Final Cut - Best buy?

I have a Mac OS X version 10.4.11 and I will be buying a new computer in a about 8 months. Before I can buy a new computer I have to edit (a lot) of footage from my Canon 7d, I know I need a more capable software than imovie hd 6.0.3 to begin. Therefore, my question is regarding final cut, what would be the best version of final cut to buy for that is compatible with this kind of footage and my Mac? I'm sure it will be an older version and that is fine I just have to get this done in the next four months! And I am pretty clueless when it comes to all this stuff so if any of you can help that would be greatly appreciated!
-Laura

Hi there
you're going to have to get away from the 7D's H.264 to work effectively in Final Cut, normally Id say prores422LT as a good choice but you're in a slightly different position as far as OS goes because it LT doesnt exist in 10.4.11.
I guess you want to keep costs upgrades etc to a minimum so if you stay with 10.4.11, try and find a copy of FCP 6.0.3, this should work with Prores 422 (standard). Use compressor or mpeg streamclip to transcode to that from H.264 onto a fast (extra internal sata ideally) drive.
Alternatively, get a copy of FCP 5 and transcode to AIC or ....
bring forward your purchase to June and get FCPX at the same time.
cheers
Andy

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Hardware Configurations for Final Cut Server

I am a small video production shop, currently running 2 standalone FCP stations; one Intel tower FCP7 with about 3T of firewire 800 Raid 1 storage, and one PPC G5 tower FCP6, on a gigibit ethernet network with a central NAS. I am adding a 3d station and a new employee. The problem we have run into is that many assets seem to always reside on the wrong system, and duplicate projects become impossible to resolve and archive effectively. We shoot exclusively on HDV.
This is the setup I am considering....
Convert the Intel Mac Pro tower to Final Cut Server
Buy 3 27"iMacs for edit stations
My plan would be to have all projects reside on the FCPServer and edit on 422 Proxy versions on the iMacs. I understand that each iMac would need a copy of FCP. Would they all need to be FCP7 to work on the same project at different times?
Other questions:
Would working on a gigabit ethernet network be a bottleneck?
Could I ingest video directly to the server? Is there a way to capture 422 video onto the server or would that require a separate copy of FCP on the server to capture from tape? If so could I use the older FCP6 copy withot upgrading just for capture? Alternately could I use a copy of FCExpress on the server just to create a project and capture on the server then open and convert to FCP7?
Any suggestions for what to do with the Dual 2.5G PowerPC Tower?

ProRes wil be much faster for rendering on the client and transcoding on any machine, and will also allow for more realtime effects vs native HDV in FCP. "Full-rez" is a misnomer here, since ProRes Proxy does not sacrifice any resolution and indeed has a higher bitrate than native HDV. You might find that your HDV source looks just as good in ProRes Proxy (it is very high quality, just not as pristine as the higher quality versions of ProRes).
Remember, ProRes 422 Proxy is still a 4:2:2 10-bit codec. I think you'd need to look awfully close to see a qualitative difference. You can choose to use ProRes Proxy at lower resolutions than your source media, but you don't need to. It is designed to work all the way up to 2K and maintain all the color fidelity of a 10-bit codec.
When you check in a project that you are cutting locally with Edit Proxies, FCSvr relinks the project to the original media, but it does not render anything. You would need to open the project on the FCSvr host with FCP to create an flattened QuickTime against the original media (in your case native HDV).
You can recapture, but when you have FCSvr cataloging your clips, you do not want to recapture the same media and duplicate the asset. If you are careful and recapture the clips that were disposed of to the exact same location with the exact same filename as before, FCSvr will re-link the media to the asset automatically. However, that workflow is very human-error-prone and I strongly recommend you not adopt it. Keep your source HDV tapes as a worst-case backup, but if you are going to use FCSvr, use its archive capability to RAID-1 external drives and only go back to the tapes if all else fails. And you'll need to be very careful to match you prior ingest if you do.
Of course, you can always delete an asset altogether when you're done with its media and later recapture the footage from tape and treat it as a new asset. It depends on how interested you are in keeping your asset records and their proxies intact for media you plan to remove from storage.
I'd take a good long look at ProRes Proxy vs HDV for quality. If you can't see a difference, capture to ProRes Proxy and make that your online format. Then you won't be eating up all your storage on the server keeping both the HDV original and a ProRes Proxy for edit proxies. If you don't enable edit proxies, FCSvr just hands out the original media.

