Premiere to Avid. How hard of a transition?

[rawfa]

Hi guys,

I was wondering how many people here migrated from Premiere to Avid and how hard was the change? I´ve been working with premiere and after fx for like 20 years, but most of the major players in the industry use AVID. So I was thinking of making the switch.

[Jim Feeley]

Most of my friends learned Avid first and then Premiere. They are fluent in both, and for complex longform storytelling, most prefer Avid. Most love love love neither. But switching is no big deal; even I can stumble through both (as a producer, not a fine editor). Takes a couple days (for me) to shift muscle memory from one system to another. For a real editor who works on both, switching back and forth seems faster/easier.

Download a free 30-day trial (after making sure your computer is listed as compatible):
https://my.avid.com/get/media-composer-ultimate-trial

Then check out some of the tutorials for people moving from Premiere/Adobe to Avid. For example:

And check out Jonny Elwyn's "Diary of an Avid Switcher." A series of blog posts from a few years ago. He was talking about moving from FCP to Avid, and things have changed a bit since he wrote that, but my memory is there's some really good stuff in there. Start with Part 1:
https://jonnyelwyn.co.uk/?s=diary


That's my take, at least.

[scorsesefan]

AVID is a different mindset than Premiere. Premiere is more drag and drop and AVID is more like editing on a Steenbeck IMO. I prefer Premiere pro...

[David Jimerson]

While it is not my favorite NLE, learning to edit the AVID way will make you a more efficient editor in whatever other NLE you choose.

As to the transition from PP, it really depends on you and how you think. I agree with above -- download the demo and try to edit a small project in it.

[El Director]

I made the switch about five years ago. To go from Premiere to Avid, you almost have to throw out how YOU think a NLE should work. It'll be much easier if you can try to be a blank slate and learn the Avid way of doing things. It really is like a digital way of cutting on film. Even "blank space" is treated as a piece of film, called "filler". I liken the experience to learning node based compositing in Nuke after mastering After Effects. There's going to be a steep learning curve, and there will be points where you say to yourself that you'll never wrap your head around it. But keep with it for a month and eventually it'll just click.

[El Director]

One last bit: For me, it helps to use Avid MC as just the editor. I export and AAF to Resolve to conform and grade. I'll spit out plates from Resolve for VFX in Nuke, and I do my audio mix in Pro Tools or Reaper depending on the day. It is possible to do everything in Avid for many productions, but I prefer using the best tools for each job, so I cut in Avid, grade in Resolve, VFX in Nuke and mix in Pro Tools. Doing this means I didn't have to learn Media Composer inside and out. I could focus on just editing, which made the transition easier.