When will people stop hating FCPX?

FCPGuy wrote: This is a common trend that has been introduced when individuals where introduced in this industry that are not really heavy on the creative background side. … .

Excellent!

In the 90ies, I noticed first on crew-sheets 'operator'.
Than 'editor'.

Same in other areas, photography, music, graphic design, industrial design, etc.

We do have the spec-sheet-memorizers, the knob-turners, the engineers.
And we do have the artists …

http://9to5mac.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/wwdc-2010-keynote-steve-jobs-walks-in-front-of-liberal-arts-technology-slide.png?w=704

Julian wrote: It really bums me out how badly they fucked this up, where was Steve Jobs on this?

He was not doing so well healthwise. But even when Steve was fully on top of things, mistakes were made at Apple in other areas. People are, despite what you may have heard, just human after all.

Apple made some bad calls with FCPX, but apart from withdrawing the old version too soon, none were that serious (as long as you had or could get the old version and kept some perspective and common sense about the timeline for new software development). They were absolutely right to change and cool heads could see the light at the end of the tunnel. The more vitriolic responses, apart from often being couched in nasty turns of phrase and personal attacks, were pretty silly and make laughable reading now.

Despite the issues with how the introduction and the nascent but growing state of FCPX, the visceral reaction is, IMHO, extremely unprofessional in many quarters.

I've worked through facilities that went through many product transition growing pains which had included the demise of the CMX6000 (very small user base) to Avid's "we're dropping Mac support" and reversal, to the death of Discreet *Edit and, while all resulted in complaints, they were professional and critical.

The "FCPX is a toy" and "Apple doesn't care" response speaks to the number of people who have entered the field without business civility IMHO.

As professional we often find ourselves working together as years go by (or at least we used to, maybe that's part of the issue) and we choose the tools we personally feel most productive with or best suites the business of our facilities.

Hi Craig,

I couldn't agree more. Having gone through all these transitions myself and our company in the past 35 years I have never witnessed such a childish and unprofessional flood of ignorant reactions to an entirely new and truly promising product. So yes, very well said.

When will people stop hating FCPX? HOw about when it becomes a mature and stable editing platform?

For the past year I have been switching back and forth between FCPX and Adobe Premiere CS 5.5 and CS 6.x, different projects being done on one or the other. Mainly to compare, but also because there were, to be honest, things I liked about FCPX (magnetic timeline--some of the time, for instance) and things I liked about Premiere (interface, dynamic link). I run a small editing station using a 2.8 GHz Quad Core Mac Pro with 16GB Ram and blah blah its good but not top of the line and I know I'd do better with a faster GPU but until I can afford one the stock ATI Radeon 5770 will have to do.

I have been suffering far too many stalls and app quits in FCPX, and today after several of those in a row I've had it, I'm not going to waste my time anymore with it, it's Total Divorce, FCPX is getting the boot from my computer as soon as I've exported each project as a QT 422 file and XML. So long FCPX, you were a cute thing, but I prefer the more mature type...and no, I don't want anyone's advice on this, don't interfere in my techno-marriage and I won't in yours.

I can easily post reports such as yours about PPro CS6. I know people who have entirely corrupted projects in CS6. At least when FCPX crashes it bounces right back with everything intact.

I have several computers here including a 2008 MacPro 8 Core, only 8GB RAM, ATI Radeon 5770. While FCPX is not as responsive as on my 2011 MBP and it does occasionally crash it takes only seconds to reopen exactly where it should be.

You can certainly chose an app that's most stable for you but there's NO REASON TO HATE an app especially when others can post that it's stable.

FCPX is fairly demanding on the system and if your machine is not up to the task that's no reason to HATE an app either.

If you've seen the BareFeats posts I've made on another thread, it shows that a late 2012 27" iMac BTO Quad i7 with nVideo 680MX better in many respects than a 2010 MacPro 6 Core with Radeon 5870.

I appreciate your frustration mjscox, and I won't tell you that you're not having a crappy experience. You obviously are.

But you should at least consider what effect your machine configuration is having on the experience. I'm running a 2011 iMac and over the last 10 months I've been working every day with the software, have been decidedly confused by a lot of the comments I read from people about persistent crashes and lost or corrupted data. FCPX has been way more solid for me than FCP7 ever was, and even on the occasional time I have a crash, I've never lost any work- even my most recent edits. And I think you'll find a lot of people having an experience similar to mine.

