Why should I switch from Final Cut X?

Who am I:
Hobbits that has been playing with this stuff since the 80's
Has Premiere and After effects in late 90's early 00 before switching to a Mac
Make no money from my work. It is mostly home video's or fun stuff laughs at the office
I have CC for photography, switched before Apple killed Aperture. For $10/month it is not bad for LightRoom's power and PhotoShop is over kill for me, though I like the power
I have had Final Cut for years, and love the CHEAP price of Final Cut Pro X
Use Motion a fair amount, though no expert
Now to switch up from the Photo package of CC to have one with Premiere and After Effects is 3x the cost, or $240 MORE as year. FCPX is $50, plus Motion $50 add Compressor and you still are 6 month pay off (and I already own them).
I agree with many reviews that FCPX is like iMovie pro, but Why would I switch to Premiere Pro?

kcossabo wrote:
Why would I switch to Premiere Pro?
Because:
Transparency. Adobe tells you what it can and can't do with various pieces of hardware (think: GPUs) on your machine. In fact, they list it exactly. Apple just says stuff like, "Oh, it'll be faster with your GPUs. Trust us." They never specifically enumerate the advantages GPU acceleration can provide.
Traditional NLE Format, FCPX's interface isn't exactly what you'd call traditional as it pertains to an NLE. Maybe you can dig it, maybe you can't. Pr's is traditional and if you've used any other NLE, you can easily figure it out.
Superb Integration. Adobe's cross-application integration is ridiculously simple and easy to use. Want to edit a sound track from Pr in Audition? Back-click on the track and tell Pr that; Audition gets launched and the track is loaded. Need some help from AE? No problem, you can easily move tracks back and forth between AE and Pr. Apple's apps aren't integrated really, at all. It's sad, too.
Better Native Editing Support. If Adobe says that Pr can edit something natively, it can. Without transcoding, without copying, without re-wrapping, without anything. FCPX, on the other hand, attempts to do the same thing. Some formats (think: AVCHD) that exist in parts will be wrapped into a single MOV container before you can edit them. This can take a while if the segments are 4GB in size...
I'm sure there are a few more reasons I can think of. FCPX isn't a bad NLE per se. I just happen to like the way Pr (and the other Adobe apps) does things.

Similar Messages

Switching from Final Cut to Premier

Hey. Just switched from Final Cut Pro to Premiere. I've followed the instructions regarding converting project with XML file.
now i can open the project but all files are not connected. for some reason Premier can't locate the files.
Maybe it's because of the files type? (Apple ProRes 422 HQ, and MOV)
Generally, What it a good format to convert from MOV files i created with nikon DSLR before starting a Premier project?
Please save my projects. Thank you!

Yael,
PrPro will go through MOV files without any difficulty. My standard footage is MOV from Panny GH3 & Nikon D600. Don't worry about transcoding, or worry about the ProRes & MOV files on the same timeline. At the same frame res/rate they'll coexist just fine.
There is a definite difference between hardware needs and what so many seem to think should work. For all the hype about USB3 being just as good as any other external connection ... some USB3 drives on some system's CAN sustain ... a burst ... at the speed claimed. That's ok for much work, but not at all for video. It's SUSTAINED throughput "live" on any particular system with its internal bus & other settings/capabilities and the drive's actual sustained read/write speeds & cache capabilities. The Hardware Forum has a site recommended off it, the Tweaker's Page. Here: Tweakers Page
They have several long articles on drive and asset layout/assignments. Including the results of testing various layouts, as EVERYTHING there is from testing on real machines with their own project files which are heavy effects loaded things that rag the crap out of all systems while another part of their Benchmark files monitors computer hardware usage. There's not the surmise or "I just know how this works" ... what they report is hard data. USB3 just can't sustain the read/write speeds for anything but straight reading of some codecs off disc so there's some usability, as I've learned ... one can say have footage on a very fast usb3 flash drive connected directly into a USB3 port and get adequate read-speeds off it. Or do exports to a USB3 drive, which is again a one-way "communication". Other than that, it's internal fast drives (no "green" drives need apply) such as at least 7500rpm if not 10,000rpm or SSD drives ... or RAID's of say 4 or 5 3TB (or four) drives, which in RAID 0 can actually handle all but system/program files for most things.
Basically, you want to avoid road-blocks & choke-points, places where your data & program/system needs bang into each other and have to wait a while. If you make at least a decent start on that, the type of codec isn't much of a problem. Especially a 1080 MOV ... that ain't nothin'. Think about what a 6k LOG file does to a system ...
Neil

