Premiere Vs. Final Cut

[dewman77]

Hi Everyone.
I am relaunching my studio with the goal of offering indi film makers a smooth, easy 4k workflow to do everything they need for their production.

I'm getting 2 mac pro's but don't know if i should go with Adobe Creative Suite CS4, with Premiere Pro and After Effects - Or to go with Final Cut Studio 2, with Final Cut Pro 6 and Apple Motion. I need a complete suite for the user.

Would love to hear what you, the film makers would rather use if you were coming in looking for a complete workflow for your film.
Thanks.
-Dewey

[David Taylor]

Dewey, if you would consider CineForm as a supplemental option for both PPro and FCP you could have a pretty smooth cross-platform workflow, running Prospect 4K on Windows and Neo 4K on Mac. Files will easily interchange between platforms and you'll have a real-time editing workflow with renderless Active Metadata processing. Your workflow would be online all the time, and you can use Express files for those times when you're in the field running a laptop.

[Dave Blackham]

FCS 2 every time but with catDV to look after workflow management. It may be you add After Affects to the set up. You need various effects plugins though (Sapphire, Joes filters, Tiffen and more)

Id consider this as a powerful system software wise, you need to ensure that the Macs have very fast GPUs in them.

Dave
UK

[amrrahmy]

final cut is much more reliable than premiere, also fcs2 comes with color which is worth the price alone, and can be a time saver in some sitiuations.
but you probably need photoshop and after effects, so production premium would be the choice, it comes with after effects, photoshop extended and illustrator among other things like premiere, u can get that and if u notice tons of crashes with no reason, or just importing small simple files being a headache, u can always get fcs2 later since u probably will need after effects and photoshop anyway.

[Dave Blackham]

FCS 2 every time but with catDV to look after workflow management. It may be you add After Affects to the set up. You need various effects plugins though (Sapphire, Joes filters, Tiffen and more)

Id consider this as a powerful system software wise, you need to ensure that the Macs have very fast GPUs in them.

Dave
UK

With this set up I've posted many very high value series for Television. amrrahmy is completely correct Color is a real asset here worth every penny.

The only aspect which needs consideration is that some effects bundles need an FCP licence and AE licence but you may be able to negociate your way round this if both packages are on the same machine.

Dave
UK

[Julio Quintana]

If this were for your personal use, I would say it's up to you. But since you need to attract customers, I recommend Final Cut Studio with After Effects. If all you offer is Premiere Pro, you will be PERCEIVED as being amateurish, whether it's true or not. For most professionals, there is still an imagined hierarchy of professional systems, and this is the order: AVID, Final Cut Pro, Premier Pro.

[Sam Roberts]

Hi Everyone.

I'm getting 2 mac pro's but don't know if i should go with Adobe Creative Suite CS4, with Premiere Pro and After Effects - Or to go with Final Cut Studio 2, with Final Cut Pro 6 and Apple Motion. I need a complete suite for the user Dewey

why not install both and take advantage of the best each has to offer?

[Mike Harrington]

If this were for your personal use, I would say it's up to you. But since you need to attract customers, I recommend Final Cut Studio with After Effects. If all you offer is Premiere Pro, you will be PERCEIVED as being amateurish, whether it's true or not. For most professionals, there is still an imagined hierarchy of professional systems, and this is the order: AVID, Final Cut Pro, Premier Pro.

i agree there is that perception.....but
out of these 3 programs only 1 can do 4k raw in high bit depth RGB.....
In november Adobe will also have native .R3D import being the first program outside of scratch (i beleive)to do so.

So you have to ask yourself if you want to look professional to others.....or do you want to do an online RAW 4k edit....

With cineform and premiere you have 2 options (as of November) to do online 4k raw...

Final Cut can do cineform as well....but not as fast,with a cropped 4k(no big deal) and Color cannot import cineform....and no native R3D....

so if you have the money, I would get both.....one to wow the clients, and show them the on set proxies....and the other to do the edit

cause once you deal with how easy cineform is....you won't want to bother with online/offline/EDL......

