is final cut pro easy to work with

lrdlrd · Post by **lrdlrd** » Mon Jun 26, 2006 6:59 pm

i am going to buy a mac so i want to know if final cut pro is easy to work with

Pwolf · Post by **Pwolf** » Mon Jun 26, 2006 7:23 pm

i think it's harder then Premiere, even more so if you've never used a mac before.

Pwolf

Minion · Post by **Minion** » Mon Jun 26, 2006 7:34 pm

depends on your video experience.
if all you've worked with is wmm, you'll need to do alot of reading before you undestand a damn thing.
if you know premiere, then it shouldn't take you too long to work with final cut.
i've fidled with it once or twice in tech school

Qyot27 · Post by **Qyot27** » Mon Jun 26, 2006 9:47 pm

The couple of times I tried using it at college I hated it, but I'm well accustommed to Premiere 6.5. I don't like the whole 'drop the clip on top of another one to do transitions' approach that we were shown, and I could not figure out how to set it so that it would snap, although we were told that there was an option for it. That just reminded me way too much of using Magix when I was in High School, and I hate Magix with an undying passion.

CelticWhisper · Post by **CelticWhisper** » Wed Jun 28, 2006 6:46 pm

It depends on your experience with video and also a bit of your experience using the Macintosh.

Macs (or rather, the Mac OS interface) take(s) a very common-sense approach to manipulating onscreen objects. Instead of being a menu driven "File-->Insert-->Position" methodology, about 90% of operations on the Mac (and, as a result, in Mac applications) is done via drag-n-drop. I've used editors on a number of platforms (for professional work too, not just hobby stuff) and once you get used to FCP, it's a lot easier to use than other software.

So I'd say that it has a steep learning curve for the unfamiliar, but once you get used to it, actually using it day-to-day is pretty straightforward. Better than Premiere, anyway, in my experience.

Hard to learn, easy to use. If you're a newcomer to the Mac (welcome, by the way, on behalf of us Mac-heads), you might try iMovie just to get your feet wet and get accustomed to the way MacOS apps handle things. You're less likely to get frustrated with iMovie's interface if you're getting used to a whole new way of doing things than you are with FCP.

Either way, though, damn fine choice of editing software.

Shazzy · Post by **Shazzy** » Thu Jun 29, 2006 1:06 am

FCP has quite a few difficulties if you're using it for AMVs. Honestly, I don't believe it's any more problematic than other professional editing programs, but you don't have the same help from the community. When Macs make up ~5% of computer users, you can imagine the resulting lack of tech support. There aren't any full-fledged Using-FCP-for-AMV guides at the moment (though I'm compiling one!). Basically, you're going to be doing a good deal of trial and error just to function.

Try iMovie or Media Edit Pro. They're much more efficient as learning tools and will ease you into FCP.

Shazzy · Post by **Shazzy** » Thu Jun 29, 2006 1:10 am

Qyot27 wrote:The couple of times I tried using it at college I hated it, but I'm well accustommed to Premiere 6.5. I don't like the whole 'drop the clip on top of another one to do transitions' approach that we were shown, and I could not figure out how to set it so that it would snap, although we were told that there was an option for it. That just reminded me way too much of using Magix when I was in High School, and I hate Magix with an undying passion.

You can insert transitions by right-clicking in the timeline, dragging the transition object itself onto two clips in the timeline, or through a custom trim edit.

Snapping turns on by pressing the "n" key or by going to the View menu and selecting Snapping.

Psygnius · Post by **Psygnius** » Thu Jun 29, 2006 1:12 am

I disagree that iMovie is a good "ease into FCP". I've only used iMovie a couple of times back in OS9 days. I'm not sure if much has changed between the OSX version and the obsolete version, but from my experience, iMovie is too basic... kinda like WMM but with transitions and title effects.

I would just suggest Premiere on the PC as probably the most sufficient way to "ease your learning curve into FCP".

Shazzy · Post by **Shazzy** » Thu Jun 29, 2006 1:17 am

Psygnius wrote:I disagree that iMovie is a good "ease into FCP".

Premier probably is closer interface-wise, but if he's barely switching to a Mac, I dunno. Using FCP and learning the Mac interface in one go?

CelticWhisper · Post by **CelticWhisper** » Thu Jun 29, 2006 10:00 am

shazzy wrote:When Macs make up ~5% of computer users, you can imagine the resulting lack of tech support.

I feel compelled to point out that this is a fallacy. Macs make up a smaller market share of computers overall, but the vast majority of professional video editing houses use either Avid (if it's a huge company running a renderfarm) or, you guessed it, Final Cut Pro.

So you're going to get just as much tech support with FCP as you will with another editor. Finding support for the system itself isn't as hard as it used to be either, since you really just need to go to Open-Source user groups now that OS X is based on BSD. Finding support for FCP is a matter of going to a pro video editors' website and/or forum-they're usually Final Cut-centric or they have sections for all the major editing apps.

For help with FCP, try http://www.dvcreators.net