Switching from Final Cut Pro to Adobe Premiere

Hi everyone,
Hopefully there are others here who have made this switch and can offer me thoughts and advice. I have for the past few years used the Final Cut Pro suite as my video authoring media. It's done a great job editing and compressing my videos, so I could burn them to DVD, but the time has come for me to start burning to blu-ray. The problem is, DVD Studio Pro does not support blu-ray (something I discovered after buying the burner, etc).
After some research, it seems that Adobe Encore is the only software I've found that people recommend for blu-ray authoring on the iMac. Is this true? If I buy Adobe Premiere, will it edit, compress, does it have a color program - basically, will it do everything I've been using Final Cut for, or will I need to move files between the two programs (if they even support this?)
Anyone with experience in using both programs or just making the switch, please comment with any advice. I'd appreciate it before I take the plunge on another expensive suite of software.

You can download a trial version. I tried it some time ago and I can only use one word "boring" sorry I can not explain this feeling in a more concrete way.

Why does Compressor take so long to export a 10 minute video clip from Final Cut Pro?

I've been trying export a 10 minute clip from Final Cut Pro. so it can be used with DVD Studio Pro and burned. However, the rendering process has taken 12 hours! The clip I'm exporting has minimal effects, no music, and is in 1080i 30fps. Does anyone know what's going on or what I can do to speed up the process?

First: How are you exporting? Are you using the Share feature or Send to Compressor?
Second: You haven't said anything about your system configuration or really very much about your movie. What is its format… is it really 30fps or 29.97? Whatever it is, are the project settings identical to the clip properties, or were they changed?
Russ

Why they ask me get a compressor from App Store to export video from final cut since I use mavericks

How can I export video from final cut can't do again since I have got maverick

What happens when you have the project active in the timeline and press the Share button?

Why won't compressor let me submitt the job after sending the job from Final Cut?

Having problems with compressor. Does not let me submitt my job. I sent the job from Final Cut to Compressor. I set up destination, settings. When I hit th submitt button it's grayed out. Can anybody help. I'm running compressor 3.5.3. And Final Cut Pro 7.0.3.

HI do you have Fcp-x, Compressor 4 and motion 5 on your system as well
just need to ask to get that out of the way first
thanks
g

Why has exporting a film from Final Cut Express (FCE) HD (3.5) taking 30 times longer and file size increased by 30X?

Exporting a 75 minute film from Final Cut Express (FCE) HD(3.5) through Quick Time Movie is now taking over an hour instead of the 2minutes it used to take. The FCEMovie file is now 14 GB instead of the 1 GB it used to be. In both cases Self Contained was notchecked when exporting. I havetried trashing the Preference file to no avail. There was a message when opening the FCE project that 140render files were offline. Ichecked the box to forget them and also did a Render All Both and Render Only Mixdownbefore exporting. I had thisproblem a few days ago and solved it by reinstalling FCE. However after two days the problem hascome back. As far as I know I didnot change anything in FCE or the system when the export times and file sizeincreased.

I think you are correct about the longer version being a self-contained movie except that I did not check that option when exporting. However, I have opened another project of the same size and that one can be exported in the usual time, the problem must reside with the particular project. A clue is that to regain some disk space I deleted the render folder for several projects including the one I am having trouble with. Also when iI opened that project I got a message that files were disconnected and I think they were render files. I did re-render before exporting and that is when the file length increased by a factor of 13, even though it was not supposed to be self-contained. FCE is working OK with other projects when I export them. I am still puzzled.

Downgrading to iMovie from Final Cut Express - exporting?