[Julio Quintana]

i agree there is that perception.....but
out of these 3 programs only 1 can do 4k raw in high bit depth RGB.....
In november Adobe will also have native .R3D import being the first program outside of scratch (i beleive)to do so.

So you have to ask yourself if you want to look professional to others.....or do you want to do an online RAW 4k edit....

With cineform and premiere you have 2 options (as of November) to do online 4k raw...

Final Cut can do cineform as well....but not as fast, and Color cannot import cineform....and no native R3D....


Excellent points. The question is whether or not he can convince his customers of this...

[Mike Harrington]

i agree....

depends on the situation I guess.....and you are right, Final Cut has a little more prestige

[dewman]

I just had to post since dewman77 and I have the same unique name :)....not to many Dewey's around.... I agree with Sam and would get both and allow your client's to choose what they are more comfortable with...

Thanks,
the OG - dewman - dewey :)

[Dave Blackham]

Im not sure if selling a suite on the merits of the software element is a good move these days. Its a mix of software hardware but above all expertees.

The image processing needs to be perfect every time which implies good understanding of the workflow. Also I know most commercials suites couldnt handle a 90 minute TV feature let alone a Cinema feature so the suite hardware spec and infrastructure is also important for the work in hand. FCP or After effects is only the stating point here, many Plugins are needed for either approach and a good understanding of how they interact. Id regard either the Apple or Adobe's approach as a QuickTime work flow suite utilising the most appropriate application for the job in hand which could be FCP, Color, Motion, AE, Photoshop, Shake or whatever, all have their place. Appropriate monitoring is also important and where finishing is concerned it needs to be as good as can be and proplery calibrated for the envoroment its in with suitable lighting.

Interestingly although Avid has been mentioned I don't think its really in the running for this type of work and mostly play's second fiddle to FCP, may be even third fiddle to Adobe in many situations. Im not against Avid in anyway as I still run three of their suites its just they are not well placed in this field right now.

Coming back to the main point surely the client is engaging with the facility primarily for the expterees rather than the software ?

Dave
UK

[Mat@imageWork]

Coming from discreet world, to me, the only concern is seamless workflow. The less who are loosing time on non-creative task, the most your project would have "real time"...Working with FCP to ship into AE don't make sens since Adobe improve their general worklow between appz.

[amrrahmy]

fcp cuts at least 3x faster than any other nle,
going to ae u can use a reference file, or just send the portion that u want as a mov file or a tiff or png sequence for photoshop and ae, and bring back that portion in a couple of clicks, it's still much faster than the adobe workflow.
and that's fcp and ae, not even going to say how much faster fcp to motion is, or even color.

[Dave Blackham]

Coming from discreet world, to me, the only concern is seamless workflow. The less who are loosing time on non-creative task, the most your project would have "real time"...Working with FCP to ship into AE don't make sens since Adobe improve their general worklow between appz.

Its really not an issue. Think of it as QT workflow rather than different vendors software. There are a couple of small issues but that are relatively easy to work with.

Dave
UK

[Mike Harrington]

fcp cuts at least 3x faster than any other nle,
going to ae u can use a reference file, or just send the portion that u want as a mov file or a tiff or png sequence for photoshop and ae, and bring back that portion in a couple of clicks, it's still much faster than the adobe workflow.
and that's fcp and ae, not even going to say how much faster fcp to motion is, or even color.

final cut to AE is not faster then premiere pro to AE, with the adobe suite you do not have to render out of AE to have the effect in your timeline...dynamic link....no need for rendering or referance files

and if you want to go to motion that's cool...just most final cut user would rather use AE anyway

if you don't know how how to use a package....the one you are coming from always seems the fastest...

