Editing: Apple (FCP) or PC software

David Jimerson said:
Unfortunately, I don't yet know Edius well enough to say outside of its P2 integration. Seems pretty typical, though.

FCP and Premiere are extremely similar programs. If you have experience with Premiere, you pretty much know what to expect.
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Over a three month period, my camera was stolen, finally received the insurance $$, ordered a new HXV, and just received the replacement HVX today. Now I'm ready to purchase an NLE. The only NLE experience I have is a little with Premier and Vegas.

I can buy MAC or PC software. Hardware is equally available, equally well "muscled" with memory and CPU.

With that in mind, between FCP and Edius, which is the easiest to grab the files of the P2 card AND start working away on the video files?

Your recommendations?

Or is it a case of both are good and I really can't go wrong picking one and learning how to use it.
 
Hi Spunknoid:

I have not used Edius but I do have many years of experience with FCP. The big advantage of FCP is that it is very capable yet extremely easy to use and learn. AVID is much more difficult to learn than FCP. I am not sure if Edius is standardized as far as the interface or if it has one of those "unique" interfaces?

Many editing programs such as AVID (sorry for the multiple AVID references but I know more about it than Edius or PPro) are modal and can only be used to do one thing at a time, in one prescribed manner. The beauty of FCP and what makes it so easy is that to do any given function, there are almost always multiple ways to perform it. Many AVID-reared editors don't like this but for a beginner, it's awesome. I have always liked the fact that with FCP you can use many different methods to achieve a given result.

Sorry to harp on FCP so much but there is a reason why Apple has taken over so much of the post market.

Dan
 
spunknoid said:
With that in mind, between FCP and Edius, which is the easiest to grab the files of the P2 card AND start working away on the video files?

Your recommendations?

Or is it a case of both are good and I really can't go wrong picking one and learning how to use it.
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I'm only speaking of P2 integration between the two here . . .

But Edius simply blows FCP away. There's no need to convert anything; you just drop the MXF files on the timeline and edit. It will play back up to six streams of DVCPRO HD in real time. You have full access and full ability to manipulate all of the clip meta data. You can work directly off the P2 cards if you want.

No problems. No conversion issues. No quirks. It's a brilliant implementation and everyone else should emulate it. Nothing else compares.
 
I have been editing in Avid Media Composer for about six months now. I feel that the MXF workflow with Avid is far more streamlined than in FCP. I used FCP at school for a while and in order to edit a clip, it would need to be rendered first ( I think it was rendered to Quicktime). In Avid you can do your entire project in MXF format. Just open your media tool and drop your clips into bins. As for working with other programs, Avid Media Composer is designed to work with Protools. If I want to use After Effects, I just export a Reference file and open it in After Effects.
3.6ghz, 8gb ram, 1 terabit hd space, HD capable video card.
Just my two cents. :)
 
I agree, FCP's handling of MXF could be better but if you haven't used it before, the new P2 import tool in FCP is pretty great. A lot of this also has to do with your post workflow. Don't think Motion, Shake and Soundtrack Pro read MXF files (does AE?) so if FCP did support native MXF, you would still have to convert it to QT on the way out to these other programs, right?

Perhaps for editing only, MXF is a good thing but for total overall system workflow, QuickTime is far superior, many more apps read it than MXF format.

Best,

Dan
 
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pdsage10 said:
I used FCP at school for a while and in order to edit a clip, it would need to be rendered first ( I think it was rendered to Quicktime).
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You do have to use the import p2 card function when accessing MXF files in FCP, and this was streamlined with previews in 5.1.2, which I find very useful. In this way, you can set i/o points, rename the clips, and import only those you wish. It is efficient and fast.

Second, I don't do any rendering when editing a clip. In fact, there is little rendering at all except when dealing with some filters, but very few.
 
Actually, when importing into FCP, technically it is not "rendering", but re-wrapping the container of the raw data to a QuickTime container, rather than the Panasonic version of MXF.

Did I mention version 3.0 of the FS-100, oh, never mind...

I bet at NAB, FCP 6.0 will be announced with killer MXF support. They did do that weird, huge licensing buy out with that MXF development company...
 
Finally NAB will have some FCS centric announcements. I know for certain that an associate has been invited to tire kick the new program.
 
There is virtually no chance that MWSF will be the platform to announce FCS 6.

NAB is the traditional venue for these announcements. Moreover, the testing I believe hasn't even started.
 
I think I'll get out a quarter and do a best 2 out of three flips and just get started on a platform. Both definitely have their strengths.

As always, thanks for the great inputs and help.
 
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