My husband and I used to be into video editing before the kids were born. We have two 6 year old macbooks and one is dead and one is dying so we are forced to make a decision here on how to procede. My husband does one or two hobby type movies a year, but we mostly use our video editing software for home movies of the kids now. We don't have the money to spend on these things we used to, or the time to really be trying to tinker around with Final Cut anymore. So we decided to buy the $600.00 Mac Mini instead of a new laptop. We are thinking about switching back to iMovie as well, since buying the newer version of Final Cut will be pretty spendy, and iMovie seems to have come a long way since we last used it. We have a really old version of Final Cut right now, so I think upgrading would be necessary if we stick with Final Cut.
I am really confused about the new iMovie though. We have been using a Sony Digital 8 camcorder and storing our movies on tape. I talked to the guy at the Apple store about the Mac Mini and asked why there was no 'export to camera' on the new iMovie (I'm actually using '09, but I am told 11 doesn't have it either). He looked stumped and actually said he had never heard of doing that and why would I want to do that. I asked where I was supposed to store our final movies and he said the hard drive. I was surprised and told him that hard drives crash, but tapes last much longer. He said tapes degrade, and I said yeah, but not for like 30 years or longer, our hard drives have only lasted on average 5 years. But later I was thinking that maybe it wasn't a bad idea to back up our tapes on the hard drive. We have a 1 TB external which we would probably fill when all is said and done. I am thinking of getting some cloud storage from BackBlaze as well, so I started thinking that maybe tapes are becoming obsolete and we should really do this HD thing (for now, until a better storage option comes out in a few years because HD's are obviously not ideal).
But then I started looking at the new iMovie and I have no idea how to export a final movie into a file that won't lose any quality. In final cut there is the 'self contained movie' setting which is a full quality version of the final movie. But in iMovie, I can't find an equivilent. How are you exporting your final movies in iMovie and where are you storing them? And if we downgrade to iMovie, will there be a loss in quality? I saw another thread that says that iMovie 11 is exporting movies that lose a lot of quality. Has Apple fixed this yet? When we started using iMovie years ago we were told that it imports and exports the exact same quality since it is all digital there would be no degradation. But now that I read that there is a loss of quality in the new iMovie I am nervous to downgrade to iMovie. Can anyone shed some light on these issues for me? Should we stick with Final Cut, or can we make iMovie work?

Is this a really slow board, or did I ask a silly question? Why no responses?

New to Premiere, from Final Cut. Help editing native RED r3d

I am one of the many new converts to Premiere Pro CS5.5 from Final Cut after many years using the Apple software. I want to dive right in and start editing with Premiere, but I've run into an immediate snag.
First, I have heard endless discussion about Premiere Pro's abillity to edit raw RED footage natively. Just drag in the r3d files and go. Yet, I haven't even been able to get Premiere to get me this far in my editing workflow. I have worked extensively with RED footage, and in the past I was transcoding in Final Cut to a Pro Res (Proxy) and conforming/onlining at the end using log and transfer or RED alert. Naturally, I was excited to be able to drop in native RED files and never have to online at the end. Here's where my problem comes in: I drag in the r3d files from a recent shoot. 4k 23.967 shot on RED. I double click the clip in my project to open it in the source monitor and all I get is black. I can't scrub, I can't playback video or audio to make my cuts; all I get is timecode. HOWEVER, if I drag the r3d file straight to the timeline, I get picture/sound and everything. Of course, this is no way to edit and I can't just be dropping full clips into the sequence and trying to trim from there. Like any editor, I want to be able to double click my clip, scrub through it in the source monitor, and find the particular take I want to use. THEN, I add it to my timeline.
WHY am I not able to see/edit the raw r3d files in my source monitor? Has anyone experienced this problem? Frustrated and unable to start using this highly touted Premiere (which I wholeheartedly want to believe in). Please instruct me so I can get up and running with my RED footage. In the meantime, it's back to Final Cut 7...
I should mention that I am using a Quad-Core Intel Xeon 2.4 GHz Mac Pro with 15GM Ram and an ATI Radeon HD 5770 graphics card. I have heard NVIDIA is the way to go, but we aren't upgrading/changing graphics cards in the immediate future. So for now, this is what I will be using. Hopefully this is not the sole reason I can't playback/see anything in my source monitor with my r3d files.
Thanks
Daniel

