Stick with Vegas or FC Studio 2?

F

flnstudios

Active member
I've been using Sony Vegas for almost three years now. I like it and I'm comfortable with it but I'm one version behind the latest upgrade.

I've used Vegas primarily to edit educational content videos that are shown online and used in conjunction with a live, online teacher. Not nearly as exciting as what many folks on this forum are doing I'll admit, but it sure does a great job of paying the bills.

I've also come to own an iMac and Final Cut Studio 2.

About a year ago, a client sprung for a 24" iMac and Final Cut Studio 2. My system crashed, they needed something done within 24 hours and I couldn't walk into a computer store and get a PC with anything other than Windows Vista preloaded.

I ended up using an old laptop to get the job done, the client was thrilled and I got to keep the iMac and FCS2.:dankk2:

I loaded the FCS2 software but never used it.

Now a year later, I plan on filming and editing a short as a ramp up to a feature within the next 18 months.

I'll be shooting with my DVX100B in 24p & probably squeeze mode. For the feature, I'd like some of the footage to be Black & White--something that as far as I know, can't be dialed into the DVX100B or any DV camera.

Is there any reason why FCS2 would be a better choice to edit vs. Sony Vegas? The $$ investment has been made for me. Would it be worth my while to make the time investment to learn FCS2?

Or should I stick with what I know and pay for the latest version of Vegas?

Thanks in advance for your input.
 
from what ive experienced, FCP has a better workflow for "film" work.
that is if you plan on working with EDL and sending audio out via OMF.

FCP allows you to open multiple sequences within one project, great for film work.
not sure if the latest version of vegas lets you do that.
when i last used it, it didnt.

i used vegas professionally for about 2 years and switched to FCP.
there are a few things vegas does better in my opinion...
-keyframing
-audio

BUT, im a big believer in if something works for you then stick with it.

hope that helps!
shawn
 
I'd take the time to learn FCP.

Look, simply put there are two systems currently taking up most of the work in film and broadcast. They are Avid and FCP.

Yes, Adobe and Sony have solid contributions but they don't have the market share. You will NOT be hurt by learning FCP.

Editing is exactly the same. You select your shot and you drop it in a timeline. Everything else is just preference.

CaptM
 
That said FCP is not going to make your work better. If you're good in Vegas and you don't care about selling your services as an FCP editor for higher stick with what you know. FCP is definitely something far more marketable on a resume than Vegas and pretty much any other editing program that's not FCP or Avid if that matters. But if it's just for personal work stick with your skills and hone them.

Noah
 
NoahK said:
That said FCP is not going to make your work better. If you're good in Vegas and you don't care about selling your services as an FCP editor for higher stick with what you know. FCP is definitely something far more marketable on a resume than Vegas and pretty much any other editing program that's not FCP or Avid if that matters. But if it's just for personal work stick with your skills and hone them.

Noah
Click to expand...

Take the words right out of my mouth.
 
Thanks everyone for your input. It looks as if FCS2 is a good time investment.

I picked up a copy of Final Cut Pro 6--Professional Editing in Final Cut Studio 2 by Diana Weynand from the Apple Pro Training Series.

It comes with a DVD of footage from Monk, SeaWorls and the BBC so I'll start there.

Any other suggestions for training Materials?
 
I only got into this stuff this year. Wanted to get into video for most of my life, but I just never had the money.

Wanted to do things the "right way" for once, regardless of budget, and I spent a small fortune. Bought a Mac Pro w/16 gigs of ram, 4tbs of storage, the whole deal. Got FCS, Magic Bullet Suite and then immediately tried editing some footage I was shooting.

Well, too many bugs stopped me from working in an effective manner immediately. Since the 2008 Mac Pro's were still new, they had this terrible problem rendering effects with the 2600 video card at the time (8 cores and 16 gigs of ram, not enough power, my ass!!) There were also some other little bugs that have since been worked out, that got in the way. After having AppleCare make me reinstall OS X in vain to fix this stuff (which were actual bugs that needed to be repaired), the whole thing frustrated the hell out of me, to say the least.

