FCPX going subscription

[puredrifting]

I have to cut a television episode on Premiere this spring, so I've been spending more time with it than I have in a long time... and I will say that Premiere is FAR FAR FAR more stable and performant on a Windows box with an Nvidia GPU than it is on a Mac of similar spec. I built out a 12-core Ryzen 3900X box with 64GB of RAM and a GeForce RTX 3080 around Christmas to experiment with the dark side... and Premiere is like a completely different app on that vs. my iMac Pro (10-core, 64GB, VEGA 64). I've noticed that Lightroom and Illustrator are both in the same boat. I haven't noticed the same difference in Photoshop.

I think Adobe's kinda just phoning it in on the Mac and has been for a while.

We don't have to go back too far in time to recall when Adobe and Apple were at war with each other over all kinds of things besides editing programs.
I'm sure that has permeated the culture at Adobe to where the Apple platform is the red headed step child. I'm looking forward to trying out the new
Resolve on my hot rod PC Live Streaming build, I haven't edited on a PC in decades.

For my business partner and me, we have exactly two clients who require us to edit on Premiere. It's a punishment for us ;-)
It's not that you can't edit on it, it's fine, it's just so slow, deliberate and clunky compared to FCP X and even Resolve for me.
If I knew how to use AE though, I would definitely use CC, makes sense, if you are one of those editors who is actually good at AE.

 

[Thomas Smet]

It's apparent that since Adobe went to the subscription model, one could observe that the reliability of Premiere has actually decreased significantly, for many generations
of bloat...er..software updates. Mostly amateurs seem to switch from Adobe because of the actual subscription charge. $50 or $60.00 per month is insignificant for
production companies or FT Pro editors for their main tool, it's something else that has caused so many to dump Premiere the past few years.

Most of the FT Pro editors I know who have switched, they tell me that it was because Premiere Pro is still built on ancient base code with many strata of new bloatware hung on it's ancient frame,
much like FCP Studio was at the end when Apple would have needed a massive overhaul of the base code to make an FCP 8, and it is crash prone. It may have changed because I
ignore Adobe now, I get invitations from them and their PR/Marketing company weekly but I saw an article a year or two ago that it would cost Adobe many, many millions of dollars to overhaul
and re-write the base code for Premiere and they didn't want to put in the money and man hours to do so. Not sure if they've done that now or if it still crashes a lot because they haven't?

I totally agree with this. When there were upgrades to be paid for Adobe had to work hard to make people want to actually pay for those upgrades. Now Adobe knows they have their users by the stones and don't really have to try as hard anymore. Once they got their regular revenue stream they just don't have to try as hard anymore.

I remember when people thought of Premiere as a joke and when FCPX came out suddenly everyone was in love with Premiere. I think that is also responsible for Adobes current laziness when it comes to Premiere. They already pulled in a larger user base then they could have ever done on their own.

Honestly the best thing many of us could do for our friends that love Adobe is to ditch Adobe and light a fire under their butts so Adobe feels the need to get creative again. The more people that leave Adobe the more Adobe will take action and do something significant again.

 

[Thomas Smet]

Much like Dan alluded to earlier, Iphone/Ipad sales make up most of their revenue, so I doubt that they care.

If that were the case Apple wouldn't ever bother with the M1 or building a new iMac Pro and Mac Pro. Of course they care about selling Macs. While they may not be their cash cow its still a significant part of their business. Its also about the entire eco system. There is no App Store without developers using Macs and Xcode to publish apps. Apple wants users to buy a Apple Watch, iPhone, Air Pods, MBP, iPad and everything between. Eliminate the Mac and now users have to buy a PC and might also look at alternative phones, watches and so on.

Having that full lineup hooks users for life.

 

[JAMedia]

If that were the case Apple wouldn't ever bother with the M1 or building a new iMac Pro and Mac Pro. .

Apple use Arm based CPU's in all their iPhones and iPads. All they are doing is bringing the Macs in line with the rest of the eco-structure. This enables them to harmonise a lot of the code and OS across their whole platform.

Of course they care about selling Macs. While they may not be their cash cow its still a significant part of their business. Its also about the entire eco system. There is no App Store without developers using Macs and Xcode to publish apps. Apple wants users to buy a Apple Watch, iPhone, Air Pods, MBP, iPad and everything between. Eliminate the Mac and now users have to buy a PC and might also look at alternative phones, watches and so on. Having that full lineup hooks users for life.

