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Apple Final Cut Studio

  

 

 

Final Cut Studio 2 helps take you beyond mere editing. Discover the intuitive power of new creative tools designed expressly for Final Cut Pro editors. Rapidly move through editing to motion graphics, audio editing and mixing, color grading, and delivery—all as a natural extension of the work you already do. Final Cut Studio 2 puts a powerful new version of Final Cut Pro at the center of an integrated post-production workflow. Final Cut Studio 2 includes Final Cut Pro 6, Motion 3, Soundtrack Pro 2, Compressor 3, DVD Studio Pro 4, and Color—a brand-new application for professional color grading.

It’s a Final Cut World

Independent filmmakers. Hollywood film editors. Corporate video and event producers. Editors with hourly deadlines cutting broadcast spots or network news. Hundreds of thousands of creative professionals all over the world have made Final Cut Pro their first choice for editing. It has rapidly become an industry standard. Building on this success, Apple has designed each application in Final Cut Studio 2 with Final Cut Pro editors in mind. Start working quickly with intuitive tools and familiar interfaces. Whenever you’re ready for precise control, a comprehensive set of features is just a click away.

The Editor’s Choice

Final Cut Studio 2 is fast, fluid, and flexible. Use a laptop on location and a desktop in the studio. Start with the tools you already use today and extend your reach when you’re ready. Final Cut Studio 2 has everything you need in a single product.

Edit. Use Final Cut Pro 6 for native editing of virtually any format—from DV and SD up to HDV, XDCAM HD, DVCPRO HD, and fully uncompressed HD. Or use ProRes 422, a new post-production format from Apple that offers uncompressed HD quality at SD file sizes. Drag clips with different formats and even different frame rates into the new open format Timeline.

Animate. Create stunning 2D and 3D motion graphics in real time with Motion 3, the fastest and most intuitive way to animate and express your creative vision. Just drag and drop to make dramatic particle effects explode into 3D space; form vector-based paint strokes with the swish of a pen. New Motion master templates let you edit text and drop in video without leaving Final Cut Pro.

Mix. Record and edit dialogue, add music and effects, and complete your mix with ease. Soundtrack Pro 2 lets you work faster than ever in its new streamlined interface. You can even produce in surround sound using innovative visual tools. If you make changes to your edit in Final Cut Pro, you can rapidly update your audio mix with the powerful Conform feature in Soundtrack Pro.

Grade. Give your production a signature look or create a consistent feel for shots from different sources. Color is the newest member of the Final Cut Studio family, offering professional color grading that can elevate the quality of any production.

Deliver. Use Compressor 3 to create pristine-quality output for a wide range of delivery formats—including the web, iPod, iPhone, Apple TV, and broadcast servers. A streamlined new interface lets you batch-process encoding with point-and-click ease. If film is your destination, use Cinema Tools 4 to output film lists that combine timecode and keycode in a single list. Or use DVD Studio Pro 4 for professional DVD
authoring and mastering.

Post-Production Without Walls

Final Cut Studio 2 is not just a product. It’s a platform. Open standards encourage innovation, giving developers and partners the freedom to create custom solutions. With XML to share project data and QuickTime to seamlessly move media between systems, Final Cut Studio 2 can fit into virtually any production pipeline or newsroom. Whether you’re working in a group of 2 or 200, Final Cut Studio lets you collaborate with ease. Share media seamlessly across multiple workstations with Xsan. Use Final Cut Server—with or without Xsan—for media asset management and workflow automation that is deeply integrated with Final Cut Studio 2. Whether you’re cutting commercials, editing feature films, or pushing out the nightly news, Final Cut Server helps you work faster whenever you’re working together.

New in Final Cut Studio 2

Final Cut Studio 2 is a powerful new version of Apple’s industry-leading postproduction software. It includes substantial upgrades—Final Cut Pro 6, Motion 3, Soundtrack Pro 2, and Compressor 3—and introduces Color, a brand-new application for professional color grading.

