Correct, my understanding is the 299USD tag is the price at which it is sold to educational establishments, and the price at which they are then allowed to resell. As far as I recall, this was never in question and was much discussed at the time. The 899USD tag is the academic price direct from Apple. Again, pretty sure all this was much discussed at the time.


Let sleeping thread lie.

What they told me in the Bookstore at UCSD is that Apple provides them with a wide latitude on pricing, it seems to be up to them; plus the other factor is the nature of their affiliation with Apple. You do have to show your University ID to snag a copy, similarly for Adobe and other academically priced software.

I've finally upgraded my G5 PowerMac to an Intel and am back to considering FCS3. I hadn't upgraded yet because I wanted to keep my MBP and my other editor (the G5) on the same version.

I've not heard too much about FCS3 since the release, what's the general thought? Worth the upgrade or not worth messing with?

I am very happy with FCS3. Lots of small things that makes life easier on a day to day bases. This depends on your workflow I suppose, but for me (I work as a cameraman and DP) it´s really is a step up.
When I edit I often have to send or upload versions on the way as a director I work with is in a different country than I am (not when we are shooting of course) and the "Share" templates are great. YouYube, MobileMe, Web reference movie, Apple TV or Blu-Ray?
Just one click away AND it you can still continue working in FC while it´s transcoding. (works best on a MacPro, not laptop though)

I´m looking foreward to when he upgrades to Snow Leopard as we he can then see my screen over iChat Theatre and look at changes directly.

The new speed tool is great for when I edit extreme sport stuff.

It seems very stable and I´ve been running it since it came out more or less (not every day though)

I kind of forgot that I have upgraded to FCS3 and I suppose that´s a good thing.

It´s not earth shattering upgrade, and a few bugs are not worked out, like if you expert directly to Compressor, you can´t use your Qmaster Cluster. You still have to export a Quicktime file and bring it in to Compressor for that to work. Really annoying.

This is on the top of my head and I just got up, sure it´s a lot I forgot

I would recommend upgrading

Personally I'm not bothering with FCS3 as I'm of the firm belief that a real update will appear this year.

I think that is unlikely, but no one knows when it comes to Apple.
I hope you are right though.
I got FCS by first buying an old copy of FC3 for $50 as they started to have the same upgrade price no matter what version of FC or FCS you upgrade from.
So for $350 I got the full FCS3, well worth it

So far, no problems with FCS 3 and I use FCP 7 every day on a MBP running Snow Leopard. Faster rendering in many cases, along with faster encodes.

Heath

Can't live without the FCS3 moving markers. SoundTrack Pro is a useful tool rather than a termite nest. Loving 4:4:4:4 for Motion Graphics. A clean install after two years of playing with filters did the system a world of good.

Hmmm. Well, it's not exactly earth shattering, is it?

Worth it if you do FCP for a living. It also can depend on your operating environment. Lots of my associates upgraded too, so sharing files between us kinda dictates the version level, and we all went for FCS7.

I've got one system on Leopard, one on Snow Leopard. The SL machine feels 'tighter' if not out and out faster. My main machine remains on Leopard for full No-Tears(tm) EX compatibility, but once the new drivers prove themselves, will up to SL simply because, once again, a clean install makes everything run sweeter for a long while, and a new interface just adds a little air freshener into the mix.

Today, Apple added 64 bit to Logic Pro via an update. A sign that they release 64bit to a pro-app via a software update!

Maybe the same awaits us, Final Cut Studio 3 users...

Just got my Final Cut 3 Studio today. it's going to be great and waiting for a Blue-Ray Burner.

Thanks for the info.

I am 6 months into my first move to a mac platform and using FCS3 and Logic - I love it.

It just feels so solid compared to the XP/Vegas/Cubase platform I used for years, and once you learn how to send stuff to Color and Soundtrack pro and return it back to FCP, its a wonder.

No bugs detected, not one crash, on my Macbook Pro as yet. Fingers=crossed.

My thoughts exactly.

Actually you're right; I definitely remember G4 machines that could encode DV25 (miniDV) content into long-GOP MPEG2 for DVD authoring in just a tick over real time. I also remember we always fussed about the possibilities of having a better hardware setup to somehow get better than real-time results, which always pointed to a Windows machine running a hardware-based encoder, which back then would have cost about the same as a new Honda Civic!

I remember in 2008 I asked some key players in Burbank known for their DVD/HD-DVD/Blu-Ray authoring expertise why the G5 and now Mac Pro towers couldn't get real-time encodes no matter how much HDD space or RAM you threw at them. One of the techs to me to a back-room and showed me a Linux based system that probably had the answer:

The system was "bare-bones" from a UI perspective; no glossy menus, no pretty desktop backgrounds and absolutely no "pretty" human interface stuff. It was as basic as a GUI could possibly be, and this thing was crunching out MPEG2 streams at almost half real-time.