Excellent! Changing to the Adobe player solved that problem (although, of course, it presented new problems, all related to Blackmagic card). Also, to answer your question-- yes, the pro res proxy files were working fine in Premiere.
Now I can see and edit my r3d files, which was paramount. However, now I can't get either the source monitor or program monitor to output playback through the blackmagic card to my external monitors (42" LCD and a smaller 17" Sony color correction monitor). I should note that both of these monitors are routed through my blackmagic card so they don't show up as options under the "playback settings" tab in the source/program monitors. Do I need to rerout these monitors differently so that Premiere Pro recognizes them and will utilize them as external monitors? I need them to playback for clients, bosses, etc.
Another note-- If I make my sequence a blackmagic preset, it will output the program monitor but only playback a few frames and then freeze. If I make it a RED cinema preset, it will playback fluidly but won't output to my external monitors.
The freezing, in my assumption, is due to the fact that the only blackmagic editing mode available is uncompressed 10bit, which doesn't playback well (it uses an editing mode of uncompressed 10bit even when I pick JPEG for the sequence preset).
I guess, in summary, my question is-- does blackmagic not integrate well with Premiere Pro CS5.5? Should I re-rout the monitors not using a BNC cable into the blackmagic card, but instead DVI them into the back of the Mac Pro? Thanks again Colin,
Daniel

Creating FLVs from Final Cut Pro

I am trying to create an FLV from Final Cut Pro 5.1.4 on an
Intel Mac. I have intalled the exporter plugin but it does not show
up as an export option in FCP. Does anyone know why this is
happening? Do they not yet have an FLV exporter for FInal Cut Pro
5?
I am stumped any help would be greatly appreciated.

The only way I could make it work was to open FCP using
Rosetta. This opens the program as if it were running on an older
(non Intel) MAC. The plugin should then show up where it is
supposed to. I guess they haven't come up with an Intel MAC plugin
yet.
To open as a Rossetta program control click on the FCP icon
and click on Get Info. Then click on the Open using Rosetta
box.

Best Way to import items from final cut pro

I have recently edited a video in final cut pro studio 1 and them compressed the file for dvd studio. However when i came to look for my file it was as a quicktime movie that dvd studio could not see. ie when i came to locate the file i dvd studio it did not show up when other files had. I tried rebooting the program but alas it still could not find it.
Can someone tell me a better way or what i have done wrong?
Thanks in advance,
Paul Andrews

Best way is to export from Final Cut (either self contained or to Compressor) and then encode the video to m2v (using Compressor or other encoder) and audio to AC3 then bring those files into DVD SP
http://dvdstepbystep.com/faqs_3.php
http://dvdstepbystep.com/faqs_4.php
http://dvdstepbystep.com/faqs_7.php
http://dvdstepbystep.com/fasttrackover.php
http://dvdstepbystep.com/qc.php
And these threads
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=4625696
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=4598467
As to why the file is not being seen, are you sure you exported to the path you are looking at? Just try exporting to the desktop to make sure you know where it is.
If you have more details on the workflow it will help (such as how you exported, where to, what types of files, etc.)

How Can I do an export that from Final Cut Pro 7 that is specific to these settings?

Hi
I am current trying to export out a movie from Final Cut Pro 7 but the settings that are required are very specific and I was going to try it through compressor as well but I wasn't sure if that would work either.
Here are the settings:
HD:
1 Video CODEC                 XDCAMHD50
2 Wrapper format           QuickTime Self-Contained
3 Bit rate                              50 Mbit/s Constant Bit Rate (CBR)
4 GOP                                   Long GOP
                                             Closed GOP
5 Time code                       Must include embedded time code. Start-timecode: 10:00:00:00
6 Movie version               UK Home Video Version
7 Delivery time                 As per contract. Supplier to specify filename, delivery format and estimated time of arrival via email at least 60 days before                                                           transmission unless otherwise specified in contract. This should be accompanied by an IMDB link.
1 HD video format           720 line progressively scanned (720p) @ 50Hz (25 FPS)
                                          1080 line interlace scanned (1080i) @ 50Hz (25 FPS)
2 Resolution                      1280 x 720
                                           1920 x 1080
3 Aspect ratio                    Content should be 16:9, however 4:3 will be accepted on exception (such as for older movies shot in 4:3)
4 Graphics                           Must be within 16:9 safe graphics area (EBU R95-2000)
5 Chroma format              4:2:2
1 HD audio format           24 bits/sample 48 kHz sampling rate
2 Track layout                    Track 1 – 2.0 Stereo L mono
                                            Track 2 – 2.0 Stereo R mono
                                            Track 3 – L
                                            Track 4 – R
                                            Track 5 – C
                                            Track 6 - Low frequency effects LFE
                                            Track 7 – L Surround
                                            Track 8 – R Surround

