Re: After a year has perception of FCPX changed?

I now find FCPX to be a great solution for our facility.

We used fcp7 but never as our main solution. M100 was always our main editor, with AE as our compositing tool, and we did most cc in M100 but often used Color XML round tripping with M100.

I tried FCPX when it first came out but it just seemed too buggy and sluggish. I kept trying it as each update came out. I really liked the DB aspect and I also actually really like the magnetic timeline. But the lack of proper monitoring and sluggish behavior kept us from adapting it.

I finally decided to try a new iMac, top of the line with everything maxed. Wow FCPX runs great on it and the Matrox MX02 runs perfectly.

I completed our last project on FCPX and as I was really getting into how it works I kept getting more impressed. I can do everything in one app now. The cc is really very good once you spend some time with it. Even the audio tools are decent, compression limit and EQ works quite well, even auto noise removal is not bad.

FCPX works great with EXcam and AF100 native formats, we always transcoded those before. This is a big time saver.

Our work is a mix of industrial training promo and safety videos. We also do commercials promoting tourism in the White Mountains, and a lot of WEB vids and kiosks for our clients. We also do some long form doc work.

I am now in the process of importing all our projects that we change and update on a yearly bases into FCPX. We do safety boating videos for a company that produces the safety courses for most of the states in the US. And they keep needing updates as laws change. The magnetic timeline makes these changes a breeze.

I think the biggest problem for us was that our 4 year old 8core MP's just were not fast enough. I am very happy with the low price of our new iMac and how quiet the TB RAID is, you no longer have to keep the SAS raid in another room to be able to edit.

I think Apple needs to make a big point of encouraging updated hardware with FCPX or editors will be disappointed in the performance. Personally I am very happy to see the end of the noisy tower computers and RAID I closures.

A new suite is now possible for very low price.

iMac $2,600.00
TB raid $1,600.00
MX02 or similar <1,000.00
FCPX etc. $500.00
SDI monitor $2,500.00

This is really amazing, compared to what this type of performance cost a few years ago. My first SD system cost almost $70,000.00. And a Betacam was $100,000.00+ back then. We are really seeing the democratization of video production, and I am all for it.

Yes lots more competition keeps you on your toes but there are also many more cients and outlets for good video.

Olof Ekbergh