Mac Pro for Final Cut Studio -- The Buying Guide

I am starting to think about upgrading my "old" Power Mac G5 Quad system to a Mac Pro system. As you might expect, this raises several issues.
What I do: I edit DV and HDV on FCS2. My specs are below. I am looking for the best speed (especially for rendering), stability and video quality I can afford (between $5,000 and $6,000).
Question 1: Is it true that Snow Leopard and FCP 7 are about a year away? If so, please assume for the following questions that I would be working with the full complement of FCS2 applications on the Leopard OS. (How worth waiting for do you think these are?)
Question 2: Without directing me to the various benchmark and testing sites (which I’ve already looked at), can you suggest the actual performance differences I would see (again, using the whole range of FCS2 apps) in the following:
Two 2.26GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon processors
Two 2.66GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon processors
Question 3: I have heard that (with the exception of Compressor) FCS can only use a maximum of 4GB of RAM, and that the 6GB that the Mac Pro ships with are already more than it can use. Is this true? Is it true that Snow Leopard would allow FCS to make greater use of more RAM? And would this show up in the programs’ performance?
Question 4: To get the best video performance with my various FCS2 applications, is there a significant quality improvement in moving up from the NVIDIA GeForce GT 120 512MB to one of the other video cards? How would I notice a difference in the quality?
Question 5: Are there any other purchasing considerations I should think about when configuring a new Mac Pro?
Thanks a lot.
Giraut

Well, well, well, you make me think more about my last upgrade of an ATI Radeon 2600 to the latest ATI Radeon HD 4870!
I was looking on the Final Cut Pro thread to find one answer and look what I found, your questions!
Since yesterday night I was seeking the Apple Support threads just for fun and I now have doubts.
I am a Mac Pro (earlier 2008) owner. I upgraded it to 4 x 1.5 Tb Seagate hard drives and 10G of RAM from OWC (Other Word Computing). First let me tell you NOT to buy from Apple Store for your hard drive and/or memory upgrade. They are totally out of price list. I got my Mac Pro first with one 500 Gb Seagate drive. Then I added 2 x 500 Gb hard drives from Apple. I payed them 199,00 $ each
Last September, I upgraded the drive bays with 4 x 1.5 Tb from OWC. I paid them 229.00 $ each!
199,00 $ for 500 Gb or 229,00 $ for 1.5 Tb (that"s 3 times 500 Gb) which one would you take? And we are talking about two models from Seagate running at 7200 RPM, with 32 Mb of buffer.
I mean... What is that?!!?
And the memory! Don't even think about it.
I got first 4GB Matched Set (2 x 2GB) for 147,99 $ in September from OWC and my second order was 4GB Matched Set (2 x 2GB) for 132,79 $ in October.
I payed a total of 280,78 $ for 8GB of RAM while the price for this upgrade on Apple Store woul have cost me 1998,00 $
*+Source Apple Store :+*
*+Apple Memory Module 4GB 800MHz DDR2 FB-DIMM ECC 2x2GB $999.00+*
Multiply that by 2!
Now how much memory would you need?
I am not a Final Cut Pro user, but I use Final Cut Express a lot, with animation QuickTime movies exported from my Astronomy software Starry Night Pro Plus.
Yesterday I posted this into a thread to answer a user :
+Every morning I have my preferred applications started: Mail, Safari, iTune, Aperture and Final Cut Express. I just did a test for you. I started Mail, Safari, Aperture, Final Cut Express, Starry Night Pro Plus (OpenGL Astronomy Software), Terminal, Quicktime, TextEdit and NeoOffice.+
+With all these apps running, I still have 6.48G of Free RAM out from the 10G installed!+
+It's when I start hungry applications like VMWare Fusion running Windows XP, or Quicktime with a lot of movies opened that I could see the memory level going low!+
+Your bottle neck in video editing will probably be the video card, after the disk speed. Be sure to use 7200 RPM disk and eSATA for your video plans if possible. Firewire 800 will works fine on external drive but it could giggle. I had an ATI Radeon HD 2600 that I recently upgraded to an ATI Radeon HD 4870. the drivers aren't ready yet from Apple. We are all waiting for the next OS X release 10.5.7 for the drivers! For now, I am running on Beta drivers.+
+It's hard to say by now if I have better performance into Final Cut Express because the movie I was working on was an animation movie using plans exported from Starry Night Pro Plus via Quicktime and "animation" codec without any compression. As soon as I make a modification, I still have to render the output for smooth playing.+
Now, after some test with Starry Night Pro Plus this morning, I can safety say that Starry Night Pro Plus with Open GL does use my video card extra speed and that my experience navigating into the Universe is much better and smooth.
But honestly, even if I have to admit that I am using the Beta drivers for the HD 4870, I must say that I have very big doubt that Final Cut Express does use the extra power of the HD 4870 compare to the HD 2600!
In fact, I am searching the support thread for this answer.
Does anyone can say if Final Cut Express or Final Cut Pro does make use of the extra hardware feature of the ATI Radeon HD 4870 or not?

