcp 7/6 to fcpx could be more robust...
I tried it through Resolve lite, and losing subtitle settings and the three way color corrector hurts...
Maybe I am doing it wrong?

[David Dixon]

I think the best option for this is 7toX for Final Cut Pro - on the App Store - $10.

Pretty sure it does the most comprehensive XML of any tool available.

[William Hohauser]

Titles still don't transfer very well. Usually only the text transfers and you have to reformat the page for font and positioning.