Does FCP Target The Pro Market?

From Alex's interview with Randy, something I think folks gloss over.

"What was the target for Final Cut Pro?
The center of the target, which I still think is very similar today, is software for the aspirational part of the market. People who want to do something good, most of them not making their living doing video - they would like to some day. They are interested in video and they spend a lot of their spare time doing it. That’s the center of the target."

So the creator of FCP and FCPX claims the "pro market" was not the target. Wow, we were wrong all along? Seriously, Randy, the creator, stating it was not originally intended, nor is today, for the pro market, but for the potential pro market.

I'm not taking a stand, just wondering what folks think, and poking the bee hive one too many times. So, your thoughts on this statement?

Hi Ben, I dont want to upset people, you asked and I answered... I am saddened at the poor quality of design coming out of Cupertino

Surprised to read that FCP X was not intended for the Professional end of the market, but on reflection, nothing Apple does is really aimed at 1 market.

The Pro range of laptops, the Macbook Pro, is truly awful, it is a rank ordinary laptop with a fancy badge...A VW wearing a Porsche badge..looks good but it is not a professional laptop. No user replaceable parts, 13 inch screen, NO 17 inch version..speaks volumes of the focus of Apple.

The 1 or maybe 2 times a year "Pro Apps" are updated, even then with minor updates, the big bugs remain bugs again speaks volumes of the attitude of Apple Dev, this extends to the basically $100 spent on typing for 8 hours 1 page of text to create the Apple.com/Final Cut Pro X home page...No video, nothing...I question why in 2015, no video, yet the previous iteration of FCP had both text and video...

The Mac Pro tower is a joke of industrial design, yes it looks good, but functionally with cables, it is a very poor example of form over function, it has great form, very poor function, it is very bad for cable with Chinese Handcauffs...

I put this down to Jony Ive, he is a great paper designer, a poor industrial designer, and professional products have to be of industrial strength.. The original macbook pro had so many replaceable parts, batteries, RAM, it was easy to service everything your self, as you do in many industries, you buy the tool, and self service...Now it cheaper to buy new if it breaks, not great industrial design.

FCP Classic was a way to tackle the Pro market of Avid headon, like for like, then Apple killed that version and replaced it with a "imovie" version, and called it FCP X.. It is better than imovie, but not by all that much, last nights mention of imovie and ipad pro makes me wonder if imovie is the pro version!!!

My first entry into FCP was via Final Cut Express 3.5 HD, having got used to the interface, I plunged into FCS 2... Loved it... Love FCP X, it has great features, but sadly let down by zero $ spent on marketing, $0.00 on upgrades, $0.00 on decent quality industrial design!!

Is FCP X professional? Too many plug ins by 3rd party developers lets Apple skate on spending a single $ on internal development....

Why not have user replaceable parts in the Pro range? Why not have a dedicated small PR department that replies to emails, that has a public face on forums...

FCP.co has a way more functional efficient forum than the what is a silly example of how not to host a forum at Apple support...

What I am pointing out is not hard nor expensive to implement for a corporation as large as Apple, yet that is the very nature of corporate industry, be it a giant in IT like Apple or a multi-national bank, the same corporate insanity exists, they loose sight of the core business, the high ranking officials become detached from reality, make decisions based on the input/output costs, given no regard to quality or function.

FCPX has suffered the fate of being too small a project in a too big a giant... The world's tallest man Robert Waldow died from a tiny infection in his foot, easily treated, but the nerves in his body were not able to relay the infection pain from his foot to his brain, as a result he died from massive gangrene... Is this the same fate of FCPX?

Lost in the maze of too many projects, too small a project to defy the cost cutting that occurs for illogical reasons in big industrial complex companies such as Apple?

What factual information are you basing your comments on? Such ignorance makes me regret starting this thread. I was hoping for intelligent discussion. Peter, please delete this as flaming and hating without facts was not my intention.

Ms, why do you use Apple products at all?

Hi Ben, you asked for comments, I gave a long detailed commentary about what I think.

I think of the 3 players in the "Pro" market, Apple has the best idea, very poor execution of that idea, the poor aspects are, infrequent updates, lack of simple fixes such as saving screen layout, they did this in Classic, why not in X??

Why do I use Apple, I prefer it, that does not mean I cannot provide critical feedback, you have a choice, read my posts, or not read my posts, my posts are supported by observations, maybe overlooked by others, or observations not considered important by others...They are important, and if it is to be believed that someone at Apple reads this blog, then my job is done.

