Is cloud editing the future of editing? http://tinyurl.com/3mpfqq5
Is the cloud the future of editing: with a facility cloud or a remote cloud? How will the tape shortage change delivery into the cloud? How does cloud editing work? Will the cloud be suitable for archive? Will the cloud be suitable for archive? Will the cloud lead to outsourcing?
(Recorded before Apple’s NAB Final Cut Pro X preview was announced to be at the Supermeet.)
Josh Mellicker of DVCreators.net posted on Facebook today that it was the 12th anniversary of the release of their first Final Cut Pro training product. Congratulations are in order. It also set me off thinking back.
The first inkling I had was at NAB – my first – in 1998. I had been aware of the Media 100/Apple QuickTime/KeyGrip announcement of a year earlier, of which only the QuickTime team had delivered their part: a cross platform fully featured QuickTime authoring environment. KeyGrip was to be the software that powered Media 100’s Windows efforts, as well as having a Mac version.
As soon as I saw Final Cut Pro, I knew my days as a Media 100 enthusiast would soon be over! It was the tool to grow into and I knew from that first view that it would be a hit.
When I summarized What I thought I knew about Final Cut Pro X, one item was that the Project format would change from being a Binary format to an XML-based format. Then I got a couple more data points that have led me to rethink that.
The primary data point happened last night when rewatching the Sneak Peek on YouTube and heard Peter Steinauer (Architect of Final Cut Pro) say about Smart Collections:
“The collection is based on Queries”
Queries mean databases in my mind.
As part of the Sneak Peek of Final Cut Pro X at the NAB 2011 Supermeet, Apple updated their user stats to 2 million customs (with 94% satisfaction).
Now, my understanding is (with help from Oliver Peters) that this number includes Final Cut Express and the early individual sales of DVD Studio Pro and Motion. Some customers will be included having paid only $199, while others will have paid the $995 purchase price and one or more upgrades. For a customer who purchased FCP 1 for $995 and paid for every upgrade, then that customer has invested, over the 12 years since NAB 1999, around $3750.
But balance that with those who bought educational pricing, and other discounted opportunities plus those low priced buy-ins and I’ll assign an average income per user of $1000. Â I think that’s conservative but the data to make a more accurate assessment isn’t available to me. (If you have it philip @ intelligentassistance.com without the spaces.) Besides, it makes the numbers easy to work with.
So, 2 million customers with an average revenue per customer of $1000 (over 12 years) and that gives a gross revenue of $2 billion dollars or roughly $168 million in revenue per year.
Preparing for Final Cut Pro X http://tinyurl.com/3dwkorr My first (and only??) FCP X seminar. Get in quickly because it’s filling very fast.
Because it’s before Final Cut Pro X ships, I’ll be drawing from my last year of fairly accurate researching and writing about Final Cut Pro X and merging it with the recent preview to give you the best preparation for the upcoming release.
While you’re there, check out the rest of the other upcoming Final Cut Pro X webinars at Final Cut Pro X Webinar Central.
Working with Effects Inside Final Cut Pro X
Presented by Kevin McAuliffe
Media Management Inside Final Cut Pro X
Presented by Brent Altomare
Color Correcting Inside Final Cut Pro X
Presented by Ben Brownlee
Terence and Philip examine the FCP X preview. http://tinyurl.com/43skvaz Episode 25 of the Terence and Philip Show.
In this Episode – recorded while Philip was still in Las Vegas before the show ended – Terence and Philip share their thoughts on the preview of Final Cut Pro X. The good, the bad and the questions.
I’ve been wracking my brain for synonyms for “Awesome” and “Jaw dropping” as Larry Jordan described it, but really, that will do.
With the caveat that we’ve seen only a fraction of a brand new app and what we saw raised as many questions as it answered. Walter Biscardi does a good job of enumerating the unanswered questions and I’m concerned about XML out of and back into Final Cut Pro X. We got a very brief overview of some key features – the headline stuff – but no real depth. Heck, we didn’t even see a single menu being pulled down!
For myself, Final Cut Pro X (nailed the name) was everything I hoped for and more. Last September I opined:
With time to consider, maybe that’s too forward looking, but my fondest hope is that Apple has taken the time to re-imagine Final Cut Pro and a NLE interface in general.
Since the Feb 17 preview of Final Cut Pro X, I’ve got clues as to the new features (well some of them) so this is what I think I know ahead of the announcement. Written on Sunday afternoon but set to publish just before the Tuesday event so as not to ruin Apple’s surprise(s).
In no particular order:
I expect FXscript to be lost to history like Log and Capture and a dedicated Viewer window.
My in depth analysis of what I’m about to see will be coming Wednesday afternoon April 13, because of the important need to party after the Supermeet, and I’m teaching 10am-1pm Wednesday.
And I expect to be blown away with what more there is than that list. On the balance of probability it will be in the App store (only?) with a price similar to the last upgrade.
As for the rest of the Studio. Motion will get an upgrade but I don’t know if we’ll see that shortly or have to wait; DVD SP will disappear, while Soundtrack Pro will also likely get an upgrade.
The anticipation might soon be over. At next Tuesday night’s Supermeet in Las Vegas we may get a sneak peek at what Apple has been working on. For those who aren’t regular readers of my blog, here’s links to my evolving thoughts on why Apple needs to rewrite both Final Cut Pro and QuickTime into a modern codebase, and why they may take this opportunity to not just rewrite, but to rethink how modern NLE software works.
The posts in bold are the key ones.
No doubt there’s some things I’ve written that are just plain wrong. But I’m expecting that on Tuesday night we’ll see the 64 bit Cocoa Final Cut Pro (using AV Foundation) that I wasn’t initially expecting until 2012, with a complete rethink of the NLE interface for the future.
On 9/27/10 I said “Apple, have the right tools to really rethink the interface and leapfrog the competition with a whole new application.“
Come Wednesday I think I’m going to be quite happy with my predictive track record.