*** FCPX vs Premiere Pro ****

Hey gang! Several people on here convinced me to let go of FCP7. I have 6 months to edit a feature film and I need to decide if I'm going to use FCPX or Premiere Pro. I really need your advice to choose what program I'm going to learn. I've watched numerous videos regarding the difference between the two, but we have some great professionals on here and I'm really counting on your expertise. Color correction is very important in this movie, so I really need to nail the cinematic look. I'll probably use some plug-ins from Red Giant. The question is FCPX or Premiere Pro?

Since you actually are in an FCPX forum people here will most likely advise you to use exactly that. Things might be different if you ask in a Premiere forum

I recommend FCPX. No doubt about that.

You're using FCP 7 now and you have six months to put together a feature, and you want to choose between two applications you've never used before, at least one of which is conceptually radically different from any you've used before? My suggestion would be: don't. A feature is deeply complex; six months is desperately short, and going into new apps for this is like jumping off a cliff in the dark and hoping it isn't too far down. I honestly don't thing this is fair to the people you're working with to take this on under these circumstances.

In many ways I agree with Tom, but, as words of encouragement...

My favourite film from last year was shot AND edited in about 3 months. It also won an academy award for best editing and best sound mixing.

I have no idea what they used to edit that movie, but I think everyone here would agree, it doesn't really matter; so long as you have the right "materials", know your "tools", and know how to "build the house" you'll be fine. If you don't, expect leaks, delays, and perhaps a collapse of funds or the house itself. (sorry for the analogy)

I feel more creative and speedy with FCPX to edit, and Resolve to Colour. But for sound I'd let my sound designer/mixer/composer/whateverotherhattheywear choose, and I'd send them the AAF via X2Pro.

Whatever you choose, make sure you know your workflow in and out.

Good luck, I hope you don't need it.

I don't know what film you mean but I'm pretty certain I'm safe in thinking that it wasn't the first time they used whatever software they used.

I agree with the idea Tom is mentioning. On short timelines use what you know.

That being said I know someone who recently cut a feature with FCP X and did it in six weeks. So if you know FCP X you can really move quick.

7Presley, I started writing my general response to you here but then discovered it was going to be a novel so I made an article out of it. I hope it's useful for you. I tried to lay out my experience with both applications.

Here's the link, hope it helps: A Look at FCP X and Premiere Pro

Three months? Six weeks? What's happened to the industry?

Having taught more FCPX classes than I can remember over the past few years, I'd say use FCPX. It is faster to learn, easier to use. I say jump in head first and learn to swim.

Tom Wolsky wrote: Three months? Six weeks? What's happened to the industry?

I agree, it was fast. I don't think he was getting enough sleep in that time period. He was technically the AE but most of the work fell on him. Either way, they had to get it out quick. Independent film, probably pushed by the distributors.

I think there is a case of the original poster not having done any research and is relying on others to convince him of which is better.

FCPX is a once off purchase, and Premiere is a monthly rental only option. Which is better is up to you, for 6 months editing, I don't think rental is the best, the software will change over the course of 6 months, and what do you have, a mess..

A once off purchase is stable, you can update as and when you need, if you need to update, you have control over this aspect 100%.

OK, FCP X is very different in how it works on the timeline, Premiere is akin to FCP7, with the stacked video tracks and audio tracks. If that is what you want, then stick with Premiere, I find this old and outdated, at times frustrating.

Clip AUDITION in the timeline is a great feature of FCPX, you can have different versions of the same clip or different clips in the same audition, with effects applied and play in real time, making creative decisions easy, along with the used/unused indicator, so you can see what you have used.

The super efficient use of subclipping, through the use of smart collections makes finding material quicker.

Lastly is the vast user base of FCP X, there are so many plug in creators, user groups in FCPX that simply do not exist in Premiere/Avid. That alone tells me where I should be looking...

A relevant point for the OP to consider, as color grading was mentioned. One thing that Adobe are trying hard with is color grading. They have just made big improvements to this part of PP. Although I use FCPX for most of my editing and quick color grades I have to round trip to Resolve for serious work and I find that a RPITA. There are so many things that can and do go wrong. Transitions, f/x, etc. Stuff you want to put in before the final grade.

I really wish FCPX had better grading abilities. Yes, I know you have to learn how to use the new color board and I've done that, been using it since the day it was released, but I still don't like it. Color Finale is the plugin that comes closest to getting it right (IMHO) in FCPX but that doesn't have the advanced features like tracking that PP does. I can't see me ever moving back to PP but I feel this is an area that Apple need to improve. (Yup, done the feature request.)

What is the cost of RPITA? Is it worth the monthly rental of Adobe? At this point you have really 2 options, stay 100% within Final Cut Pro X/Resolve or move to rental software, be it Avid/Adobe.

To this day I cannot see a flaw in my request [done the feedback to Apple] about updating Color for 2015, even sandboxing it into 64bit as a trial. Why not...Color was super powerful, yes it was roundtrip plagued with errors, but the app was powerful, and if you launched it as a stand lone it was very very useful...A bit sad that it has been set aside.