If it was not for people like me, how can Apple improve? I am no fangirl, Apple has made strides to improve FCPX, I believe they are not giving it 100% effort, as evidence by the virtually non existent FCPX page at Apple.com.

If it was not for FCP.co, then FCPX would be struggling, this is a great resource, really Apple could and should, and we as the users should pressure Apple to support Mr Wiggans in his effort.

He is doing a great PR exercise for Apple, and not being paid for such efforts, I believe FCP.co should be the number 1 resource for all things Apple Pro, not just video, but logic, and motion...Apple can afford to support FCP.co....

Apple's own website is really lame, it is stupidly designed, had zero Dollars spent updating or upgrading, you asked is FCPX pro...Apple by the evidence of infrequent updating, not supporting it's own website with video, shows a clear path that Apple want nothing to do with FCPX...

OK, whatever, I give up...

No Ben...I do not accept your giving up...
I explained what I think is wrong with Apple Pro Dev, with FCPX, the ethos at Apple Inc.

It is my own observations as to how I see things, why Macbook pro laptops had to change into the lame expensive ones they are, there is no technical reason as to why they are the way they are...

I understand industrial design, and consumer grade design, they are very very different animals, if you are going to use a suffix such as PRO, being Pro-fessional, this indicates a grade above the consumer level...Professionals are more than part time users, as you mentioned this was where FCPX was intended, and it was to this market the macbook pro was designed for and sold to.

I strongly suspect Apple Inc suffers from Corporate Blindness, when a company gets too big, it looses sight of the things that matter..Really should Apple be building a car? Designing a new Apple TV, with a new operating system...Too many cooks spoil the broth..

What is next for Apple in 2020? Apple Air...A rival to Boeing? Airbus? Learjet?

Does FCP target the Pro Market? It does and does it better than Avid and Adobe, but that does not grant them, Apple, immunity from criticism, nor does it excuse poor industrial design...I think the macbook pro range is a hunk of silver junk, it is better junk than what HP produces..Apple has not applied it's mind to the task at hand, it has let down a segment of the market that Steve may have considered important...

To answer on your original question Ben:

I also mentioned this at the Creative Cow forum after someone posted the interview, because I also found it a bit of a worrying statement, especially considering from who it came.

On the other hand, I try to 'comfort' myself with the statement:
Apple made Color affordable, they were at the forefront of making serious color grading accessible.
They pioneered with their Prores Codec.
They have an automated Proxy workflow in FCPX, great RED RAW support in FCPX, ...
A lot of their new features (look at 10.1.4 with MXF etc.) are really targeted towards professionals...

I think when people focus in the discussion about 'does Apple care about the pro's', people are quick to point out the negatives (Shake, Color, Soundtrack Pro, Aperture, ...) but don't always mention the positives (introduction of Prores, Color, Thunderbolt, ...). That being said, the above statement did worry me a bit, I can't deny.

Interesting to hear this, but I get the feeling we all kind of suspected this to some degree anyway? I mean in reality wouldn't you want all software to be simple enough to use casually but at the same time to be detailed enough to use professionally? I think thats what he meant fundamentally. It was always priced lower than other top level professional software too.

Think of all the amateurs who use Photoshop. Like FCP its easy enough to get started with casually and just mess around with, but when you're ready you can start getting into the details and start using it professionally. FCP is not that different.

Unlike AVID, for instance which was always aimed at a professional market both in price and in usability.

Nothing new that I can see, really.

At the end of the edit, the viewers sees 1 video track, maybe stereo audio, or 5.1 surround sound...Does it really matter how complex the interface is?

Who said professional had to be complicated?? Professional is using the tools to tell the best story, be it movie maker on a windows 3.1 machine, a $150 000 Avid system or a $300 piece of software from Apple called FCP X...

Larry Jordon said it best..What ever software allows you to get more jobs done in the shortest time, is the best software for you..It is about speed of completion of projects, NOT COMPLEXITY of interface!!

BenB wrote: They are interested in video and they spend a lot of their spare time doing it. That’s the center of the target."

One more thing Ben, I think the key word in that quote is center; that is that professionals were not the center of the market. Because casual users is where the bulk of the money would come from. Thats got to be true of FCPX today; most of the sales must be to casual users and not professional editing houses. Simple economies of scale.

But the word center means that the professional users are still included as a market, but on the edge, in terms of numbers.

But very interesting to see him say it nonetheless.

