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Final Cut Express 4.0

FCE4

Written by DM from Clevedon

23-Sep-2009

I am a complete amateur/novice.
Having invested in 3 PCs and countless hours on helplines- all ending up with programme stability and driver compatability issues, started over from scratch with Mac.
After 2 succesful attempts with imovie, felt the need for a metered timeline. Viisted an apple store to check compatabilty with my camera & purchased FCE4. Used the online tutorials and the occasional forum to get me through the sharp learning curve.
First project entailed downloading from Mini HDV & DV tape (Canon HD10) Direct from Sony TG7. VHS & Beta through an analogue converter and mixing in Quick Time movies - all within the same project.
Export for archiving to external hard drive & Mini dv tape. Burning to DVD for current use as well as ipod & Youtube.
FCE4 has enabled me to edit film clips, sound tracks and titling with much greater accuracy & precisicion than imovie and allows me to develop technical ability at my own pace.

27 of 28 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Excellent (except for the output options )

Written by TC from bracknell

09-Aug-2009

FCE 4 is brilliant stuff. Very stable. You do not need to understand all of it to make it work well as there are several ways to do any task. Once you have moved up from i-Movie you will not wish to return. Imports AVCHD fine from my Panasonic HCD SD 200. However as this camera will not record other than 'through its lens' ( hardly the fault of FCE !! ) you have to go through the tortuous process of burning back to DVD, which for HD is a lengthy task! If FCE would go direct to DVD it would be 'smoother'. FCE also strips off the Dolby 5.1 ( But am I bovvered?? ) The Full screen cinema playback is a good feature not featured on earlier FCE versions. If you are thinking of moving into HD camera may be a good idea to get a DV tape model with firewire whilst they exist !!!!

31 of 35 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Misinformed, erroneous review

Written by TW from Boynton Beach

21-Jul-2009

The information in this review

Written by EK
02-Mar-2009

is incorrect. AVCHD 1920x1080 material is NOT converted to 1440x1080. It is maintained as 1920. It is converted to the Apple Intermediate Codec but the data rate is not 14Mbps but closer to 100Mbps.

The information about the Canon camera is also largely misleading as Canon has made a non-standard format all of its own that uses a non-standard frame rate using a delivery codec not a production. No editing system edits it without processing.

FCE is designed for editing the consumer formats DV, HDV, and AVCHD. Its capabilities are those of a professional editing application for a small fraction of the price. For editing these formats it gives the best price to performance ratio of anything currently available.

31 of 32 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Totally liberating

Written by SB from Purfleet

12-Apr-2009

After holding out for years I finally upgraded to FCE4 from iMovie HD about six months ago. Expecting a steep learning curve I bought Tom Wolskys book FCE4 Editing Workshop with it. After working through the tutorials in this brilliant book and doing a couple of major projects in FCE I now feel like a pro when I'm using it. It's so fast and flexible with multiple approaches to doing things, it's an amazing piece of software. The last project I completed was based on 26 hours worth of DV. FCEs ability to organise and annotate all this raw footage was invaluable. As all the editing is non destructive and edits simply refer back to the original media, my media drive doesn't fill up with clips and I can instantly refer back to the original media to make new sub-clips. After years of my only editing option being 'Split video clip at playhead' now I've got Ripple,Roll,Slip,Slide etc. Being able to loop around an edit point while rippling or rolling the edit in real time with the trim window is so cool. Multiple video and audio tracks, key framing, animation and compositing, I could rant on all day. Once you get up to speed with the concepts and interface everything becomes so fluid. If you're like was, still holding on to iMovie HD and are at least halfway serious about video editing, buy this software. The asking price is peanuts for what you're getting. You'll feel like you've been let out of prison.

62 of 64 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Need More Memory!?

Written by GA from Kingston

14-Mar-2009

I purchased FCE in hope to create professional looking videos without the expensive software. Turns out that i'll need more RAM to continue to edit the video I have been making. Which will cost me lots of money. Apart from that it is good software that is easy to use but they don't tell you everything.

36 of 52 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

No Full HD quality

Written by EK

02-Mar-2009

Excellent program for standard definition editing (DV). May even work for HDV.
However, I just purchased basic AVCHD video cam that can do 1920x1080i at 24Mbps. Turns out, that FCE does NOT actually support AVCHD!! Instead it converts it to internal format, which is 1440x1080i at 14Mbps. So the quality is gone at that point. Thanks Apple for not telling us that. And if you have pro quality video cam, like Canon EOS 5D mark II, which does 1920x1080p at about 38Mbps, you are much worse off!

Bottom line: even if you have mid quality Full HD video cam (AVCHD), this software does not let you edit videos with the quality of the camera. Have to look elsewhere.

135 of 161 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

The Absolute Best Video Editing Software Ever!

