We Can't Turn Back Now - Can we?

There's been a heck of a lot of hype about Apple's release of Final Cut Pro X. More than a few cups of Haterade have been dumped on the preliminary release, and there is no shortage of voices from the professional editing community claiming that the release of FCPX is the begining of the end for Apple's Pro Apps. I haven't purchased / played with FCPX yet, but what I've heard hasn't been nice. If the reviews on Apple's Mac App Store can be considered a reliable source of customer feedback, FCPX may just be Apple's Windows Me. Remember Windows Me? Exactly. Collossal fail. But, hey, Apple was due for one.

I've had numerous conversations with students, instructors and editors about FCPX in the last month and I have yet to hear anyone who buys in to Apple's spin on the situation which is, "Listen. Change is always difficult. What Apple has done is change the game fundamentally. Editing as you know it is unnecessarily cumbersome. What we've done with FCPX is lay the foundation for a new NLE paradigm. Get through the growing pains and you'll find yourself wondering how you ever got anything done the old way." Me, I'm not buying it - and I'm just one device short of being an offical Apple fanboy. You know who else isn't buying it? Freelance editor and BAVC Apple Pro Apps instructor, David Santamaria. He recently forwarded me a great post that he submitted to SF Cutters, an online discussion group for all things Final Cut Pro. It's a great read. Here is an excerpt for your enjoyment:

"I recently started working on a short comedy about a half-mountain climbing guide who only takes his climbers up half to 2/3rds of a mountain before turning back, and moving on to the next mountain.  He's a great climber and climbing guide, but not very popular with the majority of climbers who get struck by summit fever.   

I was thinking this morning that this is a semi-decent analogy for what bugs me about the release of FCPX. Apple seemed so close to reaching the top of its game in the editing world. Instead of reaching the top, they decided to change the game/move on to the next game.  Here we are, having, in a sense, walked along/up with Apple through FCP's many iterations. We gave feedback, and for the most part,  Apple kept improving the software.  Not that I have software summit fever, but FCP, was oh so close. 

"Alright, let's turn it around and climb another mountain." And so Apple has taken us to the next mountain, FCP X. Here we are, if we choose to stay with the guide/Apple, starting from pretty close to the bottom of another mountain.  

How close they were to reaching the top with the software is debatable.  In my mind, with a few changes, FCP 8 would havebeen a phenomenal piece of editing software. Here's my wish list, I'm sure, if you cared to, you could add to it, and who knows, maybe Adobe, or ??? will listen.  
 
1) Just making a 64bit version of FCP 7 would have been pretty damn fine. 

2) More stability for the entire suite, definitely. 

3)Some interface changes were overdue. Certainly a less subtle interface(think of things like the faint gray line on timeline tracks that determines whether a dragged clip is inserted or overwritten into a sequence). 

4)A more stable media manager and overall improvements to the media management portion of the program like a copy to scratch disk checkbox feature upon imports. 

5) a timeline that could work with other wrappers besides movs  


On a more personal note, I've been disappointed with how Apple has dealt with their Certified Trainers. That's not to say they wont come up with something that makes itall right, but up to now, big disappointment. Usually, they contact trainers a month or two after they release the software. We receive emails from Apple letting us know that we'll need to take a new certification test showing we understand the changes to the software and we'll be able to teach these changes to the FCP editing world.  FCP X was such a dramatic shift in the software, and as of yet, they haven't reached out to us in any way.  With such a major overhaul, they should have given us a heads up and contacted us the moment the software was released, if not sooner.  

On another personal note, it sucks being an expert at something that may soon be obsolete. In this regard, I can't say Apple hasn't prepared me.  I used to teach DVD Studio Pro. The classes were often full, until...  Apple stopped updating the program and that was that. 

If nothing else, the release of FCP X, and being an expert at potentially dead-end software, has made me rethink how I approach this career in film and editing.  I'm not sure where the rethinking will take me, yet.  Maybe I need to join the half-mountain climbing guide and climb a bunch of half-mountains for a while to figure it all out."