All that technical nonsense at that time caused me to look elsewhere, and ever since I've been slowly but surely learning a number of systems. Thankfully, Macs now run PC stuff with ease, too. I use bootcamp w/Vista 64 to get access to all 8 cores when I need them, but usually everything works just fine in a little window within OS X provided by VMWare Fusion (which runs the same bootcamp install, but with only 2 cores active).

This may be a bit naive of me, but as a relative neophite sure looks like a like Sony Vegas is a little more "state of the art" in some ways. The whole thing just feels more real-time. The audio processing is also very very cool, if you have 5.1 to deal with.

I hope Final Cut 7 learns a thing or 10 from Vegas in this regard. If it does, I'll be the first to upgrade when it comes out. For whatever reason, I'd prefer to work completely (or almost completely) on the OS X side, if possible. OS X just seems nicer, even if Windows has some killer apps.

Also, Adobe After Effects is now on my plate to learn next. I see too much incredible compositing work coming from this platform to be able to ignore it any longer, even from relative beginners. It seems like it'd be better to buy plugs for this system from now on, rather than FxPlugs or other formats.

So for my own personal work, I lean a little towards Vegas because it's faster and easier to do the few things I'm capable of (especially when dealing with AVCHD footage). But I ultimately hope I can switch back to FCS at some time.

The funny thing is, if I needed to hire someone else to edit my footage, I'd probably want to hire someone using Final Cut w/ProRes 422 as an intermediate, as a sort of "shortcut" to knowing they're skilled. In fact, I did that about a month ago. It's just good to know that someone is FCP fluent. It shows a high degree of commitment in my book, and it's very easy for one FCP professional to work with another.

So if you're looking or work opportunities, it might just be in your best interest to go with FCP, or even step up to Avid. I'm in LA, and I've heard that some of the big guys are still pretty insistent about that platform.

As far as compositing and effects go, however, I think nobody minds After Effects. A friend mine recently converted a poem into this visual extravaganza for Tim Burton, and all he was using was After Effects running under OS X. It's amazing what that piece of software can do. It's equally amazing how acceptable it is to industry. It seems like most companies like to use software that's completely out of reach of the general public, price wise. AE, for whatever reason, doesn't seem to be looked down by industry like a lot of other (at least semi-)affordable software.
 
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I'm toying with the idea of not replacing FCP, persay, but rather supplementing it with Vegas. There's basically one reason I want to do this and that's portability. i want to get a laptop next year, for portability, and I've been reading here that Vegas will run well on a moderate system. If I had the budget for a Macbook, I probably would go that route but i don't so a Windows based system running Vegas seems to be a promising choice. I do event videography and some corporate but not "film" (unfortunately) so it sounds like Vegas might work okay for me.
 
aramikvideo said:
I'm toying with the idea of not replacing FCP, persay, but rather supplementing it with Vegas. There's basically one reason I want to do this and that's portability. i want to get a laptop next year, for portability, and I've been reading here that Vegas will run well on a moderate system. If I had the budget for a Macbook, I probably would go that route but i don't so a Windows based system running Vegas seems to be a promising choice. I do event videography and some corporate but not "film" (unfortunately) so it sounds like Vegas might work okay for me.
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portability yes but compatibility no. if you plan to jump your projects back and forth between fcp/vegas pc/mac, it is a pain in the ass. not worth the couple hundred bucks you will save.

use the education discount online to get a macbook for under $1000 and run FCP. i have a mac pro at home and the cheapest macbook on the road. i cut hvx200 footage on the macbook and it does fine.
 
Yeah the Macbook itself will run FCP ok. Motion and Color not without a fuss but FCP on the road ok. Better a used Powerbook or older MacBook Pro.

Noah
 
NoahK said:
Yeah the Macbook itself will run FCP ok. Motion and Color not without a fuss but FCP on the road ok. Better a used Powerbook or older MacBook Pro.

Noah
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true that but it probably could if apple would let it try.... but i guess they have to sell mb pros.

i can't run motion on my macbook but i can run after effects cs3 and it runs well.....
 
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