I do video productions for a small local TV station. I use Final Cut Express to edit. I need a new video camera but am at a loss as to what to buy. I know I will get a digital camera but do not know the difference between just digital and digital HD.

I do video productions for a small local TV station. I use Final Cut Express to edit. I need a new video camera but am at a loss as to what to buy. I know I will get a digital camera but do not know the difference between just digital and digital HD. Also, I can not afford an expensive camera and need some advice on which of the available cameras would be best and also work well with a Mac. One last issue, I currently use a Panasonic #CCD camera that takes a tape. When I load video to Final Cut the audio and video are out of sinc. Go figure. Can anyone help with these questions. Karen

Hello Karen,
If you are using Final Cut Express, then look for camcorders that are AVCHD camcorders. Look especially for the AVCHD logo and specific mention of AVCHD in the specs. Most of the major manufacturers produce good quality camdcorders - Canon, Sony, etc.
Also, be aware that there are a lot of "not quite AVCHD" camcorders on the market (sometimes they say they record video as MPEG4-H.264/AVC) - buyer beware!
Most everything you are going to find on the market today is HD, which stands for "high-def".
Regarding your question about the Panasonic camcorder, it's best if you post that as a separate question, and please identify the specific model camcorder and the Easy Setup you are using in FCE.

Downscaling a movie from 1080 to 720 the best way in Final Cut Pro?

Which way is best to achieve the best quality in this procedure? I was hoping to be able to do this using the Final Cut Pro application, hopefully not the compressor or any other application if possible.

Does hardware affect quality that much?
Yes, it does.
Is it not a matter of converting 0 and 1 anyway?
Yes, but some things do this better than others. Hardware is best...then the Terranex...then the other hardware. Then After Effects which does this VERY well. FCP is low on that list. Putting the 1s and 0s in the right GOOD order. I'm no engineer, so I can't say specifically what it happening. I can say what my experience has shown.
I think Terranex is about 60K$?
You don't buy one. You take your tape to a post facility that has one and pay them to do it. Or you buy a capture card. Yes, the Mini will upconvert DV to HD, and it will do a decent job. THe Kona card does it better, but the Matrox isn't too far behind. I have both the MXO2 and the MXO2 mini..plus I have used the Kona 3. The Kona is slightly better, but you can't go wrong with the MIni. Real time conversion as you capture, plus the ability to monitor out to an HDTV...bonus!
Shane

What's the best Mac for running Final Cut Pro X?

Title says it all. What's the best Mac for running Final Cut Pro X? I'm not looking to make a feature length hollywood film. But I'd like to be able to edit video without lag.

Yes. Begin with the fastest processor / graphics card / and as much RAM as you can afford. (As all three will become obsolete over time.)
I started from scratch. I have a 27-inch iMac with a 3.4 G Intel Core i7. (currently the fastest processor for an iMac) I also ordered the best graphics card--AMD Ratheon HD. I ordered 16G of RAM, but recently added more RAM to equal 24G. (OWC makes good after-market RAM for iMACs.)
Last, I ordered a flash drive / SATA hard drive combo. (250G on flash / ITB on SATA). The OS and all of my applications run off the flash drive. (for fast start up!)
I put all of my media and FCP projects onto the SATA hard drive.
Now, I had the option to order a 2TB SATA. But, I realized I can always buy more external storage as I edit more and more projects. ALSO! FCPX is GREAT when it comes to editing projects on external drives! I can segregate an entire project and its media files onto a removeable drive. I simply launch FCPX, plug in the drive and--poof!--I'm ready to edit. It sees the project and the media right away. When I'm done editing, I can then send this drive to another editor (also using FCPX) or attach it to my MacBook if I want to edit the same project in the field.
This has worked for me. I wish you luck.

