Apple announces Final Cut Pro X for $299

Apple announced Final Cut Pro X today at FCPUG SuperMeet in Las Vegas. The new version of FCP has been long-awaited, and its feature set seems to deliver on what modern video professionals have been asking for. Randy Ubillos (an avid diver) took the stage and showed off a demo version of the product. Reports form livebloggers indicate that the audience went crazy when certain features were announced.

FCP X is a ground-up rewrite of the platform. It is 64-bit and uses Grand Central Dispatch, which means that it should properly leverage multi-core machines (unlike the current version of FCP, which essentially leaves a 12-core Mac Pro idling). FCP X is resolution-independent, fully color-managed, and edits everything natively (no more transcoding!). It also includes quite a few progressive features like people and shot detection, keywording, one-click color matching, and automatic background rendering.

The best part? It's $299, and will be downloadable in the Mac App Store in June.

There are sure to be more in-depth articles about its features soon; until then, check out these sites for more detailed information:

Apple Announces Redesigned 64-Bit Final Cut Pro X with Background Rendering for $299

http://nofilmschool.com/2011/04/apple-anno...ound-rendering/

To Much Applause, Apple Unveils Final Cut X Today in Las Vegas

http://www.cultofmac.com/to-much-applause-...las-vegas/90082

No transcoding! Say it again, say it again!! Great News.

Cheers, Simon

No transcoding! Say it again, say it again!! Great News.

No transcoding. No transcoding.

Errr keep telling yourselves that. Let's see which machines can do it first

What is transcoding ?

What is transcoding ?

You forgot to mention Edius dude, you are slipping

why so cheap? is it a non full featured version? Doesn't FCP usually sell for over $1000? Is this a FCP lite? like photoshop elements sort of thing?

Mike, this version has been called iMovie Pro. But it's simple. Apple is about a year or so behind the ball of Adobe in 64bit and other goodies, and Adobe is dual platform. So basically they compete in price now as well. Avid is I think retailing @ $2500 and not 64bit on the mac. Premiere Pro 5.5 will be $500 I think. Also remember that Apple sells hardware so pricing software lower to sell hardware can make the Apple hardware premium more justifiable as a package.

Finally this is just Final Cut Pro X, not the Final Cut Studio. Since they didn't mention the rest of the suite, it's probably there'll be a serious rehash. They released FCPX solo, which makes it sorta incomplete still because even if everything is edited native, some users need to compress for distribution, and Compressor is still 32bit and slow.

Aw, Drew just farted in our FCPx bubble

No Transcoding!

No transcoding from HDV .m2t? No transcoding from DV .avi?

No transcoding from anything it knows about. Who knows what that means! I hope it isn't an extension of what means in the still camera world: new camera / codec, 6-18 months to wait for support.

The Final Cut Studio. Since they didn't mention the rest of the suite, it's probably there'll be a serious rehash.

Studio or Suite, I am confused

The announcement video:

That there wasn't a Q & A after the presentation left too many editors with unanswered questions and for anyone following many of the editing forums like the kenstone.net or lafcpug.org sites, panic is in the air. That includes me to a degree. I wanted access to all my cores and all my ram which X provides but I didn't want or expect an entirely new GUI or complete change in workflow. Thankfully, FCX and the current FCP7 will be able to co exist on the same computer. Like others, I will now open iMovie for the first time and try to learn it. Here is an excellent article on that: http://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/imovi...cision%20editor and I intend to read it thoroughly as I mess around in there. Since X is being sold as a separate application from the app store, we can expect that the rest of the suite has not been touched or that Apple is going back to its a la carte menu when Motion first came out.

At this point, I am not a happy camper. Yes, there are some cool proactive features but this was a poor way to introduce what, in effect, is an entirely new NLE. I could rant on this forever but....

Steve

I hope it isn't an extension of what means in the still camera world: new camera / codec, 6-18 months to wait for support.

That happened before with HDV, DSLR H.264, XDCAM etc. If the camera manufacturers don't give them a serious heads up, the products tend to lag behind. With secret alliances with different brands with cameras, it could make things worse. Red with Apple then Adobe then Apple again, Sony with Vegas (well that's a blatant one!) etc.

Interesting article about how much isn't actually new and has been in other NLE's like Vegas for years. Still, it's made me wonder about a Mac in the future, if only so I can check how my Vegas-edited stuff opens/looks in FCP without guessing or asking my clients.

Nick, you can always buy a 2nd hand Macbook 13" and play thru there. Or you could buy a Mac Pro and run Windoze through it. Adobe CS5 with 24 cores is quite nice, even if it's just for AEFx.

There is some interesting information and opinions on the New Final Cut Pro... and what might follow on Larry Jordans Blog at: http://www.larryjordan.biz/goodies/blog.html

Larry is one of the guys who started the rumors flying when he announced that he had seen the new final Cut Pro back in February and that it was going to be a "Jaw dropper"!

As someone who has been sitting on the fence for most of the past year... waiting to see what Apple would do before deciding to go the Final Cut or Premier route... this makes it an easy decision!

All of a sudden the past year spent playing around with iMovie... for lack of any other sandbox to play in... doesn't seem like a total waste of my time anymore! And I can just add other software as I need it... whether it comes from Apple or other software companies like Adobe or Red Giant!

Dale

No transcoding, no transcoding! Non destructive colour balancing! Image analysis on capture/ingest! Auto second source audio syncing! No trasncoding, no transcoding! (and that's just from the first 12 mins of the first video above that I've managed to watch). I think I'm going to love X!

Any idea how it will run on a 2007 Mac Pro (Snow Leopard with 4gig RAM which I guess I could massively upgrade now).

Cheers, Simon

There is some interesting information and opinions on the New Final Cut Pro... and what might follow on Larry Jordans Blog at: http://www.larryjordan.biz/goodies/blog.html

Larry is one of the guys who started the rumors flying when he announced that he had seen the new final Cut Pro back in February and that it was going to be a "Jaw dropper"!

 

As someone who has been sitting on the fence for most of the past year... waiting to see what Apple would do before deciding to go the Final Cut or Premier route... this makes it an easy decision!

 

All of a sudden the past year spent playing around with iMovie... for lack of any other sandbox to play in... doesn't seem like a total waste of my time anymore! And I can just add other software as I need it... whether it comes from Apple or other software companies like Adobe or Red Giant!

Jaw dropping if you are ONLY a FCP user. Any editor familiar with CS5 or Avid and other NLE on other platforms will be impressed but jaw dropping is something left for multi-platform universal files with no rendering realtime full res efx Premier Pro 5.5 is also coming out and has many of the FCPX features as well.

Features will always cross between programs as editors give their feedback to the companies. Magnetic Timeline, native editing etc all came from one software company or another and then added or improved upon with later iterations from competing software.

No transcoding, no transcoding! Non destructive colour balancing! Image analysis on capture/ingest! Auto second source audio syncing! No trasncoding, no transcoding! (and that's just from the first 12 mins of the first video above that I've managed to watch). I think I'm going to love X!

 

Any idea how it will run on a 2007 Mac Pro (Snow Leopard with 4gig RAM which I guess I could massively upgrade now).

 

Cheers, Simon

The minimum requirements for hardware won't be out for awhile due to NDA restrictions.

The minimum requirements for hardware won't be out for awhile due to NDA restrictions.

Wonder who we can bribe, I mean speak with, who can give us some information.

Guess we just need to wait until June...