I was a die hard avid user, until red came along and I wanted online 4k
so i had to bite the bullet and go the adobe route,which was at first clunkier

and there are a lot of nle's faster then final cut...
speededit for one
and it can send an entire timeline as an AVI referance file....the same way you send a single clip as a quicktime referance....but the program is only 8 bit and cannot do 4k
but neither can final cut right?natively I mean....

http://02bb6aa.netsolhost.com/downloads/Red_Workflow.mp4
cineform adoble workflow including online 4k and active metada...so it's like you never left Redcine(as far as look choices)

[amrrahmy]

u dont have to render in ae?how would u check what u have done inside ae, even then, if u dont save and render u will have to keep the ae open the entire time to the finished product, if u use ae in the first frame of the edit u will keep the files open to the end and not render in ae or premiere and u wont check to see what u have done at all, even then when ur exporting it will still render, dynamic link doesn't mean u wont render at some point.u'll have to check ur work at some point and need to render be it in ae or premiere it's the same.
fcp is the fastest nle, this has nothing to do with exporting time of files, we are talking about the nle application itself, the cutting the effects the linking to other media, adjusting this and that and bring everthing together, the time u spend on the export is nothing compared to the time u spend actually editing the files, and exporting uncompressed or reference files is the same on any application that is for your information.

[Mike Harrington]

Have you used dynamic link before?
You check your work in the premiere timeline, you only need to render once.
if you do everything right the first time and you don't need any sort of versioning...then you don't need dynamic link....if your dealing with directors and producers who want changes in the comp...then there instantaneous, and need only be rendered at export of the timeline.

For final cut and AE, you would have to render every change out of AE, and reimport into Final Cut....and if it need's changes, render again and reimport... while maybe not that big of a deal...you specifically said that Final Cut to AE was faster then the Adobe workflow.

dynamic link can be thought of as a referance to the AE comp

and as for Final cut being the fastest....you would have to try Speededit or Avid Liquid before you could compare.

In speededit there is no render time, not for color corrections or anything else.(You can import an HDR or EXR sequence right into the timeline)
And avid liquid killed in pure timeline speed and interface...
Neither if these have high bit depth rendering though....and speededit is limited to 2.8k....
and they both can handle quicktime's or avi's

[tfg]

fcp cuts at least 3x faster than any other nle

I work as a television editor and use FCP about 10 hours a day... I love FCP, but I can easily tell you that FCP does not cut faster than Premiere Pro.

Reasons:
- FCP's "open sequence" feature doesn't allow nearly as many different formats as Premiere Pro without rendering
- Some formats require a quicktime wrapper, wasting time during import
- FCP does not handle any real-time alpha channels. So... you imported a picture or video containing an alpha... prepare to render.
- FCP's media manager is only 2-core aware, totally wasting the other cores of a mac pro machine (unless you use compressor to do your rendering, even which requires you to make a series of virtual clusters in qmaster).

For the record, I am not proposing that Premiere Pro replace FCP as the NLE of choice ... but speed is definitely not an issue. Premiere is a clear winner in that area.

PS: I just thought I would express my excitement for the scarlet announcement ;)

[amrrahmy]

biased pc guys, okay:

dynamic link is the sad attempt to try to link premiere with ae or any sad attempt to link different adobe products that where not even adobe products from the start and not really build or integrated for that purpose, it doesn't happen, ae stuff needs rendering either in ae or premiere or whatever other application, passing the rendering job to another application doesn't mean there is no rendering.
...just to put that in prespective.... if u do something in motion u can preview it in motion in realtime, so there is no rendering, that means u can actually see what you are doing and there is no rendering, that's not the case in ae, u need to render inside ae just to be able to preview your work.

as for speededit and (liquid?), even if you dont have to render in speededit, still the fcp interface will make you edit faster, alot faster.

dont know how you can argue something so obvious, but tell me what mixed formats can premiere do realtime that fcp cant, and when do u use video with alpha channel, cuz i think would have to make the video, and remove a portion to/or add the alpha information in the video in the first place that would put the video in the middle of the project not at the start and makes rendering a normal state of affairs, and i won't even say how fast an image takes to render.

also working in fcp is totally different than premiere, where fcp is stable, premiere is more like a russian roulette.

and i used premiere alot in the past i used premire 2 and cs3 allot and i have tried premiere cs4, and i used an older version of avid, i only liked avid cuz it was controlled with a smooth controller surface that i liked, i like tablets more thou.

but premiere, or speededit are not even runners in nle apps., if am cutting something on pc i would use virtual dub and not premiere if i can.
i miss some stuff about directx but speed in nle is not one of them.