Is there any other way to buy pro apps like logic pro x or final cut pro x without downloading straight from the internet?

Hi,
Just straigt to the issue, I'm not really sure with my internet connection in my country. I mean its so slow and sometimes it disconnects and reconnect. So I'm not trusting the internet connection here to download such a big software like Logic Pro x or Final Cut Pro x. So is there any way for me to buy the pro apps without downloading straight from the internet? I mean like the oldschool method, come with a box. I bought Logic pro 7 and 8 like that and has no problem with it. But now apple selling all the pro apps from the app store, its cool and easy but im afraid if i bought it online and im pretty sure i will encounter problems during the download period. It might took me like a week or more maybe to download 40GB file, i dont know. And more over, what if my internet connection cut off while i download the software?
So please do help me with this. I would love to have Logic Pro X on my apple computer.
Thanks.

ahavu wrote:
And to my knowledge I can't sort of 'drag and drop' the clips from the sealed Final Cut event files either.
The events are not "sealed". Your clips – if you copied rather than leaving in place – are in the Original Media folder. If you used 10.1.x, you right click on the library bundle and choose Show Package Contents. In early versions, just open the event folder.
There are multiple ways to get media on ones' computer. One way is to use a card reader and copy the entire card structure to whatever destination is used for a media drive. Then import into the NLE.
I don't have any experience with Hitfilm but I assume their user forums would be a good place to get an understanding of what workflows work best for that application.
Good luck.
Russ

Which Mac Mini is best for Editing in Final Cut Pro X i5 or i7 ?

Hey guys plz suggest me a good mac mini machine for editing in Final Cut Pro X. Is there any difference in i5 mac mini or i7 in terms of rendering or editing, and what is the use of an SSD drive in terms of editing in mac mini either than its 5400rpm HD, or should i buy imac i5 with ssd ?
Lets see if i buy mac mini i5 with 16gb ram and a ssd drive, Will it work better than mac mini i7 with 16gb ram but without ssd drive ?
So guys plzz suggest me the best mac specs for video editing
Thanks in advance

Your budget?
Take a look at this: http://www.barefeats.com/minivmp.html
The 2012 Quad-Core i7 Mac mini is a real contender when it comes to CPU power compared to our examples of a Quad-Core Mac Pro and Quad-Core iMac. We plan to add some other examples of Quad-Core desktop Macs (including a faster Mac mini) to these graphs in the days ahead but the point is made.
However, the GPU in the 2012 Quad-Core i7 Mac mini is weak in comparison to the Mac Pro (and iMac) as you can see from the "Heaven" graph.
That's going to affect its ability to handle advanced Pro Apps that make use of the GPU for certain types of effect rendering.
These apps include Apple's Final Cut Pro and Motion as well as Adobe's Photoshop, Premiere Pro, and After Effects.
The Mac mini's Intel HD 4000 GPU will also hamstring hard-core gamers.
The Mac mini is also weak in support of OpenCL as you can see from the "LuxMark" graph.
It is forced to render the model using only CPU while the iMac and Mac Pro GPUs are able to render the model.
Why does this matter? Because apps like Final Cut Pro, Motion, and Photoshop use OpenCL acceleration for rendering certain effects.
http://www.barefeats.com/imac12p1.html
Even a Mac Pro (refurbished special 4-core 2.8 is $1819 and can be upgraded to more RAM, 4x4TB w/o going into Thunderbolt storage) and have multiple SSDs as the choice or need arises.)
Fusion drive + Thunderbolt but I think you are asking too much out of the mini. It is fine for a lot of uses.

