A new Mac Pro wasn't the only thing coming out of Apple yesterday. They also introduced a major new update for their NLE, Final Cut Pro X. This 10.1 update adds a number of features, including more 4K software and hardware support, optimized dual-GPU performance, native support for more camera files, and the ability to upload 4K videos directly to YouTube. Perhaps the biggest addition, however, is a change in the way FCPX organizes projects, which should make for much better project and media management.
You need to make sure that you have the new OS X 10.9 Mavericks installed, as that is the only OS compatible with the 10.1 update, but before you update, it's probably worth it to watch these three videos from Ripple Training:
One of the biggest changes about the way the program works involves Libraries. Libraries can now contain everything from a particular project, so it will be easier to media manage and move a project to another computer. If you want to work with older projects, they will have to be updated slightly to work correctly with this new project management structure. Here is what Mark Spencer and Steve Martin from Ripple Training had to say about that over on FCP.co, and you can watch a video below to see more on Libraries:
Perhaps the biggest change from prior versions of Final Cut Pro X is the consolidation of the previously separated Event and Project libraries. Now, all Projects are contained within Events.Events are simply “buckets” for both media and Projects - and Events themselves are contained within Libraries. From our standpoint this is huge.
Previous versions of Final Cut Pro made managing media confusing because Projects could contain media from multiple Events spread across multiple drives. And you wouldn’t know this until you tried to move the Project or hand it off to another editor. Then the screaming would begin...
The new options for media import:
You can check out more of the Ripple Training videos for Final Cut 10.1 over on their YouTube page.
At First Site Films shared a video that was uploaded directly from FCPX to YouTube in 4K, and it worked flawlessly. Here's what they had to say:
Today our team took a bit of a leap of faith and updated both Compressor and Final Cut Pro X, which we’ve been using exclusively as our go-to NLE for the last year or so.
One feature we really wanted to test was 4K export to YouTube which seemed to work flawlessly.
We put together a really short piece showing off some beautiful footage from a shoot we had in Banff, Alberta this past fall and it’s viewable in all its 4K glory here:
These are all of the additions in the new update:
- Optimized playback and rendering using dual GPUs in the new Mac Pro
- Video monitoring up to 4K via Thunderbolt 2 and HDMI on select Mac computers
- 4K content including titles, transitions, and generators
- Libraries allow you to gather multiple events and projects within a single bundle
- Easily open and close individual libraries to load just the material you need
- Option to import media to locations inside or outside a library
- Automatically back up libraries to a user-specified drive or network location
- Project Snapshots let you quickly capture the project state for fast versioning
- Audio fade handles on individual audio channels in the timeline
- Add precise retime speeds by entering them numerically in the timeline
- Non-rippling retime option
- One-step Replace and Retime
- Custom project frame sizes
- Through edits displayed on all clip types
- Join Through Edit command removes bladed cuts to clips in the timeline
- Detach audio from Multicam Clips in the timeline to manipulate audio and video separately
- Make video or audio-only edits into the timeline with Multicam Clips as sources
- Blade and move audio in J- and L-cuts
- Roll audio with J- and L-cut splits open
- Option to hide the Browser to gain more screen space for viewing
- Native support for .MTS and .MT2S files from AVCHD cameras
- Used media indicators on source clips
- Improved performance with large projects
- Improved performance when modifying or adding keywords to many clips at once
- Easily move, copy, and paste multiple keyframes
- Option for linear animation with Ken Burns effect
- Improved image stabilization with InertiaCam and Tripod mode
- Import photos from iOS devices
- Proxy and playback quality controls accessible in Viewer menu
- Support for portrait/landscape metadata in still images
- Effects parameters, fonts, and text size included in XML metadata
- Improved support for growing media and edit while ingest
- FxPlug 3 with custom plug-in interfaces and dual-GPU support
- API for custom Share operations using third-party software
- Share directly to YouTube at 4K resolution
- Share directly to Chinese video sites Youku and Tudou
- Spanish language localization
For those who use Motion, that also got an update to 5.1 which included:
- Optimized playback and rendering using dual GPUs in the new Mac Pro
- FxPlug 3 with custom plug-in interfaces and dual-GPU support
- Faster project loading, especially for complex projects
- Share directly to YouTube at 4K resolution
- Spanish language localization
Compressor got a few additions as well:
- New interface with a single-window layout and streamlined controls
- Preset Destinations for common encoding tasks
- Simplified setup for distributed encoding
Check out the links below for more information on what's new in 10.1.
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