Code-monkeys and system tweakers have been saying ever since the Power-PC days and OS 7 through 8 that *all* operating systems both Mac and PC based were becoming bloated with frilly features that have absolutely nothing to do with helping the computer do it's work and everything to do with creating a "feel good" experience for the human using it.

My suspicion (and I wish I had an older G4 to test out the theory - heck, I wish I still had my Amiga-based Video Toaster from NewTek!) is that as our wonderful, gorgeous and over-the-top pretty OS packages have become so full of themselves with nonsensical things like bouncing icons, icon previews, screen-savers and all other manner of human-interface toys that in fact all we've done is add bloat to the core processing engines and forced things to slow down globally and systemwide, not just pro apps.

I truly wish there was a Linux-like Mac OS that was so streamlined that it literally contained *only* the code required to do it's work, run your apps and help you navigate to find files. Anything else is a waste of CPU clock-cycles. Just how fast would ANY type of encoding be - especially HD codecs - if we had access to such a streamlined OS? My guess is it would be scary-fast. But we'll never know; Apple-land is all about uber-glossy and pretty, not utilitarian.

Of course people would say, "But there IS a Linux...". Yes, there is, but it can't run Final Cut, Photoshop or any of the other industry-standard tools we all need to do our work.

My Apple IIe still boots to prompt in about 30s... but the interface would never support anything usable by the general public... its audience was geeks and gadget folks who could handle CLI commands and coding their own OS if they wanted anything remotely menu driven (Peeks, pokes and Beagle Bros!).

As a support guy for many years, I can tell you that there are many creative professionals who can't figure out the easy to use OS/GUI much less a CLI driven one... even though it's got plenty of speed due to a complete lack of really anything in the way of built in stuff.

This is however, completely OT and irrelevant, so I'll stop now ;)

I doubt that the interface really has that much to do with speed of encoding speed. look at how fast programs like Handbrake can encode.

I just did a test encode. I took a 1min long DV file and encoded it with Compressor with Qmaster properly set up. It did a single pass encode in five seconds! That is just on my 1st gen Intel Mac Pro. That's rather a lot faster than realtime!

Using the same compression settings an MPEG2 DVD encode from 1080 EX footage took about the same as the length of the clip itself (realtime).

An HD MPEG2 encode was about two secs faster than realtime.

I like having a nice looking interface. I have to look at it all day when editing. I used to feel like I was working on something from the early 80's whenever I worked with XP set to the classic interface.

I still have not updated. Don't know, just doesn't seem much of an upgrade. Is Apple actually officially calling it Final Cut Studio 3? I have not seen this mentioned in any official documentation.

Interesting to know, if it's true:

Apple Reportedly Lays Off 40 Final Cut Employees - Mac Rumors


Could be good news (fresh people), could be bad news...
Didn't want to make a new thread because it's still not confirmed or official.

http://petewarden.typepad.com/search...in-austin.html

Layoffs: Was this not a phone support team layout/cutback? Just because we never saw that Shake/Phenomenon remake doesn't mean that Final Cut Pro is gone or dwindling. Red's entire workflow revolves around ease of use with FCP.

I can see Express getting scrapped. Why have 3 video editing apps?

Ow, I'm also pretty sure Final Cut Pro isn't going away, with 50 procent or more of the market share...

But you can't ignore some facts. Steve Jobs saying at the iPad presentation that Apple is a mobile company...
Apple killing Shake.
One of the key people that worked on the Shake replacement, and went over to Nuke.
A Final Cut Studio 3 update that wasn't really great (but had a pretty cheap upgrade-price either, so)

This could be just a sign that their focus is less and less on Pro apps. It could also just be that they layed off people who weren't necessary or that they are trying to streamline things...

On the other hand. They just released a 64-bit Logic Pro. A new Aperture, but one that I've heard has many bugs in it.
But admit... Final Cut Studio 3 has been out since August now, and the (pretty big) Share-bug still is in it...

I think the layoffs were more than that. Bob Sliga, who used to be part of the Color dev team, said three of the layoffs were staffers from the Color team (1 engineer and 2 QA guys). I think saying that Red's entire workflow revolves around FCP is giving FCP way too much credit and Avid, Adobe, Scratch, etc., not nearly enough.


-Andrew

I believe that Apple first created FCP b/c Avid refused to support a new version of Mac OS. So Apple bought from Macromedia what has become FCP.

Apple wanted to insure that the Mac platform would be entrenched in the multimedia world. We all know that any computer nowadays can run office apps perfectly acceptably. It's multimedia that still needs cutting edge, i.e. expensive machines.

FCP clearly met that goal. But so are other software as well. Premiere and Avid both run on the Mac. There is no reason for FCP to feel like it has to carry the torch for the Mac platform. Other companies are developing Mac software that will require top of the line Macs.

FCP isn't going anywhere, but I could see Apple deciding the program has accomplished what it set out to do and slowing its pace of development.