[Russ McDonald]

Had to way in here, Adobe came and showed us the beta red plug-in for Premiere, and AE. It was as close to flawless as you can get with software in the development phase. It was fantastic. I think Premiere just grew-up and will be a player in high-end finishing. I think Premiere, has always gotten a bad rap as a wedding video tool. Things are changing...

[Ben Holmes]

Had to way in here, Adobe came and showed us the beta red plug-in for Premiere, and AE. It was as close to flawless as you can get with software in the development phase. It was fantastic. I think Premiere just grew-up and will be a player in high-end finishing. I think Premiere, has always gotten a bad rap as a wedding video tool. Things are changing...

As a long time FCP editor, and more recent AE compositor (it's clearly a superior tool to Motion - and you only get 'realtime' in Motion for simple projects, with quicker RAM previews in AE for more complex work) I think you may be right.

Adobe have capitalised on a lengthy period of ZERO progress from Apple, a situation I suspect will not last forever - I predict a fully rewritten FCS released in April to run under Snow Leopard - but dynamic link and a GUI that doesn't make me puke anymore goes a long way to helping. I'm also amazed by the speed of Premiere - but I still prefer the FCP interface for basic editing.

Don't expect Apple to lie down and take it for much longer - reports of FCS's death have been greatly exaggerated... There's a lot of frustrated developers hiding behind NDAs right now.

Ben

[Mike Harrington]

biased pc guys, okay:

dynamic link is the sad attempt to try to link premiere with ae or any sad attempt to link different adobe products that where not even adobe products from the start and not really build or integrated for that purpose, it doesn't happen, ae stuff needs rendering either in ae or premiere or whatever other application, passing the rendering job to another application doesn't mean there is no rendering.
...just to put that in prespective.... if u do something in motion u can preview it in motion in realtime, so there is no rendering, that means u can actually see what you are doing and there is no rendering, that's not the case in ae, u need to render inside ae just to be able to preview your work.

as for speededit and (liquid?), even if you dont have to render in speededit, still the fcp interface will make you edit faster, alot faster.

dont know how you can argue something so obvious, but tell me what mixed formats can premiere do realtime that fcp cant, and when do u use video with alpha channel, cuz i think would have to make the video, and remove a portion to/or add the alpha information in the video in the first place that would put the video in the middle of the project not at the start and makes rendering a normal state of affairs, and i won't even say how fast an image takes to render.

also working in fcp is totally different than premiere, where fcp is stable, premiere is more like a russian roulette.

and i used premiere alot in the past i used premire 2 and cs3 allot and i have tried premiere cs4, and i used an older version of avid, i only liked avid cuz it was controlled with a smooth controller surface that i liked, i like tablets more thou.

but premiere, or speededit are not even runners in nle apps., if am cutting something on pc i would use virtual dub and not premiere if i can.
i miss some stuff about directx but speed in nle is not one of them.

Burnt any Blu rays lately?

Let me make something clear...
I am editing a 4k RAW short in Ppro CS3.....and in 4k on the timeline
Final cut cannot do 4k....can it....hmmm
I am also in 12bit RGB....final cut....limited to 10 right.
Color also is 2k right......
I am grading in color finesse at 4k.....

If you would rather cut in virtual dub then premiere...then no one can clearly take you seriousely....although maybe virtualdub can do 4k.....
how many longform project have you cut in virtual dub????

Happy youtubin

Final cut is an awsome program....but for a Red based studio....without access to scratch,it's not as convienient a solution. Whereas with Ppro and cineform, and the Adobe suite, you are good end to end for full 4k.

For the final cut diehards it is quite capable, and is a great package....so you final cut users out there, don't be offended by my nitpicking...