Yeah, I think you hit right on that point. The bulk of the market are folks who "want" to do pro work, but aren't working as pros, or are lower food chain (for lack of better phrase) freelancers. Was a time when broadcast networks and Hollywood were 100% of the market. Now, the market is pretty much everyone and their cousin. Making networks and Hollywood studios the minority. But folks still want to measure everything by what networks and major studios do. So yeah, good point.

Since Jobs returned to Apple they were always focused on the "center". That is the market. But look at the iPhone/iPad/MacBooks and you will see that customers are buying these devices to use in their jobs. Once they are dependent on these devices then the enterprise decides they also needs to buy Apple equipment. Not sure if it is a strategy of Apple's but it has played well for them. Just look at the partnerships with IBM and Cisco. How does this apply to FCPX. One million purchases of the product and now FCPX is being used for editing major motion pictures. In fact I saw a movie this weekend on Netflix that was edited in FCPX, Gordon Family Tree. This movie came out in 2013 so it must have been edited on a older version of FCPX then the version used on Focus. So what am I saying in this rambling post, Apple is doing what they do best, making software and devices that people want. And in the end who cares if they are aiming for the "center" because all across the markets their products are being used by professionals. Yes I want to see some new features for FCPX and I am confident that they will be implemented sooner than later.

I'd say more than ever apple is supporting the "pro" market whatever that may fall into.
Whether it is the indie filmmaker, event videographer, or whatever it may be. they've done this by making products that increase efficiency for everyone.

OSX can transcode Prores for us; to me that says something.

FCPX is crazy efficient, and efficiency in how one works is often what separates pros from amateurs.

"...efficiency in how one works is often what separates pros from amateurs."

At least it separates who lands the nice productions and who gets stuck with the crap work. LOL!

I agree with Simon, many popular software options were not necessarily 'intended' for the market that they eventually captured. Photoshop was designed as a graphics arts solution for the offset print industry ... not a digital pixel editing option for the masses.

I also agree that the aspiring video editor may have been the 'center' of the target at the conception and initial introduction of FCP ... but it surely has evolved into an extremely formidable option that is easy to learn, implement and expand upon.

The efficiency aspect is also an extremely valuable aspect of utilizing FCP X. I have been a full-time professional photographer for over 40 years. I have owned and used Apple computers in my business since 1993. I also owned and operated a custom color print lab that severed several hundred pro clients that spanned the days of film and enlargers to a 12 workstation fully digital process. I never understood why some folks think that 'professional' has to equate to 'complicated' ...

I value the simplicity of use and fluidity of working with FCP X ... I also value the modest price tag and the fact that every license holder has received many outstanding updates, improvements and additional features for no additional cost ... if I had been using Premier Pro for the same span of time, my wallet would be much lighter and I don't think I would feel the same about the efficiency aspect.

Randy may have shared a comment that could be concerning when taken in isolation ... I wouldn't worry too much about it ... after all, Apple has always listed FCP as a 'Pro' app.

FCP was never intended for the "pro" market. Actually they were very surprised about it's success in the television and film business.

FCP X is a completely different story. It was created at a time where the lines between "pro" and "prosumer" already had disappeared. When FCP was created you still needed tons of hardware to use it professionally. Today, everyone with some talent can create television shows on a MacBookPro. I even know of a dozen features that have been cut solely on an MBP. FCP X is intended for these new markets, where there is no real distinction between "pro" and "amateur" anymore. It has everything we need to create high-profile television content and movies, while it is still very accessible for anyone who just starts editing. That's why I think it is far better adapted to the changing markets than any other NLE out there.

- Ronny

I remember "Pro-sumer" being an actual label used all over the place. Basically it referred to wedding and event videographers. I actually did a stint for about 5 years as a wedding and event videographer. Was some decent money at the time, and everyone and their cousin was trying to get in on the "easy money". Trust me, there wasn't anything "easy" about that type of work. The only medium was mini-dv tape, and you shot either NTSC or PAL standard definition. Then one day HDV came along, and everything went to hell...

But yeah, pro-sumer, what a really odd label...

MsJustine wrote: Hi Ben, I dont want to upset people, you asked and I answered... I am saddened at the poor quality of design coming out of Cupertino

Surprised to read that FCP X was not intended for the Professional end of the market, but on reflection, nothing Apple does is really aimed at 1 market.

The Pro range of laptops, the Macbook Pro, is truly awful, it is a rank ordinary laptop with a fancy badge...A VW wearing a Porsche badge..looks good but it is not a professional laptop. No user replaceable parts, 13 inch screen, NO 17 inch version..speaks volumes of the focus of Apple.