Just my humble .02.

Peter,

That's what I've been wondering since Apple discontinued development for Shake a few years ago. How far down the post production rabbit hole is Apple willing to go? 'Cause the deeper you go the smaller, less revenue generating but more demanding of a user base you encounter. I would be surprised if Apple flat out killed FCP, but I wouldn't be surprised if they 'leveled off' development compared to the early years when you really felt that Apple was gunning for Adobe and Avid.


-Andrew

I think I'll cry if I'm only left with a choice of Adobe or Avid! FCP is like the Vegas of the mac world from a price/performance/features angle.

I hate the Avid interface, and there is no way that Adobe is getting my money. So if FCP development stops it's back to Vegas for me.

I doubt FCP is going anywhere, but I do think they are slowing down development. I'd like to see the Share slowness to get fixed, and background rendering to come into play. And better Smooth Cam functionality--it's great now, but could be better.

Heath

While FCP is my preferred NLE it's just a tool. I've actually been planning on buying the Creative Suite as well as picking up Media Composer to use for things that don't suit FCP all that well. The only Pro App loss that would really bum me out would be Color going down the tubes because there really isn't anything comparable for the price.


-Andrew

It's all speculation right now. One place says it was part of the Motion team, here we see it might have been a few from the Color team, somewhere else it was FCS help desk staff. Who knows what is going on. It could just as well have been that Apple decided to let go of people who weren't pulling their weight anymore as much as Apple focusing on iPad applications. If you look at their job offers these days, many seem to be directed at the iPad/iPhone mobile applications. Or maybe Steve Jobs has gone a little balmy again.

Does anyone know how many people are employed solely on the FCS applications?

I do know for a fact that none of the Austin team was affected by this.

I got ever so slightly smacked on a panel recently for daring to poke FCP in its tawdriness in getting a new version out (if we accept that 7.0 was really a 6.5).

I wasn't petulantly demanding new toys and features, just want the FCS suite to

- Use more than 1.5 GB RAM
- Use the expensive multiprocessor systems we have efficiently
- Fix 'those' bugs
- Overhaul Color so it becomes usable by a non-specialist

FCP was groomed to make high end Apple hardware the must-buy for an industry that reaches from videographers to broadcast networks. We bought into it because Apple told us that they were committed to it. Well, they're having a ball with the iPhone...

I've stuck with FCS in the hope that soon it will be nicer to work on long form edits where we bump into that RAM barrier, and various export bugs get fixed, and round trips improve. But there's been not-a-lot happening for a long time now.

Two scenarios:

- They're rewriting it from the ground up in Cocoa, a mammoth task, major commitment, taking longer than they'd hoped, but the result will be worth it, AND they get multi-touch and an iPad helper app at the same time. Whatever.

- They've lost enthusiasm, costs too high, returns too low, supported for the medium term, but consumer hardware generates more cash and buzz.

The one strongest thing that makes me teeter towards option 1 (and it is only by the slenderest of margins) was some activity not so long ago to recruit a Video Editor Product Designer. The job description had some interesting twists in it IIRC.

While there are a number of workflow problems w/Color that need to get fixed I think it would be a shame if the whole app got dumbed down into a 'light' version. Personally, I didn't think Color was difficult to get into at all once I watched a tutorial that explained what all the rooms, options, etc., were for.


-Andrew

It's the round-tripping with Color that got to me. Things break, things need workarounds, so I just use Colorista. On the other end of the scale, colleagues swear by adding expensive control surfaces. Maybe some wriggle-room between these scales?

I was hoping for a version of Color that was similar in UI to FCP, SoundTrack, and DVD Studio Pro (remember how DVDSP 1.0/1.5 were difficult to use??).

Heath

I don't use Color or Motion at all. Something about the workflow and interface just doesn't work for me. Other people love them so it's my problem.

Meanwhile Apple is in a position with FCS. It a middle of the road set of highly versatile applications with some very pro applications (Color) uncomfortably wedged in. Where can Apple take it that's worth the development? Making a program that high-end pros are willing to spend tens of thousands of dollars to purchase but Apple can only expect to sell a few dozen a year? At some point someone made a decision to leave the specialty programs in the hands of specialty software companies who could focus better on the needs of a limited set of clients. Just as Apple opened the door for filter and effect programmers to create an unlimited number of options for us to use within FCP. Believe me, I wish Apple would get into video server and master control operations, the PC options are maddening to work with, but it's really unlikely.

What I would like in FCP:

- Fixing the Qmaster inconsistencies.
- Better tape mastering capabilities such as global audio filters (just for output, no creating new sequences), better slate & countdown options.
- more options when starting a new project or sequence. I hate the mess when switching from PAL to NTSC or 16:9 to 4:3.
- fixing Media Manager, it still gets confused.
- get those processors all working in rendering as an User option.
- get some of the Color processes available as filters.