First of all, what are your sequence settings? Looks like they want stereo AND dolby 5.1 audio tracks embedded in the quicktime (I've delivered a few films like this). Do you have a surround sound mix?
You will almost always have more options and control in compressor over fcp so that's the way I'd go, but not sure compressor will give you the ability to match these specs.
Do you understand about safe zones for graphics? If not, post back.
I don't see any option to set the GOP in xdcam in compressor. This may be built in to the xdcam format.
I don't see any option for 720 xdcam hd in compressor.
There are many other tools available for this kind of work, but they may be out of your price range. You might want to just find a facility with experience in deliverying this sort of thing.

My files from final cut pro trial aren't transferring to final cut pro x - how do I fix this?

I had been making a video in the final cut pro trial and didn't realize my trial was going to run out as soon as it did that day. I downloaded final cut pro x and was planning on finishing up editing tonight, but none of my files from final cut pro trial transferred over to final cut pro x. Everywhere I have read online said they should transfer automatically, but that's not happening. Is there a fix?

you're tried using the 'Open Library' command?
http://help.apple.com/finalcutpro/mac/10.1/?lang=en#ver217d6e77d
Where are your Projects & Events located?

Exporting From Final Cut Pro 5.0

Hello,
I need to export my work from Final Cut Pro 5.0 to a Quicktime Movie with the following settings -
Compression: H.264
Frame Rate: 15fps
Bit Rate: 200k
Is this posible without loosing the quality of the video footage? The footage was capture from a MiniDV tape.

Is this posible without loosing the quality of the video footage? The footage was capture from a MiniDV tape.
If you want full resolution 640 x 480 then 200Kbps isn't going to look very good. As a guide you can note that Apple is using about 600Kbps to encode the iTunes video content and that has a resolution of only 320 x 240. However, since you're only using a frame rate of 15fps you should be able to produce good looking content at just over 1Mbps for 640 x 480.
Of course, it does depend upon the nature of your source video (the subject). Simple "talking head" shots could go lower, while rapid action material might need considerably more than 1Mbps (along with a higher frame rate).

Importing FCP Hi Rez from Final Cut with Encore Destination

I wonder if i could get some advise and comment on trying to get the best Blu Ray encode from Final Cut.
What I have done is this:
I have imported a 60 minute Quicktime FCP file into Premier CS4. (The file was imported as HDV video from a Canon XHA1 and converted in FCP to 422Hi Rez). I set Premier to HDV and not Quicktime before the import. When the import finished, I notice that playback was very jerky, so I rendered the whole time line. This took about 5 hours. Following this, play back was perfect.
So, what should my settings have been initially....might I have not set everything correctly. What settings should I have set initially?
(I have not figured out how to export a sequence directly from FCP which 4.01 is supposed to do.)
Now that it is play fine in Premier CS4 4.01, I am planning to use the dynamic link system to export into Encore CS4 .01 . But before I do so, do I have to fill out copyright info in Premier...I noticed an area for this?
I chose this work flow because I did not want to use the FCP's Compressor for make a Blu Ray. I want to use Encore's H264 compression which produces a smaller file and thus less disc space. I do understand that I could have left out Premier altogether and gone directly from Compressor to Encore, but then I would not have had the H264 choice..;is this right...I am not entirely au fait with all the terms:)
So far, no crashes or weird behaviour. I am on a MacPro Quad Core 2 Porcessor 2.8 GHZ processor.
Tim

Thanks for the advice. I now have the project in Encore. While it played perfectly in Premiere, it cannot do so in Encore. Maybe this is because I have the settings set to the highest resolution- 1920 x 1080 and Blu Ray NTSC. I am trying to set up chapters and it is very jerky trying to get to the right place. Shou/ld I be doing this at a lower resolution and then changing things at the end?
Also I currently have DVD Transcode set to automatic and Blu-ray Transcode set to Automatic.
Are these settings going to look at the best on a 54" Samsung HDTV 1080i ? I notice a whole slew of choices in the drop down!!
I am ploughing through the Lynda.com tutorials, but some of these questions don't seem to be answered there.
I am planning on saving things to hard drive so I can test before burning...is this feasible on a mac?
Tim

Why should I switch from Final Cut X?

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