Apple wants all the iPhone/pad/watch users to have Macbooks. That is their main market not the almost insignificant number of "serious" film makers as we have seen from the last two generations of mac Pro's. For the latest Mac Pro you can get double the performance for half the price with a PC (making the low-mid range models unattractive to most people ) Then a year or so after launch and people have invested in the MAc Pro and Apple change the CPU family in the iMacs and MacBooks!

Basically Apple is chasing the mass market of trendies who want looks and fashion over heavy duty things the media industry production people need.

 

[DLD]

There's already an ARM version of Windows, and Microsoft is currently rumored to be developing its own ARM processor...

Both Google and Microsoft are trying to emulate Apple's "hardware & software" strategy now, with Apple probably getting a substantial head start on its own ARM based ecosystem. Cook said it might take two years to complete the transfer from x86 to ARM but it might be an optimistic scenario. However, if it does arrive onto the laptop/Mac market with a 8-16 core CPU and optimized software, it might look to make all of their software packages subscription based. In other words, it won't be just FCP but everything else too. And, much like with Apple+ streamer, they'll be giving it away free of charge as a free first year promo but, once you're in, make it very difficult for anyone to jump back to x86, Fuchsia or M-ARM.

Now, at some point, someone will release a compiler package but, as with the present M-soft-to-ARM, it won't match the performance of a one store shop. And then tons of people will be stuck with $100-$300 annual fees, albeit for the full Apple lineup. And if one multiplies a billion iPhone/iPad/Mac times $100, he'll get the idea what Apple is angling for.

 

[Donald Gregory]

I switched from FCP7 to Premiere and recently have mostly moved to Resolve. I know FCPX has improved greatly from where it started, but I'm too happy with Resolve to consider switching. Actually my biggest concern with Resolve is that it's too cheap and I'm afraid they'll stop improving it. I think Apple turning to a subscription model is reasonable as long as they provide value. Premiere Pro has really gotten buggy and I'd totally cancel my subscription if I found some reasonable alternatives to AE and Photoshop.

 

[paulears]

Buggy? My Premiere is rock solid - never have problems with it on two computers?

 

[Donald Gregory]

Buggy? My Premiere is rock solid - never have problems with it on two computers?

Are you on a Mac or PC?

Editing any 4k footage?

We've moved away from it about a year or so ago. It seems like the larger a project got the more the timeline would lock up and not play back or crash when exporting.

 

[puredrifting]

Are you on a Mac or PC?

Editing any 4k footage?

We've moved away from it about a year or so ago. It seems like the larger a project got the more the timeline would lock up and not play back or crash when exporting.

My experience has been very close to yours. But I use Premiere on Mac, have never and probably won't ever use it on PC, it will be my Resolve Studio license on my new high end PC.
I am vexed by wanting to use my old 5.1 version of Photoshop, it won't run anymore and I don't want to pay Adobe any money to use the new Photoshop. So I need to figure out a
viable substitute for it soon. My 2017 iMac on High Sierra still runs the old version of PS but this new 2020 iMac I am using more these days won't because it has stupid Catalina on it.

At least on Mac, Premiere has been VERY crash prone the past three years, not only with me but with a dozen editor friends, most of who are FT Pro editors, not dabblers like me.
That's why most of them have dumped Premiere and moved on to FCP X and Resolve. Premiere is clunky and painful compared to either IMHO.

 

[Imamacuser]

Premiere Pro has really gotten buggy and I'd totally cancel my subscription if I found some reasonable alternatives to AE and Photoshop.

Is Fusion not a replacement for AE, granted there will be a learning curve? Have you tried Affinity Photo as a PS alternative?

 

[puredrifting]

Is Fusion not a replacement for AE, granted there will be a learning curve? Have you tried Affinity Photo as a PS alternative?

Fusion is pretty different from AE. The way they work, plug in support, results, totally different. Fusion is more geared toward VFX than AE is IMHO.