The following are some of the top new features in Final Cut Studio 2:

  • Open format Timeline. The new open format Timeline in Final Cut Pro 6 lets you mix and match source material in a wide range of formats and even different frame rates. Freely edit a combination of HD and SD, including NTSC and PAL, all in real time.
  • Apple ProRes 422 . Final Cut Pro 6 introduces ProRes 422, Apple’s new post-production format offering uncompressed HD quality at SD file sizes. Use ProRes 422 when collaborating over an Xsan storage network or working on a portable computer in the field; when working with non-native camera formats; or to preserve maximum quality for composites and demanding color grading work.
  • Real-time professional color grading. Use Color, Apple’s new color grading application, to create signature looks for projects ranging from short video pieces to full-length theatrical films. Move freely through a set of streamlined workspaces designed for primary and secondary color adjustments, color effects, reference stills, and geometry changes. An easy-to-use toolset helps editors work efficiently, using familiar interfaces and intuitive adjustment tools. Round-trip integration makes Color
    a seamless extension of your work in Final Cut Pro 6.
  • 3D multiplane compositing environment. Motion 3 makes it easy to create 3D motion graphics by extending the 2D tools you already use into 3D space. Drag and drop camera behaviors to dolly, truck, and orbit around a scene or move from layer to layer. Use multiple viewports to adjust cameras, lights, layers, and motion paths in 3D space. Then go beyond the basics by bringing elements like particles, Replicator patterns, and text behaviors into this comprehensive 3D design environment.
  • Point tracking and match moving. Set up point tracking or four-corner match moves in just a few clicks using intuitive new tools in Motion 3. Quickly attach text, particles, or any layer to an object in a video clip and follow the movement of the object with pinpoint accuracy. Say good-bye to guessing and repeated trials; Motion identifies the best potential tracking points and dynamically adjusts for common tracking errors.
  • Image stabilization and SmoothCam. Motion 3 offers two powerful options for correcting shaky shots. Use the image stabilizer to lock down a shot without the time-consuming setup required by most stabilization tools. Or use the SmoothCam feature to retain standard camera moves like pans, tilts, and zooms while eliminating handheld camera jitters or bumps. Both features are based on sophisticated optical flow technology originally developed for Shake.
  • Professional multitrack editing. Work more efficiently than ever in the new singlewindow interface in Soundtrack Pro 2, with tools designed to save you time on common tasks such as selecting takes, spotting sound to video, and removing noise from field recordings. Then use a rich palette of audio effect plug-ins, Foley, sound effects, and music to add the perfect creative touch to your soundtrack.
  • Intuitive surround sound. Soundtrack Pro 2 makes it easy to create professional surround sound mixes. Use an innovative surround panner to view a dynamic visual representation of how sound is panned in the surround field. Choose from more than 1000 royalty-free surround music beds and sound effects; use any of the provided surround audio effect plug-ins, such as the Space Designer convolution reverb, or adapt any mono or stereo effect plug-in for use on surround tracks.
  • Automatic audio conform process. If you make changes to your sequence in Final Cut Pro, use the powerful new Conform feature in Soundtrack Pro 2 to automatically update your audio project to match the video edit. The Conform feature compares the two versions and highlights the changed audio clips. Confidence ranking, auditioning, and intuitive navigation tools help you choose whether to accept, reject, or modify each change, or you can accept all changes. Then Soundtrack Pro repositions your accepted changes to match the audio edit to the video edit.
  • Multiformat delivery made easy. Compressor 3 has been streamlined to optimize efficiency for any encoding job, including the output of multiple files to multiple formats. With a customizable interface and drag-and-drop batch processing tools, Compressor makes it easy to create files for delivery on iPod, Apple TV, the web, DVD, mobile phones, and next-generation Blu-ray and HD DVD discs. This versatility comes through expanded support for leading industry-standard formats, such as MPEG-2 and H.264, as well as chaptering tools for podcasts and Apple TV.
  • AutoCluster for distributed encoding. Use the Qmaster application included in Compressor 3 to distribute encoding jobs across a network of Mac systems. The new AutoCluster feature in Qmaster automatically configures a cluster of computers based on available resources. For even faster throughput, you can configure Qmaster to manage individual processors in each computer, turning any Mac Pro into a virtual render farm.

Final Cut Pro 6 - One timeline. Infinite possibilities.