So while I'll be the first one to admit that the platform needs to mature, I think your specific issues might be more based on YOUR specific situation, rather than a fault in the software itself in this case.

Totally agree. And don't get my rant wrong: this is about My experience, My platform, My problem, My "techno-divorce" from fcpx. The only reason, actually, that I posted this was because I feel so let down by this application. I bought it, and so I have the option of reinstalling it down the road. But for now, I'm outta here.

You've got to work with the gear you've got- so if FCPX is a frustrating experience on that machine, then you've got to do what you have to in order to get the work done.

In general, I think 2013 will be a really interesting year for FCPX from both a hardware and software perspective. I think we'll see the first "major" revision to FCPX this year (10.1) and we'll finally see Apple's vision for the future of the professional desktop. With those two releases, all the armchair quarterbacking and guesswork will be over, and people will know where Apple's commitment to this space is, and whether it aligns with their business.

Good editing!

OK, time to speak truth at the risk of more negative karma points I don't give a rat's behind about. But this is the truth.

As much as I love FCP X, I will readily admit is has major stability issues. I was helping a friend yesterday, in fact, who has flat out lost projects, lost data, lost files. Worked one day just fine. Fired up FCP X the next day to continue and the Events were GONE. We finally got them back, but they were empty. Over 24 hours later he got his event back intact, after a LOT of hairbrained ideas we both came up with. And he has gone through this several times, delaying his deliveries past deadline.

So to say FCP X is more stable or as stable as anything else is blatantly not factually true. The databases have major corruption issues for many users. Not for everyone, but I have several users I've helped who've "lost data 100%". I have, also, lost data on some work once. It's a minority of users, but it happens, and makes FCP X tough to make a living with for them.

I don't think PPro users have lost data as much as FCP X users have. There is going to be major growing pains with FCP X as it was released incomplete. So it is only a matter of time. The question is, how much time will it take? Quick enough to salvage the users we have now? Or so long FCP looses too much ground to continue?

Every new feature, every new command, every new behavior added opens it up to more and more bugs. That is the reality of software engineering. It is my hope that 2013 sees FCP X stabilize the databases more, or at least offer an Auto-Save function built-in along with a database repair routine such as Aperture has.

Your hardware configuration has nothing to do with the stability of the databases. They were much more stable in Final Cut Server, and this is the exact same engine. So they CAN be more stable, we just have to wait for the pro apps dev team to work that out. Now that we have pretty much all of the basic functions we need, let's hope they attack the stability issues ASAP.

mjscox is having an experience that is more common than many wish to admit. As a consultant, trainer, engineer, I have had many, many, many people come to me directly with FCP X issues. Database and general stability is for real and not tied to the hardware you're running. Speed and responsiveness are tied to hardware configurations.

Did FCP 7 have the same stability problems? No. Did project files ever become corrupt? Yes. But not on the scale of FCP X. It is getting better, but yes, it has some serious stability issues to overcome.

All of that said, I use it daily and love it. If Apple does with FCP X what I hope they do over 2013, I'm an FCP X user for life. If things such as built-in Auto-Save, database repair, general stability are not addressed and solved, who knows where I'll end up.

I'm a realist.

Point is, mjscox is experiencing something common with many users, and Apple has to seriously address stability and data loss issues right away. I instinctively feel they are.

Some people will probably hate Final Cut Pro X in perpetuity. Some will hate it because of the way it was introduced to the industry. Some will hat it because its not "Final Cut 8". Some will hate it because its not Avid. Some will hate it because it forces them to change how they do things (or will force them to do that). Some will hate it because its missing their favorite feature. Some will hate it because of new features. Some people will hate it because it has "X" as part of its name. And some will hate it because someone that they talk to or whose blog they follow said that it was unfit for use.

There are more reasons that people will continue to hate Final Cut Pro X than I have the time and interest to list.

Rather than spending more energy on why people don't like it, I'm going to spend time using it to do the things I like. Hope you get the chance to do the same.

Totally agreed, grailz.