 

[Thomas Smet]

I switched from FCP7 to Premiere and recently have mostly moved to Resolve. I know FCPX has improved greatly from where it started, but I'm too happy with Resolve to consider switching. Actually my biggest concern with Resolve is that it's too cheap and I'm afraid they'll stop improving it. I think Apple turning to a subscription model is reasonable as long as they provide value. Premiere Pro has really gotten buggy and I'd totally cancel my subscription if I found some reasonable alternatives to AE and Photoshop.

I replaced AE with Fusion for VFX/Compositing and Motion for motion graphics. I replaced Photoshop and Illustrator with Affinity Photo and Design. I also bought Affinity Publisher for print publishing work although I tend to use Apple Pages most of the time for documents, client proposals, contracts and so forth.

Premiere has been replaced mostly by FCPX but I do use Resolve sometimes. Still deciding if I want to keep converting Braw to ProRes to use in FCPX or if I will just switch to Resolve. I prefer how FCPX works with its magnetic timeline and organization but using Braw as is in Resolve is making it easier to move to Resolve enough though I find it kind of a clunky workflow.

I also tend to use Blender a lot for more 3D geared motion graphics. Fusion has amazing 3D model import support and true 3D environment and rendering but I love the realism of the Cycles renderer in Blender and the speed of the near realtime Eevvee renderer in Blender.

I use Compressor as an alternative to Media Encoder.

For app UI design I use Sketch over Adobe XD.

I never really liked Dreamweaver for web development and use VSCode at work and my own projects.

That honestly pretty much covers everything I ever used Adobe for. Sometimes I miss having Adobe Audition to clean up audio but thats not very common anymore. Resolve has some very sophisticated audio editing now.

I have no desire to ever move back to Adobe. I also at times miss a few features in Photoshop and Illustrator but not enough to ever go back. For example Illustrator has some complex CAD tools for drawing arcs and slicing them to an exact size and so forth. Affinity has shape tools and the typical set of pen tools but you are kind of on your own for precision CAD like drawing.

Format compatibility works very well in Affinity as well. I can save a Affinity Photo design as a PSD and bring it into Motion with all the layers so I can animate each as desired for something like a lower third. Affinity Design cannot however export a AI file if a client ever needs it. It can export a PDF with layers however so not all is lost. Some more picky clients however may not be happy not getting a AI file that works perfect for them.

 

[Thomas Smet]

Fusion is pretty different from AE. The way they work, plug in support, results, totally different. Fusion is more geared toward VFX than AE is IMHO.

AE always tried to be a do it all application. VFX and motion graphics. Apple Motion leans more towards motion graphics and Fusion leans more towards VFX. All three can do it all to a certain degree but each specializes a bit differently.

I learned VFX in college on Shake so Fusion is like a phoenix born from ashes to me. With that said I lived on AE for decades and its hard to admit it is not an amazing tool. Motion is amazing what it can playback in realtime and stunning for $50 but I always found the UI a little odd. likely a curse from learning AE and node based programs like Shake. I have a friend that is an absolute wizard on Motion and blows me away what he can whip together quickly.

 

[unomas]

AE always tried to be a do it all application. VFX and motion graphics. Apple Motion leans more towards motion graphics and Fusion leans more towards VFX. All three can do it all to a certain degree but each specializes a bit differently.

I learned VFX in college on Shake so Fusion is like a phoenix born from ashes to me. With that said I lived on AE for decades and its hard to admit it is not an amazing tool. Motion is amazing what it can playback in realtime and stunning for $50 but I always found the UI a little odd. likely a curse from learning AE and node based programs like Shake. I have a friend that is an absolute wizard on Motion and blows me away what he can whip together quickly.

I moved over fully to Resolve a little over two years ago. I love Fusion, but if I need to do something that consists of only Motion graphics work (social media ad etc) I've now switched over to using Motion 5. The real time playback with motion blur turned off is amazing on the new M1 macs. I really wish Resolve would do away with nodes for motion graphics work, half the nodes you have in a project are "merge nodes" and you can't do the things you can do to an individual node like you can in a layer in Motion 5.

As an example, let's say I start a color solid/background in Resolve and I want to add some colors over that background, each new color needs it's own new background node, then you have to use the pen or shape tools to mask that color out which requires another node. The node trees for motion graphics can become huge for a 30 second social media spot, and the playback is slow once the project becomes large. In Motion 5, what I just described can be done in a single layer by selecting your background/solid, then just selecting the pen/mask tool to cut out the colors you want over your background. All on one layer, and without have to add so many nodes to get the job done.