HELP! Capture quits even after buying new Final Cut Express HD 3.5

Had a problem with the quiting of the application upon trying to capture. Thought it was some sort of incompatability with the OS 10.4.9 and my old Final Cut Express program. Accordingly, I upgraded to FCEHD 3.5, thinking everything would be cool.
Same problem! X?X?X?X??!!
Anyone with any ideas? I try to capture, and the program immediately quits without any type of error message.
I Movie captures perfectly.
George Paul
G 5 Mac OS X (10.4.9) power mac dual

DARN it
These were two very helpful suggestions. I tried both of them. I could not find any Quick Time receipts, and I trashed the permissions and other files, and repaired the permissions, as indicated on the website.
HOWEVER, stilll having the same problem. Computers are complex ecosystems, I suppose.
I am leaving to go visit a couple of nature recording friends, for a week, and will be away from my computer.
I hope others will read about this problem, and if the spirit moves them, help me solve the mystery. I am sure that all of us have experienced that feeling of frustration when you try to buy the best, and use the best protocols, and the darn thing just won't work.
Thanks for helping, Community of Final Cut Express Users, especially in the wee hours of the morning.

Best MacBook Pro specs for using Final Cut 7

Hello Forum:
I have a MacBook Pro from 2008 that I'm currently using to do video editing in FCP7 for my film projects.
I want to upgrade to a new MacBook as Final Cut tells me quite frequently that I don't have enough graphic capabilities to render certain files, etc. etc.
Does anyone have experience using FCP7 on a MacBook Pro that can advise what the best specs are for upgrading to a new MacBook Pro?
The refurbished unit I'm looking at has the specs below. If anyone has any suggestions I would be extremely grateful.
Many thanks and Happy New Year to all!
Processor
2.9 GHz Dual-core Intel Core i7 processor (Turbo Boost up to 3.6GHz)
Cache
4MB shared L3 cache
Memory
8GB (2x4GB) of 1600MHz DDR3 SDRAM
Graphics
Intel HD Graphics 4000
Storage1
750GB Serial ATA, 5400 rpm
Optical drive
8x double-layer SuperDrive (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)
Wireless
Wi-Fi (based on IEEE 802.11n specification)2 Bluetooth 4.0 wireless technology
Expansion
One Thunderbolt port (up to 10 Gbps), one FireWire 800 port (up to 800 Mbps), Two USB 3 ports (up to 5 Gbps), one SDXC card slot
Video and Audio
FaceTime HD camera; Thunderbolt port with support for DVI, VGA, dual-link DVI, and HDMI (requires adapters, sold separately)
Stereo speakers with subwoofer, omnidirectional microphone, headphone port (Support for Apple iPhone headset with remote and microphone).
Size and weight
Height: .95 inches (2.41 cm)
Width: 12.78 inches (32.5 cm)
Depth: 8.94 inches (22.7 cm)
Weight (standard configuration): 4.5 pounds (2.06 kg)3
Originally released June 2012
13.3-inch (diagonal) LED-backlit glossy widescreen display, 1280-by-800 resolution
8GB (2 x 4GB) of 1600MHz DDR3 SDRAM
750GB Serial ATA @ 5400 rpm
8x double-layer SuperDrive (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)
Intel HD Graphics 4000

It might help us to advise you if we knew what your budget is.
In the meantime, I can suggest a couple or three items that aren't too expensive.
1) Your computer has four drive bays. Fill them up with the largest hard drives you can afford. I prefer the Seagate 7200.11 SATA drives. The 1TB version is about $120 each right now. With four drives living in your MP, you can have one boot (system) drive and three media drives. I would NOT RAID them. The 7200.11 drives in a MP will benchmark at around 100 MB/sec, which is plenty fast for your needs.
2) You have an 8 processor computer and Apple recommends 1GB of RAM per processor for running Compressor batches. So, you should buy 6 X 1GB RAM modules to fill your MP RAM slots. Make sure you buy RAM with Apple approved heat sinks. Crucial.com is a good source.
3) For back-up and archiving of media files, I recommend firewire drives with removable trays, like the Burly enclosures from MacGurus. You buy the enclosures and the extra trays from MacGurus, then buy the raw drives (Seagate 7200.11) separately from a reliable online vendor, like newegg.com, for the trays. The Burly case is built like a tank, with two fans, so it isn't as likely to burn up drives like some other firewire enclosures.

Imovie or final cut express, which one works best?