[Mike Harrington]

dynamic link is the sad attempt to try to link premiere with ae or any sad attempt to link different adobe products that where not even adobe products from the start and not really build or integrated for that purpose,

not even adobe products from the start huh....

you do realize final cut was written by Adobe employees on contract to Macromedia.....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final_Cut_Pro
read the history

and color....you think apple wrote that?
motion....ever hear of chalice....
logic.....

apple has hardly written any apps....they buy existing ones and mash them together

[amrrahmy]

not sure you understand what nle does exactly, so you dont get the requirements needed.

also it's not 12bit rgb, 12bit rgb means 12bit in every channel, that's not the case.
also exporting 2k from fcp would give you better image quality compared to the 4k, or what you think is 4k anyway.
what does color finesse has to do with premiere?

[Mike Harrington]

also it's not 12bit rgb, 12bit rgb means 12bit in every channel, that's not the case.

12 bit cinform 444
or 12 bit cineform RAW

you do realize what that means don't you??? a professional editor such as yourself.....

http://www.cineform.com/products/TechNotes/Red-Prospect4K.htm


also exporting 2k from fcp would give you better image quality compared to the 4k, or what you think is 4k anyway

exporting 2k is better then 4k.....
then 720p must be even better...thanks for the tip

I guess i'll sell my red and get another HVX....

maybe I can sell the Adobe suite and get Virtual Dub since it's free.....

[amrrahmy]

wow, it doesnt matter where you put it, the camera is not doing 12bit in every channel, if you have an 8 bit image and you put it in a 16 bit file, it's still an 8bit image, if it was 4:2:2 or 4:2:0 or whatever and you put it in 4:4:4 it doesnt make it a 4:4:4(that's not referring to red)
it's not 4k it's saved as 4k where it's more like 3.2 that would go to 2k in the downsizing for better results, so it's more like 2k to begin with to get the best quality.

another hvx?

[amrrahmy]

if you dont know what your talking about stop reciting the technical information on the boxes, it doesnt make you look smart, it makes it worse

[Mike Harrington]

the camera is not doing 12bit in every channel

http://www.red.com/cameras

native 12 bit Raw....
did you think Red was an 8 bit camera?

[Mike Harrington]

I predict an explanation that 8 bit is better then 12 bit anyway

happy youtubin

[amrrahmy]

it's doing half the bits in the two channels.
10rgb that's 30 bit total for the slow people makes better colors specially in low light and bright situations, where the lack of color even compare to 8bit rgb, makes color shifts in the compensation. if that gets over your youtubehead dont worry, other stuff did in the past too.

[Mike Harrington]

it's doing half the bits in the two channels.

bit depth is how color is represented

it dosn't matter on the bayer sampling at all

a 1 pixel sensor could be 12 bit, in that color

your confusing sampling (4:2:2.....4:4:4) with bit depth

you can have files from say hd cam that are 3:1:1 8 bit
or hd cam SR that are 4:4:4 10 bit or 4:2:2 10 bit

Red happens to be 4:4:4 12 bit

some people(yourself included) confuse the bayer sampling (2 times as many green as red or blue)....with color sampling

you just took it a step further and confused it with bit depth as well

[Mike Harrington]

I strongly disagree about calling a sensor a 4:2:0, as not only is it bad terminology for where it was designed to be used for Y'CbCr chroma sub-sampling, but absolutely does not apply to a Bayer pattern sensor, and indeed does not apply to any sensor configuration.

Graeme

only Graeme though.....

[amrrahmy]

dude please, any color assumption is not real color, that means it's not really 4:4:4 that the first fact.
dont argue with it, if it's made up it means it's not there that's what less than 4:4:4 does and that's what this camera does and poorly i might add. so it's not 4:4:4 to begin with
it's not 12 bit rgb either if the information is not there, in all channels or if it's made up, it's the same thing.

[Mike Harrington]

your right....

[amrrahmy]

what it actually is and what it was designed for are different subjects, this camera doesn't have an iso range(or whatever you would call it, luminous or light change), it's a couple of steps darker with a fixed iso, and the nearst clipping point known to a camera, and is in the worst top 10 cameras in shadow noise and artifacts, that's reality. no matter how many people say it you are still not willing to accept it.

[Mike Harrington]

no i totally agree....

I just didn't realize it wasn't 4:4:4...I feel cheated kinda

why advertise it at 12 bit?