They say when you get enough experience in this industry, you learn that you essentially just need the right tool for the job. Well, for Motion graphics only projects, Motion 5 has become that tool for me. Resolve needs to step up it's Motion graphics game and the amount of time it takes to create them. I believe if Resolve wants to truly crush Adobe, they should implement a tab for motion graphics that's layer based and keep the node based workflow for 3D work and compositing. I mean, Resolve has an edit tab and a cut page, why not add a layer based Motion graphics tab that helps speed up turnaround times for motion graphics? Nodes aren't the way in my opinion when it comes to pure speed. Want to move an image around in Fusion? Gotta add a transform node to do that. Want to add a drop shadow to an image in Fusion? Gotta add a drop shadow or shadow node to the image. In Motion 5, those options are built into the image when you import it into your project. You can mask that image, add a drop shadow, or keyframe it and move it all without adding any additional nodes. Fusion just can't do that, almost everything you want to do requires adding extra nodes to get the job done. It's slow and unnecessary for Motion Graphics work.

I love Resolve but would love to see a layer based Motion graphics tab. Do that and an awful lot of users would be very happy and you would get more people switching over from Adobe. Keep the Fusion Tab, that can be used for compositing and 3D work. Just my 2 cents as someone who edits in Resolve 50+ hours per week

 

[ahalpert]

Eliminate the Mac and now users have to buy a PC and might also look at alternative phones, watches and so on.

Having that full lineup hooks users for life.

This is so true. I've always had android phones, partly to obstruct an apple smartphone monopoly, and that was part of the reason I bought an Android-powered TV. One login and then all my apps and settings got ported onto it (including my Twilight blue-light nighttime filter, which is fantastic. I always weep for someone's circadian rhythms when I pass a house full of bright blue TV glow at night).

If I had an iPhone or an Alexa something, I might have been tempted by Apple or Amazon smart TV products. I mean, I have Mac computers but I'm not fully integrated into their ecosystem and can barely ever remember my apple login for the app store.

Btw I love where this thread has gone in discussion of motion graphics/vfx software - very interesting food for thought.

Re:FCPX vs Premiere - bugs and crashes in Premiere caused me to switch to FCPX about a year and a half ago, and I've never looked back (except when a specific client requests it). FCPX has been great, although I've experienced some crashing when dealing with graphics, even simple ones (as has one of my clients on a different model machine). And I've seen very rare bugs (like twice a year) with transform keyframes not behaving or audio glitches.

 

[Thomas Smet]

I moved over fully to Resolve a little over two years ago. I love Fusion, but if I need to do something that consists of only Motion graphics work (social media ad etc) I've now switched over to using Motion 5. The real time playback with motion blur turned off is amazing on the new M1 macs. I really wish Resolve would do away with nodes for motion graphics work, half the nodes you have in a project are "merge nodes" and you can't do the things you can do to an individual node like you can in a layer in Motion 5.

As an example, let's say I start a color solid/background in Resolve and I want to add some colors over that background, each new color needs it's own new background node, then you have to use the pen or shape tools to mask that color out which requires another node. The node trees for motion graphics can become huge for a 30 second social media spot, and the playback is slow once the project becomes large. In Motion 5, what I just described can be done in a single layer by selecting your background/solid, then just selecting the pen/mask tool to cut out the colors you want over your background. All on one layer, and without have to add so many nodes to get the job done.

They say when you get enough experience in this industry, you learn that you essentially just need the right tool for the job. Well, for Motion graphics only projects, Motion 5 has become that tool for me. Resolve needs to step up it's Motion graphics game and the amount of time it takes to create them. I believe if Resolve wants to truly crush Adobe, they should implement a tab for motion graphics that's layer based and keep the node based workflow for 3D work and compositing. I mean, Resolve has an edit tab and a cut page, why not add a layer based Motion graphics tab that helps speed up turnaround times for motion graphics? Nodes aren't the way in my opinion when it comes to pure speed. Want to move an image around in Fusion? Gotta add a transform node to do that. Want to add a drop shadow to an image in Fusion? Gotta add a drop shadow or shadow node to the image. In Motion 5, those options are built into the image when you import it into your project. You can mask that image, add a drop shadow, or keyframe it and move it all without adding any additional nodes. Fusion just can't do that, almost everything you want to do requires adding extra nodes to get the job done. It's slow and unnecessary for Motion Graphics work.