The first choice of professional editors worldwide, Final Cut Pro 6 delivers highperformance digital nonlinear editing, native support for virtually any video format, and facility-class extensibility and interoperability. Its workflow extends through the other Final Cut Studio applications and Final Cut Server for even more power. Whether you’re working solo or collaborating with a team, Final Cut Pro gives you more creative options and technical control than ever before, including:

  • Broad format support
  • Incredible real-time effects
  • Comprehensive editing tools
  • Expanded power as the hub of Final Cut Studio
  • Open, extensible architecture

New in Final Cut Pro 6

New features in Final Cut Pro 6 offer even more ease of use and flexibility—including expanded format support and deeper integration with the other applications in Final Cut Studio 2. New features include:

  • Open format Timeline. The new open format Timeline in Final Cut Pro 6 lets you mix and match source material in a wide range of formats and even different frame rates. Freely edit a combination of HD and SD, including NTSC and PAL, all in real time.
  • Apple ProRes 422 . Final Cut Pro 6 introduces ProRes 422, Apple’s new post-production format offering uncompressed HD quality at SD file sizes.
  • SmoothCam. The SmoothCam feature automatically smoothes out shaky shots while preserving standard camera moves like dollies, pans, and zooms.
  • Deep integration with Motion 3. Editable Motion 3 master templates—complete with video drop zones and text fields—let you easily update content without leaving Final Cut Pro. Transfer clips to Motion while preserving your retiming and SmoothCam information from Final Cut Pro.
  • FxPlug filters and transitions. Add to more than 150 real-time filters and effects in Final Cut Pro 6 by bringing in third-party filters based on the FxPlug standard—the format used to produce the extraordinary real-time effects in Motion.
  • Improved audio. New Soft Normalize and Gain controls can be applied to single or multiple clips to automatically raise the level of any clip to its maximum without distortion. Create a surround sound mix in Soundtrack Pro, then return to Final Cut Pro to monitor your audio in full 5.1 surround sound as you continue your video edit.
  • Simplified setups. Setting up a sequence is now as easy as dragging and dropping. Final Cut Pro instantly configures the setup to match the format of the first clip you drop into the Timeline. For manual setups, save time with the Easy Setup feature.
  • Integration with Color. Send your project to Color for advanced color grading with round-trip ease. Color can also be used in Digital Intermediate workflows to color grade and output high-resolution film scans.
  • Cinema Tools 4. A streamlined interface in Cinema Tools 4 helps you work more efficiently. Customizable film lists now let you mix timecode and keycode in the same list. Easily export your lists as XML and import them into industry-standard tracking systems used to pull film negatives. You can also output easy-to-read PDF lists.

Broad Format Support

Final Cut Pro 6 lets you edit virtually anything and retain the highest possible quality, including camera-native editing of leading SD and HD formats. Work with DV one day, then HDV, XDCAM HD, DVCPRO HD, or uncompressed HD the next. Or use ProRes 422, Apple’s new post-production format, for uncompressed HD quality at SD file sizes.

Open format Timeline
The new open format Timeline in Final Cut Pro 6 lets you mix and match source material in a wide range of formats and even different frame rates. Just drag and drop your footage into the Timeline. Freely mix and match HD and SD, including NTSC and PAL. Final Cut Pro 6 offers real-time scaling and playback for video in various camera-native formats as well as Apple ProRes 422.

Apple ProRes 422
Final Cut Pro 6 introduces ProRes 422, the new post-production format from Apple that offers uncompressed HD quality at SD file sizes. Use ProRes 422 when collaborating on an Xsan storage network, when working with non-native camera formats, or to preserve maximum quality for composites and demanding color grading work.

Camera-native editing
Final Cut Pro 6 lets you edit virtually anything natively. That means that you’ll get pristine quality from the first cut to the final output. Final Cut Pro doesn’t need to transcode video from camera-native formats—no matter whether it’s coming from a DV, HDV, or DVCPRO HD camera. Your output will always be as stunning as your original source.

Tapeless formats
It’s easy to work with the latest high-speed, tapeless devices from Panasonic and Sony. Use the Log and Transfer function in Final Cut Pro for ingesting Panasonic P2 files; use Sony’s free XDCAM Transfer software for ingesting 18-, 25-, and 35-Mbps XDCAM HD footage. Preview shots before you bring them in, add In and Out points, and incorporate metadata before you transfer files to save time when you get to the edit. Ingest tapeless files in the background at high speeds while you continue to edit or preview other material.