Andrew Gormley

Beyond bug fixes, here's a list of the new features straight from the Final Cut Pro X App Store page:

• Multicam editing with automatic sync and support for mixed formats, mixed frame rates, and up to 64 camera angles
• Advanced chroma keying with controls for color sampling and edge quality
• Media relink for manual reconnect of projects and Events to new media
• Ability to import and edit layered Photoshop graphics
• XML 1.1 with support for primary color grades, effect parameters, and audio keyframes
• Beta version of broadcast monitoring with third-party PCIe and Thunderbolt I/O devices

Another feature that they tout way at the bottom of the Final Cut Pro X page is a third party app called "7toX", which is an Apple-endorsed way to convert your Final Cut Pro 7 projects into the new format. I've personally used this software on a handful of projects today and can say that it works as advertised: all transitions come over successfully (though need to be re-rendered), as well as any clip modifications like scaling or cropping. Granted, I wasn't converting incredibly complicated sequences (the largest one had three tracks of video and six tracks of audio), but everything converted nicely and without much fuss.

Finally. Multicam.

I'll be the first to admit that multicam editing in Final Cut Pro 7 was easily one of the best implementations I've ever used, especially when you synced timecode and were able to switch between clips on the fly just using the keyboard. For a while people were complaining that you couldn't do this in FCPX, when it was indeed possible simply by synchronizing clips, but now that the official implementation is here I'm happy to say it could be even better than (if not incredibly similar to) FCP7's. Here's a short video that I shot with two iPhones that I was able to put together in under 5 minutes:

Media Relinking

I can say that in the 7 months and approximately 12 videos projects I've edited that I've never had a problem with losing media in FCPX. In my case, though, I copy all footage over to my scratch drive AND create optimized or proxy versions of each clip. From what I understand, prior to this update if there was media missing you have to actually remove it from your Event library and then re-import it. It's great to see that they've added a relinking feature for people who may be working off of multiple volumes or who keep clips in separate places.

Layered Photoshop Graphics

I remember before I learned Motion that this was a necessity for me in both Final Cut Pro and DVD Studio Pro. Now it seems like something that's nice to have, but not particularly useful unless Photoshop is your primary graphics tool of choice. I'll admit it's still nice to have the option to use tools outside of Apple's suite, though.

Broadcast Monitor Support

This will be huge for the professional community that has an eyebrow raised in the direction of FCPX. One possible downside is that it's limited to Thunderbolt Macs and only the newest hardware from companies like AJA, Blackmagic, etc. I don't have the need for a broadcast monitor at the moment, but it's nice to know that if the need arises FCPX will be up to the job.

Chroma Keyer Updates

Speaking from very recent experience working on a project using the FCPX chroma keyer, I can say that there have been some huge improvements made. In addition to adding a slew of new controls and panels, it seems like the keyer is more accurate as soon as it's applied, with very little additional color sampling required. Most of these features seem directly imported from Motion, which is where I did a majority of my keying in the aforementioned project, so it's nice to see useful stuff like this being rolled into FCPX. Here's a quick example key that I did, note that the green screen gets darker towards the bottom, yet FCPX had no problem figuring out what to remove:

In Just 7 Months

Apple has made good on their promise to add the most-demanded features back into Final Cut Pro X and they've done so in a way that makes once-complicated features like multicam and chroma keying accessible to anyone willing to put a few hours in to learn them. I have no doubts that within a few more point versions that professional editors will have little-to-nothing to complain about as far as missing features go. The fact that major third party video companies also all had huge FCPX announcements yesterday, annoucing both hardware and software support, shows that Apple is dedicated to the platform and continually trying to improve it.