I don't think it's about love or hate (at least for serious people), it's more about works or doesn't work.
So even those who love it in some cases have to admit that it doesn't work in special (needed) workflow. Others who say "it's not a professional piece of software" have to admit that for many jobs it's a perfect tool.
As Ben I'm doing a lot of workflow consulting (and a lot of help for some friends). I had a "end of year" discussion with a customer (one of those which are visited by the AAA companies quite often). This customer belongs to the first group saying "if it would be possible to integrate it into our daily workflow it will be our choice".
So make what you want out this quote. Depending on the context (or better taking it out of it) it could mean "not a professional software", "doesn't work at all" and so on. So you can have a lot of fun with partial or commented citations.

Ok, well think about it this way.

The Black Magic Cinema camera is basically a DSLR reinvented. There have been a ton of delays and many issues with the camera overall. But the buzz about this new product is how absolutely amazing it is and even if this first one isn't everything we want, it's going to have great potential.

Now people think that because the BMCC is something pretty different and shooters understand that there will be issues that come up and get fixed.

Now pretend that FCPX was made by a company other than Apple and treated this as a version one product. Editors would be in love with it, sure it wouldn't have everything they want now, but what it offers is so different and there is just so much potential for the future.

But because it's Apple and everyone always has a crazy love hate relationship with Apple they all just hate FCPX.

I think that's what the real issue is. All these version 1 issues will be worked out and it will be able to do what people need, it's just not there yet.

Agree with you, Ben, I too will look for major improvements to FCPX, but in the meantime I have projects to complete and as I am conversant with Premiere (much thanks to Maxim Jago on Video2Brain for his tutorials) I'll stick with it for now, as I've had fewer issues with it.

A side note, or question, to stir the pot: we don't know Apple's game plan, not really. We can guess, but we don't know for sure. The FCPX intro debacle is over and done with; but then they do that mapping disaster on the phones; they haven't made any new Mac Pro; they don't support Blu-Ray; I could go on but what I'm getting at is this: I don't entirely trust them, not like I used to (I was a mac evangelist among my friends for many years), and I cannot afford, professionally, to put all my eggs into their i-basket. So that's why I bought and began learning Adobe Premiere, not because I "hate" FCPX or Apple, but I feel I've been burned once too often. Nuff said.

Apple really isn't any different than any other company.

I don't trust Avid because they said they were dropping Mac support (and fortunately reversed that decision). I was a facility engineer that was hit square on with a difficult financial decision as a result.

I don't trust Adobe because they left the Mac market for some years between Original Premiere and the first few years of Adobe Premiere Pro and I was an Adobe Premiere user.

I don't trust Discreet/AutoDesk because they EOL'd Edit DV/Cinestream which I used at home after moving from Premiere, then abandoned Cleaner, EOL'd Edit*, abandoned Combustion.

I don't "hate" any of them. I don't "trust" any company and their primary objective is running their business, not mine. They make decisions appropriate to their bottom line and I do likewise for my business.

At least these days I'm not faced with $60,000 an Avid seat concern when a company considers dropping support. So I do trust the democratization process that allows me a much shorter ROI should I need to shift software or hardware.

I don't think there is that big of a connection between Apple Maps and FCPX. Completely different teams and completely different impact on the company. Apple Maps is only bad because it's going up against Google Maps which have been around since 2005. I just read an article the other day about how dedicated GPS systems still aren't perfect and get people lost. I love Apple Maps and have no issues at all, but I live in SF which is obviously going to be mapped really well.


But if you want to look at the bigger picture it's clear that Apple is shifting to more beta testing with their software. Siri, Maps, FCPX. I believe that this is the way to go for these products, but only if you are really going to listen to feedback on the products, which they clearly are.

Siri and Maps will evolve and become much better products over the next few years because of the huge number of people using them, if they just sat on the product and waited for it to be perfect then it would never be ready.

This is what I think they are doing with FCPX. They have created a completely new NLE and released a beta version (which they should have just stated). With this beta version they are going to work really hard on fine tuning everything and adding the other more complex features as the product evolves. But this means we have to obsessively provide feedback. Is there a thread in this forum where we can keep a running list of feedback we're providing so we can all send them the same message?

There are lots of reasons not to trust any company, but I think Apple is going to prove themselves trustworthy with FCPX in the long run. Apple has so much money that the whole FCPX division probably costs them nothing to run. Creativity is a big part of what makes Apple special, they aren't going to drop the product, they need it to be a part of the company.

Now that Johnny Ive is responsible for all the human interface software designs, I do wonder if he will do anything with FCPX. I really doubt it though, but I am curious about how the FCPX division really does fit in with the rest of Apple.