I am sick and tired of all the bugs in imovie. And I feel bad for everyone who are going out of their minds with soooooooo many problems with imove. I'm ready to buy final cut express, but does any one know if final cut express will run alot smoother and more relieable than imovie?
Thanks, ED

Hi M
I also use iMovie (pref v6) and FinalCut Express (3.5.1) and FCP (5.x.?).
FinalCut Express and Pro are rather same in work flow. iMovie is mentally
somthing completely different.
You need to be a very organized person to get the best of FCE eg. numbering all
Your tapes (tape unique numbering), preparing a structure from beginning etc.
BUT: The freedom of about 99 video and audio tracks. Resizing a video track
above another (pic-in-pic), rotating a slightly off horizon eg 2 deg, color-
correction (much better than in iMovie), Green/blue screen and so much more
that needs plug-ins to iMovie (with a cost) as standard.
Can give Your creativity a real spinn.
Yours happy with both worlds: Bengt W

Best version of Final Cut Pro? Searching on a budget...

I have been editing a film project on a friend's old G4 with Final Cut 4.0. The computer is on its last leg and is running the program excruciatingly slowly. I would like to purchase my own version of Final Cut and install it on my MacBook, but I don't have a lot of money to spend. I am hoping to find something for $500 or cheaper but don't want to sacrifice any critical upgrades just to be cheap. So...what version of Final Cut Pro on the market, new or used, delivers the best bang for my buck?

The upgrade will work with ANY full version of Final Cut Pro or Final Cut Studio. So if you can find a genuine full version of FCP 1, 2, 3, 4, or Final Cut Studio 1 or 2, you'll be able to install the upgrade. If buying on eBay, just be sure you're bidding on a FULL version, and that it's not an academic version - so read the small print.
Message was edited by: Denis Murphy

Buy Final Cut Studio 2 for DVD Studio Pro? Pro & Cons of DVD Studio Pro?

I am thinking of buying Final Cut Studio 2 because it includes the DVD authoring software DVD Studio Pro. iDVD uses automatic settings that are hard if not impossible to alter and so some DVDs are authored with very poor bit rates.
1. Is it possible to change the bit rate manually in DVD Studio Pro so the best Quality DVD can be authored?
2. Is is possible to change the audio from PCM (which takes up a lot of DVD space) to AC-3 in DVD Studio Pro, so picture quality is improved?
3. Is there a way to buy DVD Studio Pro as a separate software package and use it with Final Cut Express?
4. Generally what other options for DVD authoring with Mac are there besides iDVD and DVD Studio Pro?
5. Is DVD Studio Pro a good piece of software or are there any particular faults?

1. Yes, but you would use Compressor for your encoding instead of DVDSP.
2. DVDSP will only encode to AIFF, Compressor will allow you to encode audio to AC3.
3. Negative. DVDSP is only available as part of Final Cut Studio 2.
4. You could try using Roxio Toast.
5. DVDSP gets the job done for me. I think it works quite well.
For a good explanation of how Compressor and DVDSP workflows work within Final Cut Studio, I'd recommend you take a look at DVD StepByStep

Best video format to export from final cut pro to encore

hi, i'm using final cut pro and no matter what format i export my video in, be it quicktime, mpeg2 or avi, there's still a slight degradation of picture quality when i import it into encore. mpeg2 by far suffers the least. but is there a best video format i can export from final cut to adobe so dat there's minimal loss in quality?

Sure, export it as an uncompressed AVI or QT file.

The best Mac laptop to use Final Cut Pro 4???

I don't know much about Macs and I know even less about Mac laptops! Someone told me that the macbook (Intel based??) would be the best mac laptop to use with Final Cut Pro 4. Could someone tell me if this IS my best option or if I should be looking for a powerbook? What specs do I need to be looking for? I know that I need a G4 or higher, but the memory, speed, etc... I'm clueless about...

Get a MacBookPro 17" and upgrade to FCP5.1
You need the 17" to get the firewire 800 port - necessary if you want to edit anything more than DV or HDV.
The upgrade from FCP4 to FCP5.1 is very inexpensive now (offer expires in mid December) and you would be very foolish to not do it.
good luck.
x
yes, this should have been posted in the FCP forum, but why clutter up two forums ...

Final Cut - Best buy?

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