The 1 or maybe 2 times a year "Pro Apps" are updated, even then with minor updates, the big bugs remain bugs again speaks volumes of the attitude of Apple Dev, this extends to the basically $100 spent on typing for 8 hours 1 page of text to create the Apple.com/Final Cut Pro X home page...No video, nothing...I question why in 2015, no video, yet the previous iteration of FCP had both text and video...

The Mac Pro tower is a joke of industrial design, yes it looks good, but functionally with cables, it is a very poor example of form over function, it has great form, very poor function, it is very bad for cable with Chinese Handcauffs...

I put this down to Jony Ive, he is a great paper designer, a poor industrial designer, and professional products have to be of industrial strength.. The original macbook pro had so many replaceable parts, batteries, RAM, it was easy to service everything your self, as you do in many industries, you buy the tool, and self service...Now it cheaper to buy new if it breaks, not great industrial design.

FCP Classic was a way to tackle the Pro market of Avid headon, like for like, then Apple killed that version and replaced it with a "imovie" version, and called it FCP X.. It is better than imovie, but not by all that much, last nights mention of imovie and ipad pro makes me wonder if imovie is the pro version!!!

My first entry into FCP was via Final Cut Express 3.5 HD, having got used to the interface, I plunged into FCS 2... Loved it... Love FCP X, it has great features, but sadly let down by zero $ spent on marketing, $0.00 on upgrades, $0.00 on decent quality industrial design!!

Is FCP X professional? Too many plug ins by 3rd party developers lets Apple skate on spending a single $ on internal development....

Why not have user replaceable parts in the Pro range? Why not have a dedicated small PR department that replies to emails, that has a public face on forums...

FCP.co has a way more functional efficient forum than the what is a silly example of how not to host a forum at Apple support...

What I am pointing out is not hard nor expensive to implement for a corporation as large as Apple, yet that is the very nature of corporate industry, be it a giant in IT like Apple or a multi-national bank, the same corporate insanity exists, they loose sight of the core business, the high ranking officials become detached from reality, make decisions based on the input/output costs, given no regard to quality or function.

FCPX has suffered the fate of being too small a project in a too big a giant... The world's tallest man Robert Waldow died from a tiny infection in his foot, easily treated, but the nerves in his body were not able to relay the infection pain from his foot to his brain, as a result he died from massive gangrene... Is this the same fate of FCPX?

Lost in the maze of too many projects, too small a project to defy the cost cutting that occurs for illogical reasons in big industrial complex companies such as Apple?

I agree it you on the Mac Pro it is really the fifth wheel in the Pro Wagon.
But just as reminder the Porsche Pro Racing are actually belong to VW.

CMD C then CMD V my entire comment then 2 lines of your thoughts ???

What I was trying to say about VW is that the macbook pro is a rank ordinary laptop, with a fancy badge, it has no unique features that makes it better than a top of the line HP or other brand laptop...

Apple is spread too thin, too many projects, smaller projects such as FCPX will be lost in the maze of organograms and corporate culture, this is a fact of how corporate industry works..HQ looses touch with the reality of on the ground work, in the chase to improve profits for the number 1 client of Apple, that is the shareholders...

Bold design is a swear word, now it is clone technology, all laptops are the same, same RAM, same HDD, same screens,and the same damn glue and solder..Makes me wonder if Jony has secret shares in the glue and solder suppliers...If I was abusing the glue and solder to the degree his designs call for, I would sure heck spend my Apple bonus buying shares in the glue and solder companies...

It was not so hard to design the previous version of the mbp, with replaceable batteries, RAM, keyboard, screen, fans, logic board, ifixit supplied the tools, and the how to...Now you throw it away as soon as it stutters....a wicked horrible waste..example of poor industrial design.

Maybe that is the problem with Tim.He does not know about industrial design, and Jony, a great paper designer, but short on great industrial projects..

The iphone is boring, looks the same from iteration 1 to iteration 7...ipads with no expansion ports, and a confusing operating system that makes data transfer frustrating...

In the end, none of that matters, as the Apple drones line up for 10 days prior to launch, to spend money on new inferior products...

I think Apple could do better, the shareholders think not...They win..

Its not that surprising I suppose. It's clearly an 'accessible' program for the masses given the pricing etc, an when it came out it real actively tried to hide it's inner workings, (Remember the sparse disk images workaround?). I think its found its feet since the the 10.1 release, and given the huge drop in price of high end camera what counts as 'professional' is always being redefined.

All I can say is that for my work it makes me faster, which makes it easier to deliver a high quality product. Although it still rankles me that we have 3D text but still no audio mixing (grrrrr).