I love Resolve but would love to see a layer based Motion graphics tab. Do that and an awful lot of users would be very happy and you would get more people switching over from Adobe. Keep the Fusion Tab, that can be used for compositing and 3D work. Just my 2 cents as someone who edits in Resolve 50+ hours per week

Thats because you need to learn to build your own macros. With macros you can build single Fusion effects that contain transform controls, drop shadow and whatever else you want. The point of nodes is to break everything down to basic building blocks to have finer control. You can then group controls together into single macros so you don't have to build complex node trees every time. If you find yourself doing duplicate node trees then you are not leveraging macros and building reusable components for Motion graphics.

For example I have a ton of macros for chroma up sampling and scaling material. Single nodes to attach to the source. The chroma strips the video into YUV color channels and then blurs the U and V channels and merges back together. Instead of building the half dozen nodes to do this each time I have a single macro that does all of it. Feed the source into the input and the feed the output from the node and thats it. It has a few params I setup to adjust the amount of blur or if only the X direction should be blurred in the case of 4:2:2. I have built many different versions where instead of blurring it scales down and back up the U and V channels to try to duplicate what happens with 4:2:0 and 4:2:2 chroma subsampling.

Other macros convert 4:2:0 4k to 4:4:4 2k using precise scaling methods to try to mimic what a sensor with 2x photo sites would capture. Another converts 4:2:2 to an odd anamorphic format that is 4:4:4 For example 4096x2160 becomes 2048x2160 4:4:4 since only the horizontal uses chroma subsampling. No need to sacrifice the vertical resolution on 4:2:2.

Anyway make use of macros to help eliminate duplicate nodes for motion graphics. Eventually you will have your own library of building blocks like a lower third fly on that you can apply to any image. You can set params for the speed, direction and so forth.

 

[sgttom]

The two reasons I stay with Adobe is the people I work with all use it and there is some benefit in using the same editing systems for projects. The other reason is Lightroom. I like Final Cut a lot in some ways but in other ways certain tools seem really odd. Davinci is also more stable than FCP with the M1 chip at the moment. Which is a really odd but speaks very well for Davinci. I wish I could use double monitors with Davinci without getting hardware.

 

[puredrifting]

The two reasons I stay with Adobe is the people I work with all use it and there is some benefit in using the same editing systems for projects. The other reason is Lightroom. I like Final Cut a lot in some ways but in other ways certain tools seem really odd. Davinci is also more stable than FCP with the M1 chip at the moment. Which is a really odd but speaks very well for Davinci. I wish I could use double monitors with Davinci without getting hardware.

I have a good friend/client and her entire production company is on the Adobe CC programs. Makes collaboration, especially on a huge documentary we've been working on together, a royal PITA. I truly dislike Premiere and will only use it when forced to. FCP X is my favorite as I think it's the fastest editor on the market
and with a few exceptions, I really like the feature set, other than audio. FCP X audio handling is amateur hour. Good enough, but FCP Studio had a far more intuitive audio workflow to me. Resolve, I am going to dive in deep, as if Apple decides to do the dumb move of making FCP X subscription only, I'll be dumping it
after two decades and going to all Resolve. If Apple makes FCP X subscription just an option, I have no problem with paying for big updates once a year or two but monthly, I am out, even if it was $2.00 per month. It ain't the money, it's the principal. Resolve seems like it's evolving into as very good editing tool as well as
the industry standard CC program, it impresses the hell out of me. Hopefully BMD will keep it a one time charge or just charge for optional updates. Subscriptions are just abhorrent to me.