To the OP - how much time do you have before your 6 month project begins? Do you consider that enough time to learn a new app?

MsJustine wrote: To this day I cannot see a flaw in my request [done the feedback to Apple] about updating Color for 2015, even sandboxing it into 64bit as a trial. Why not...Color was super powerful, yes it was roundtrip plagued with errors, but the app was powerful, and if you launched it as a stand lone it was very very useful...A bit sad that it has been set aside.

The flaw is at least two fold:
1) It would cost time and money to update it
2) You can get better tools for free (e.g. Resolve) so not many would go back to Apple Color - even if it were also free!

Hi Dave

I would like to disagree with your suggestion of my post idea being flawed, ie too much money, and better apps ie Resolve.

Apple has spent in the past a lot of cash buying software, think of the Color app prior to it being included in Final Cut Studio 2 and 3. This app was a $100 000 stand alone product which Apple shipped for zero $ in Final Cut Studio 2.

The problem with Resolve is that it is external to Apple, it falls outside of product control of Apple, this is both good and bad.

Motion and Compression are $50 stand alone apps, they are not part of Final Cut Pro X, so it really is not that hard to see why Color would not be a $50 app, that works both as a stand alone app and round trips to FCP X.

Apple is one company not shy to spend cash...

MsJustine wrote: Hi Dave

I would like to disagree with your suggestion of my post idea being flawed

Well, that's no surprise really but Apple Color was built on old code, just like FCP7 was and compared to products like Resolve that allow you unlimited corrections / nodes, Apple Color had very limited scope for primary / secondary corrections and lacked lots of the tools now available to us in modern apps (like Resolve).

Apple have spent a ton of money in the past buying these things, but as you said, they are flush with money so can afford to thrown them away rather than spend even more money re-writing them for the modern OS.

Even at $50 I wouldn't buy it unless they improved it dramatically over the original AND made it fully roundtripable for FCPX, something they have yet to do even for Motion. I think you could be waiting a long time.

As I am sure there are better compression software than Compressor, the point is, there should be something between the color board in FCPX and Resolve, maybe Color with a few tweaks could be the stage 2, that 90% of users would use for 90% of workflow, 5% of users would use only the color board, and 5% of power super users would need to go beyond stage 2 and into Resolve or other such...

Just a suggestion...

I don't disagree that we could use better colour tools in FCPX, but then that's what the likes of Color Finale are trying to address.

While I've had some good results with Color Finale, I'm not yet convinced it is enough tool to make me stop going to resolve for the really important stuff.

Having the color built in to FCPX is absolutely the best from a workflow point of view because you can grade things more easily before you get final picture lock.

Now if only we could get Resolve within FCPX instead of them trying to emulate FCPX inside Resolve

Really what I am trying to say, that there is no tool that is more than the color board, and less than Resolve that is part of the Apple Dev team mandate, and that is a huge problem.

Not everyone needs super powerful apps like Resolve, Color Finale is a great start, and many will find this just enough, the problem is that it is not an Apple internal project, which is of course limiting into what can be developed external to Apple.

I just suggested Color as it is Resolve like, it could be I am sure tweaked and the code updated, as was done to get it into the Final Cut Studio package, smart people at Apple...

Just how much needs the power and skills, and the investment of Resolve, you really need qualified calibrated monitors, a color suitable suite, all expense, when many projects do not need this complexity of color correcting..

MsJustine wrote: I just suggested Color as it is Resolve like, it could be I am sure tweaked and the code updated, as was done to get it into the Final Cut Studio package, smart people at Apple... .

Probably easier to re-write the entire thing than to try to port the old code.... or buy in stuff like TrackX and Color Finale and integrate those.

However, it seems that Apple is content to allow the eco system to thrive for now.

Purchase FCPX, Color Finale, and the Slice X/Track X (and coming Drive X) bundle, and you've spent less than you did on a year of the PPro CC rental program. And have a powerful editing system (I've not touched Resolve in almost a year now, and I do tons of color grading).

Also, see the latest virtual user group round table, and you'll see why investing in PPro and MC may be a waste of money at this point. In a nutshell; Apple sacrificed some functionality to go with a new code that will handle the new generations of codecs, processors, media, etc. Now, they're adding more and more third party development ability, and can handle way more 4K, 5K, 6K streams than either PPro or MC can even come close to. Why? Because PPro and MC are both using very old code, very old render engines, that won't handle it. In the long run, FCPX will come out ahead, and both Adobe and Avid will need to do what Apple did already; re-write with modern code and updated, powerful engines, from scratch, geared towards digital media (which neither PPro or MC is made for at this point, but struggle with). Watch the webcast, very good information and insights into why FCPX is the place to "invest" your professional money, time, and training at this point for the long haul.
www.fcp.co/final-cut-pro/articles/1690-r...cut-pro-x-user-group