What about our Audio tracks? FCP is limited?
 

Final Cut is great for video but I've noticed that the audio portion of it really blows? I mean it doesn't even have a Normalize feature. After coming from Vegas Video, it's like having a strip model Toyota. I figured by version 4 they would have better audio stuff by now. But gosh you are so limited.

What do you guys do on the jobs where audio is just as important as the video. Another program?

Am I missing something or is the audio control in FCP very limited? All Audio effects need to be applied clip by clip?

They really edit hollywood films with this thing? Come on now, you have to be pulling my leg. Or maybe I don't know where the surround sound button is.

First note: some (only a few) hollywood movies are indeed
EDITED on FCP. They are not saying they are doing the sound
mixing on FCP (which they almost certainly aren't doing). A
lot of audio mixes is done on ProTools (on the mac mostly).

Searching a bit on the normalize thing I found this piece:

" When I have the need to filter more than a trivial
part of the audio, I use the (included) Bias PEAK audio editor, which
integrates pretty well and is better suited to audio editing than any
NLE. Although its changes aren't reversible "

And this:

" As people have told you time and time again, normalize is NOT missing.
It's simply provided as a part of Peak which comes free with EVERY
legitimate copy of FCP and integrates easily "

So it seems like you need to use the included Peak for that. Not
too user friendly indeed. Weird.

Yes, you need to use the included BIAS products. If you need additional audio work done beyond the BIAS products look at ProTools (as Rob suggests) or Logic Platnum 6, which is owned by Apple. FCP 4 is not meant as an all in one solution. It integrates well with the Apple Family of digital production software such as Shake, Logic, DVD studio Pro, and FCP. Over the past few years Apple has incorporated stand alone products (such as Cinema Tools) into FCP. I would expect the audio features of FCP to see greater integration with Logic in the near future.

Vegas started out as an audio editing program, which is why it's just so much better than every other NLE for doing audio editing.

FCP needs a 3rd party application for mixing. Which is ok, but not as convenient as Vegas where you can do it all in one program.

Peak isn't great for mixing. It only lets you deal with one file at a time. What it IS good for is recording, breaking down audio clips, running a filter or two. Bias Peak has at least 5 levels of Undo or more, so changes can indeed be reversed.

I do Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround EX mixes inside of Final Cut Pro literally all the time. It's just a matter of exporting 6 individual mono tracks to encode to AC-3. The results truly do kick ass. If you have eMagic (no, it doesn't only work with eMacs) then you can mix the audio in 5.1 in real time in your screening room (everyone has a screening room). There is no "surround button". That's just silly.

I am not disappointed at all in FCP's audio capabilities.

By the way, it sounds like you are trolling. You came in here saying how "our" product is weak.

Ted,

I'm not trolling at all. I'm a recent switcher and am still new to the Mac world. Although I grew up on Macs and left when Windows 95 came out. I love my new G5, it rocks.

Anyway. I have an extensive audio background and sound production is a big deal to me (control is everything). On the PC they have a program called WaveLab which is hands down the best audio tool software available. But unfortunately Steinberg does not have a MAC version of this program.

So being a little bummed out leaving Wave Lab, I have yet to find an Audio editor for the Mac that comes close to the professionalism and control that wave lab had. I do have Peak and to be honest I am not that impressed with it, and I feel "forced" to use it because it is more stable then "Spark XL". Spark almost hits the mark but it has many bugs and the timeline has many restrictions that can be very frustrating.

Never did audio for video with an external editor before so I'm still new to it. There are many times where you need to match audio to video and it's very difficult if you are in a 3rd party editor and you can not see the video. This is part of my frustration because adjusting levels in FCP is not very user friendly.

Anyway, I'm getting it worked out over here. I do appreciate the feedback. Logic 6 looks really tasty. Thanks!

Logic Audio will allow you to sync the sound to the picture, and you get to use an external mixing board as well. Not cheap.

I do all my audio post in Logic Platinum V6.3 and have a Logic control surface (my background is on the audio side) and believe that FCX/FCP audio side is severely lacking and not conducive to proper audio editing (rendering audio edits before being able to hear the effect!!)

I also find that the audio monitoring in FCX/FCP is undependable as I often find that it fails to see my USB audio I/o and end up hearing the speaker on my G5 instead of my Genlecs!

Also, importing and rendering .mp3 files in FCX/FCP generates audio glitches on my G5.

FCX/FCP is fine for time line assembly of FINISHED audio mixes but I would not edit/eq/compress etc in FCX/FCP

Also 5.1 in Logic is good and I can bypass FCX/FCP and go straight to A Pack.

Regards P

Nuendo 2, WaveLab 4.0 and who could not forget Cubase with all those VST plug-ins that are available to choose from Steinberg is one of the best apps for the Mac and for FCP.

BIAS, BitHeadz, and yes one of my all time favorites Native Instruments

ReBirth 2.0.1, Logic Platinum, or Nuendo 2 are something to look at.

I agree with Patrick that having to render an audio edit before hearing the results is not top-shelf. Fortunately most of what I do is timeline editing and not heavy-duty mixing....although it is tempting to bite the bullet and get Logic.

Given Apples purchase of emagic. I'd expect thet FCP will soon incorporate many of Logic's features. (real time audio rendering)

Regards P

That'll be nice, Patrick. Of course it will involve buying (another) new version of FCP! Arrrgh!
Oh well, that's Apple.