 

[Thomas Smet]

I have a good friend/client and her entire production company is on the Adobe CC programs. Makes collaboration, especially on a huge documentary we've been working on together, a royal PITA. I truly dislike Premiere and will only use it when forced to. FCP X is my favorite as I think it's the fastest editor on the market
and with a few exceptions, I really like the feature set, other than audio. FCP X audio handling is amateur hour. Good enough, but FCP Studio had a far more intuitive audio workflow to me. Resolve, I am going to dive in deep, as if Apple decides to do the dumb move of making FCP X subscription only, I'll be dumping it
after two decades and going to all Resolve. If Apple makes FCP X subscription just an option, I have no problem with paying for big updates once a year or two but monthly, I am out, even if it was $2.00 per month. It ain't the money, it's the principal. Resolve seems like it's evolving into as very good editing tool as well as
the industry standard CC program, it impresses the hell out of me. Hopefully BMD will keep it a one time charge or just charge for optional updates. Subscriptions are just abhorrent to me.

I love editing with FCPX as well but its hard to ignore how good Resolve is now. Still feels a bit clunky to me to edit with but grading, VFX with the now integrated Fusion tab and the Fairlight audio editing are making it really tough to ignore.

I agree FCPX is the fastest and once one gets used to the magnetic timeline they will be able to edit faster than ever before.

It really comes down to workflow in the end and if one finds they spend more time tweaking the grade, doing some interesting compositing and needs to really dig deep into the audio mix than Resolve is clearly the better way to go. Those projects tend to focus more energy on all those aspects vs the act of cutting together clips. If I am editing a project that is 90% cutting with very little of the rest then FCPX makes a ton more sense.

As I use the P4k more the decision gets even more difficult. Especially as I now use Braw all the time. If I know a project will be mostly slap on a corrective out and light grade for taste, have clean audio where I just need an occasional fade and little to no effects I will shoot ProRes and just stay in FCPX 100%. Really kills me that I can't use Braw directly in FCPX. Still deciding if I just want to stick with ProRes for certain projects or if I should just shoot Braw and batch convert from Resolve. Seems kind of pointless if I don't plan on going back to Resolve for anything. Just creating pointless in between steps. The only advantage would be to convert to ProRes444 which is insanely efficient to use in FCPX and still 12bit and 4:4:4. Massive files however so its a bit of a cluster vs just staying in Resolve. Especially if its a project that actually benefits from 12bit 4:4:4.

It all just seems like a strange compromise now to force myself to stay with FCPX.

 

[Thomas Smet]

The two reasons I stay with Adobe is the people I work with all use it and there is some benefit in using the same editing systems for projects. The other reason is Lightroom. I like Final Cut a lot in some ways but in other ways certain tools seem really odd. Davinci is also more stable than FCP with the M1 chip at the moment. Which is a really odd but speaks very well for Davinci. I wish I could use double monitors with Davinci without getting hardware.

I think the stability of Resolve on M1 has to do with how dedicated the development team is at BMD and how quickly the push out beta updates vs Apple which loves to sit on small updates for many months. Apple has a very serious development problem. They create great tools but they just don't develop at the pace required anymore. I think FCPX is one of the most well put together NLEs ever created from a resource use perspective but they need to push out bug fixes faster.

BMD is super dedicated to making their software work for a lot of people and they get a massive ton of respect from me for that. They develop software more like an open source mentality where if a fix is needed they make a fix and release said fix. The fact that Resolve 17.1 (the M1 version) has now gone through 10 betas speaks highly of their dedication to software development.

Lets also not forget that BMD has the stones to actually use what eGPU was always supposed to be good for. Not replacing an existing GPU but adding multipole GPUs to a computer that is not a massive tower. Apple royally screwed up by treating eGPU as some odd way to replace cheaper Macs GPUs to make them usable. That is a good use case of course but the significant benefit of eGPU was always to add more GPU processing power. Applications like Blender and Resolve get that and can use 2,3 or more eGPUs to process faster. Apple killed eGPU long before the lack of eGPU support on the M1. Too many users bought a eGPU thinking it would greatly improve FCPX performance on their MBP and it didn't really help much at all. Resolve on the other hand could suddenly use two GPUs. Resolve could use up to I think 3 or 4 GPUs. Blender could use as many as you could make work on a limited number of thunderbolt controllers in the system. Blender could still see a lot of benefit with two eGPUs per TB3 controller. That meant each eGPUY only ran at 2x speed. That worked fine for Cuda processing since the video data wasn't going through the display but just using the processing cores to crunch data. Video editing is another story so eGPU could usually only use one eGPU per bus before they slowed down too much. I did see some tests where Reolve used two eGPUs on the same controller and it did still have an advantage but adding anymore would have likely hurt.