[Mike Harrington]

it's doing half the bits in the two channels.
10rgb that's 30 bit total for the slow people makes better colors specially in low light and bright situations, where the lack of color even compare to 8bit rgb, makes color shifts in the compensation


so doing the math 12 bits green
and then only half for red and blue....meaning 6 each right...

so like 24 bits total....not the 36 i said.....

i see what your saying

well seeing that I was wrong about so much....:poster_oops:

assuming that 4k downsampled was better, and assuming the camera was 444 12 bit, I question why I bothered with cineform at all

I could have saved $2000(that's the price of cineform 4k) and just used adobe in 8 bit mode....(10 bit must still be a little better)

maybe I could trade in PPro for final cut

[David Newman]

What are you guys on about?

12-bit is luma precision, it helps define (potential) dynamic range, it doesn't matter if it is bayer, 4:2:0, 3:1:1 or 4:4:4, luma precision is the most import factor, particularly after you have more that HD resolution. A bayer sensor when developed, resolves more than 4:2:0 or 4:2:2 at the sensor resolution, while not resolving to 4:4:4, you need 4:4:4 to store all the information of the developed image (perferrable at 10 or 12-bits per channel.)

[Mike Harrington]

ahh you ruined it....
:shifty:

I was going to get him to explain lattitude next
http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?p=230039#post230039

[amrrahmy]

that's only in a precise light condition, cuz of the fixed iso.
it has to be in a controlled environment.

still taking in the 4by where red is not.okay dude whatever,
one color in 12bit doesn't mean it's 12bit rgb, if it doesn't store that info, what you think is not important,
it's not 4:4:4 when there is a s#$% load of color shift made by the assumptions in the camera to fill the huge gaps that make low light condition worse than 8bit rgb all these are facts, why are you arguing?
i'm done here.

[Mike Harrington]

amrramy....

looking at most of the threads your involved in,(i especially liked the one where you told David Mullen all about cinemetography) they usually get closed by a mod, followed by a warning to you from a mod...and 5 or six people adding you to there ignore list.....

I have a schizophrenic brother....and learned not to argue with him, as he could not follow logic....he's much better now though....good medication...he calls it "Liquid Straightjacket"...

[amrrahmy]

not liking what i say doesn't dispute the fact that it is real.

[Mike Harrington]

that what my brother would say:biggrin:

[amrrahmy]

okay, show me one test in low light against any other camera, where red footage is better as you say.

[Mike Harrington]

when did I say that???

feel free to PM me.....even though your the only entry on my ignore list
PS adding you to the ignore list means I can't see your post....so I won't see your response....so don't bother

I think it's time to stop hijacking this thread before it get's closed like the other ones you right in....

[amrrahmy]

you started the 12 bit rgb not me, we might get to somewhere fun where you find out that adobe 4k is not of the best interest to the image quality compared to 2k,

maybe we can get somewhere here,so you don't agree that your saying it's better,

so, it's not better, you know why it's not better?

[shashbugu]

fcp cuts at least 3x faster than any other nle,
going to ae u can use a reference file, or just send the portion that u want as a mov file or a tiff or png sequence for photoshop and ae, and bring back that portion in a couple of clicks, it's still much faster than the adobe workflow.
and that's fcp and ae, not even going to say how much faster fcp to motion is, or even color.

FCP cuts faster than all NLE's period.

[Santiago Marti]

FCP cuts faster than all NLE's period.


CS4 is really ahead. integration is tight, period. amrrahmy, when you say "send" y read "render", that is not fast at all. Rendering a .mov out of fcp to ae is not fast nor convenient. Cut and paste 4K .r3d files between premiere and ae looks better to me. Motion is not a serious program, to compare it against ae is plain ignorance. Color is ok thoug, but not for 4K or .r3d. Is color able to import dpx files? i don't know. Anyway, after trying premiere cs4 i decided to use the whole suite, it is really excelent. Unbeatable. Period. For now, FCP is anything but convenient. It is like buying an NLE from nokia or motorola. :)

[amrrahmy]

i remember talking about dynamic link in adobe and fcp to motion, didn't compare ae to motion.
sending a reference is not the same as rendering a self contained mov file.
if you want to justify to yourself that you dont need fcp, or that premiere is better, that fine, but dont share it with others.and dont repeat other peoples thoughts, or what they try to convince themselves with, only a nerd would judge a program better because it's newer.

