Final Cut Studio won't be dumbed down
On Tuesday, Appleinsider wrote that Apple's Final Cut team may refocus the application suite's focus from its current professional target to a more "prosumer" type of customer. Since then, many avid Final Cut Studio users have lamented the possibility of an iMovie 8-style "dumbing down" of the video editing suite, fearing that Apple's catering to "prosumer" users would mean excising the "pro" from Final Cut Pro.Apple spokesman Bill Evans told CNET that's not going to happen. He stresses Apple's commitment to its professional video editor customers and says, "The next version of Final Cut is going to be awesome, and our pro customers are going to love it." This echoes remarks from a Steve Jobs e-mail last month, where he assured a concerned Final Cut Pro user that people removed from the Final Cut team "were in support, not engineering." "Next release will be awesome," Jobs said.
It may be the case that Apple is focusing on making Final Cut Express more user-friendly for those used to the simpler interface of iMovie, while still maintaining the features professionals have demanded of Final Cut Studio. Hopefully we should know one way or the other soon; Final Cut Studio's last update was July 23 of last year.
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On Tuesday, Appleinsider wrote that Apple's Final Cut team may refocus the application suite's focus from its current professional target...
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IF you have a commitment to your professional video editor customers then put an ExpressCard slot back in my 15" Macbook Pro!
May 21 2010 at 3:15 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyI think saying "avid Final Cut Studio" might be a bad choice of words. Since a company called Avid is a big competitor to apple, at least in broadcast anyway! lol :)
May 20 2010 at 2:22 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyHahaha, I wondered how long it would take someone to pick up on that.
May 20 2010 at 4:16 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyAs a true power user for almost 10 years now. I think the last FCP was one of the most important and critical updates in years. The new ways to manage folders and projects was greatly needed, and this improvement is the just the starting point.
People that complain about the last update either don't know what they are talking about or are busy riding the Negative Nancy Train.
Keep in mind bells and whistles do nothing until you add creativity to make music.
How about an "Express" mode? So you could lash things together in a simpler interface, then throw the "Deep" switch and dig in.
May 20 2010 at 10:41 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Replythat's kind of what I meant. They do this a little in Garageband and I think iMovie.
also, to the folks saying 'but they would have to put in Blu-ray drives', no they don't. And someone reminded me that there's already very crude support, without built in drives, in DSP.
Actually Final Cut could REALLY use a user-experience overhaul. I can't believe video editing software is still so strongly based on its analog counterpart. Just look at the current final cut interface, it's an unmanagable mess of grey buttons, sliders, knobs, tabs, windows and panels.
"PRO" doesn't have to mean archaic and old-fashioned. If there's one thing the iPhone and iPad revolution has made clear it's that user interface design can improve dramatically if you cast away all the old presumptions of how an interface should look and work.
For a very thoughtful response to the AI article, read this:
http://www.philiphodgetts.com/2010/05/18/why-apple-insider-couldnt-be-more-wrong/
Does anybody else feel that Final Cut has some of the (pardon the French) shittiest UI on the entire OS? It still looks like it belongs on OS9. The whole program can use a major usability facelift!
Does anybody know of a timetable for the new release?
I do. I could go with some serious interface improvements. Sure, After Effects crashes, doesn't render sound right, can't fix a crash on quit bug, etc - but at least my background can be black!
May 20 2010 at 3:30 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyHave you used Color? It has such an awful GUI. I think Apple was trying to make it look more like a sci-fi prop.
May 20 2010 at 8:24 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyThe only thing ever "dumbed-down" was the quality of blogging on this topic. Someone asks Jobs about FCP in an email and gets a response, "just wait, it will be awesome" and that gets translated to "OMG! Final Cut is getting axed!!!!!11!!!!"
Yeah, I was really puzzled after reading that AI article. Apple would be shooting themselves in the foot for dumbing down FCP. It's such an essential (and ubiquitous) tool in every TV station and post house I've worked in.
64 bit support. bring back Shake. change DVD studio pro to more of a Media Studio with DVD, Bluray, itunes etc
as far as the prosumer thing goes, I wouldn't mind a two mode system where the default view is the most common stuff and with a settings change, you can activate the full feature set.
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