[Santiago Marti]

amrrahmy, i will stop here, cuz it is obvious you don't have any idea of what you are talking about and you are talking just like a macfan. if you want to show your love for steve is ok but don't share it with others :sarcasm: i've been editing for 13 years now, so you won't tell me i repeat other people thoughts. yes i am a nerd. saying that FCP is 3 times faster is the stupidest thing i heard in a really long time. it is like saying that my shoes run faster than yours.

[Mike Harrington]

feel free to carry on the discussion...
I believe we have the first reduser banned on the basis of incompetence

so long amrrahmy
you were truly one of a kind:bye2:

[Mat@imageWork]

md,

Do you use adobe suite in a day to day basis? What do you think about new progress of CUDA, GPU accelerate progress? In fact, I'm uppon to invest in suite, not only for RED project. As I have a mac I "use to edit" with FCP. As long as we only do commercial with quite a lot of effect, I don't stick a lot in nle, and ship ASAP to comp. CS4 and worklow means a lot saving time to me. Also, my background is on smoke-Flame...I have been almost protected from bug appz. How CS4 deals with bug*? * Let's say Color have for me been the biggest nightmare ever seen, and smoke on tezro the most gentle suite ever build...FCP is not a finishing system to me as long as 10 bit yuv is NOT enought as long as effect and CC are involve a lot...

Thanks in advance...

[Mike Harrington]

I don't want to discredit the FCP workflow....
a alot of talented people are using it for Red projects right now.

The only thing I see in the Adobe workflow is the potential for end-to-end 4k at full bit depth....self contained

People using FCP in combination with Scratch for example have no issues whatsoever....but without the inclusion of something like scratch (Smoke/Flame would also qualify) FCP is not in itself a complete solution.

Does PPro have problems....you bet.
Is AE the best compositer out there....not really(it is getting better all the time though)
But they do offer support where the numbers count....in resolution and bit depth.
It's more of a financial (idealistic) choice.

If you can afford scratch smoke flame filmaster ect....then cutting in Final Cut could very well be the best workflow going.
But for an indie style budget, the best quality end-end finishing will be Adobe.

The time will come in the next few years when some of the big boys will have to adjust there prices. If Adobe had a grading suite...like color(but working)there would be no need to leave the suite. (Color Finesse would almost do but it needs some tracking, and takes too long to do a long form project)

Similar to 3d packages like maya 10 years ago cost $50,000...why
because the modern PC of that time did not have the power to run them and people needed specialized equipment.

A similar thing is going to happen with high end finishing...why
cause right now to run a smoke or flame a large raid array is needed to power them and out of the price of most small companies.
With compressed codecs such as Cineform and Redcode coming into play....there soon will not be a reason to go to DPX other then for final film out. Not to mention were likely on the edge of a revolution in storage with proper SSD`s coming on line, and that last mechanical bottleneck on the PC will soon vanish.

[Mike Harrington]

What do you think about new progress of CUDA, GPU accelerate progress

still in it`s infancy...and somewhat overated
the next couple versions though it could be a huge help

Nvidia had a redering plugin for maya called Gelato that was supposed to be faster because it passed off most of the calculations to the card.
While it helped it all eventually failed(you can download it for free from Nvidia...used to cost like $3500) because it didn`t offer the speed gains that you would think over modern rendering algorithms using the CPU.

BTW Nvidia has since bought Mental Ray and probaly would be working on GPU accelerated verion of that....which would be very bad for AMD

I asked David Newman about implementing this in cineform and here`s the answer I got


Until a GPU don't slow us down, we will stick with the CPU. Compression, particular high-end compression, is not a good fit for GPUs. While a hybrid codec that does some CPU work and some GPU work is fine, that design is best for presentation only, not for post-production where the output of the decoder may be feed into other CPU based operations (the ping-pong from GPU to CPU is still a bottleneck.)