Written by NN from London

16-Jan-2009

I have tried all kinds of video editing softwares in my life but nothing is more powerful than Final Cut Express 4.0. It may be a junior version of Final Cut Pro but don't let that fool you. The Express version is still a magnificent software whether you are a beginner or an expert video editor. Final Cut may have some learning curves to it but this masterpiece is worth the purchase. I love it!

33 of 38 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

AMAZING PRODUCT!!!

Written by TM from london

25-Dec-2008

Amazing Product to edit Movies and Animation!!! I am Perfectly happy with this Software!!! BEST PRODUCT EVER USED!!!

16 of 22 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Great software

Written by AO from Appleby-In-Westmorland

22-Nov-2008

I have just upgraded from Final Cut Express 3.5 to version 4 having just bought the Panasonic HDCSD9 CAMCORDER. I connected the camcorder to the mac via USB, and in Final Cut, went to file-Log & Transfer and all the movie clips appeared, I then clicked the import button and they appeared in the Browser, simple as that. Great software no problems at all.

43 of 47 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Go to an Apple shop 1st.

Written by AW from Stanford-le-Hope

11-Aug-2008

Before I parted with my cash I went into an Apple shop last Thursday and had one of the staff show me the basics and specific things that I wanted to achieve. I spent about 45 mins. with them and now (Monday) I am on my third short movie edit, it has been a breeze. This software has given me so much more freedom than iMovie ever did and now I can get my edits looking the way I want them to, really quickly. It's also bundled with Live Type which is great at creating animated titles, I think FCE4 its an absolute steel.

So my advise is... buy this if you want professional looking edits for a bargain, but get someone in an Apple shop to show you how to use it first, you won't regret it.

231 of 238 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Fantastic! The best editing software EVER!

Written by SB from LEEDS

26-Jul-2008

This is fantastic! Final cut is the best editing software and it does what it says on the box. If you have being editing video on iMovie HD or iMovie '08 and want to make your movies look even better for a small price, this is defiantly the software you need.
It is easy to use and easy to understand when you first start using the software, Apple have a fantastic range of video tutorials that allow you to learn the basic features and once you have done that, you can start teaching your self about more advanced things like Chroma-keying etc.
This is a must buy if you are editing allot of video on a budget. The price is worth it and it will make your movies and video podcasts fantastic!

58 of 65 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Dont try this at home!

Written by BM from LEEDS

22-Jul-2008

Unless of course you buy the excellent book on FCE 4 and work through all the lessons. At the end of the book you will have reached a reasonable level of competence and will be able to produce excellent movies. I struggled for years with windows based video editing and made a decision when I bought a Mac in 2007 to use FCE 4 rather than IMovie. I was starting afresh and thought I might as well learn the potentialy more rewarding application.
I am glad I did. Editing in HDV has been relativly easy and the results stunning.
To sum up dont even bother tp buy this unless you are prepared to put in the time and then you willl be well rewarded.

59 of 75 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

I use Final Cut but there is not that mush differene

Written by NS from Chesterfield

11-Jun-2008

I use final cut at collage and i was told that this and finl ut pro have harly any difference now. My advice is to buy this one and unless you are really perfesstional get the pro verision i mean holly wood perfessional. I make music videos and this is fine for doing so check them out on youtube search

62 of 115 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Good value

Written by RS from London

04-Jun-2008

Bottom line- fairly professional and under £200.... bargain for mid-range editing or moving up from iMovie projects.

69 of 120 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Um.........

Written by SS from March

26-May-2008

........How do you use it?

You certainly can't edit within 1 hour like you can on other programs. I've had it for 3 months and still can't use its basic functions. So frustrating. Don't bother unless you are a VERY serious video buff.

65 of 177 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Just Brilliant!

Written by JM from Doncaster

19-Apr-2008

After using a PC for editing video this is a must, I will tell you exactly what is good about final cut express! the end result is just amazing. For example I needed a picture just to place as a slug for a project i was working on. I went into google and downloaded a jpg from a site which I dragged and dropped into the time line. In the viewer it looked Ok but I thought that it would look terrible when played back through a dvd player

I was absolutely amazed when i viewed the DVD on the Television and the jpg looked like a a standard jpg from a quality digital camera. I think that somewhere that apple have put some form of quark programming in this program to upscale images.

Also I would recommend Final cut express 4 Apple Pro Training book by Diana Weynard worth every penny and after reading the book my work flow is allot better, and quicker. Overall I cant fault this software for the money in my opinion its a no brainer

110 of 179 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

Get what you need...

Written by RT from PLYMOUTH

14-Feb-2008

if you buy this product with the intention of creating high classed/high quality feature or short films, then you should be shooting your film with nothing less than a pd150, at the least, i hear people complaining about the fact that it does not recognise certain hand held cameras and doesn't export in some formats, i don't understand why anyone would buy this program if they are using hand helds to shoot their film in the first place, if this is you, then you would do better to continue using something like imovie.

as far as this program goes for rating, i personally thing FCP is worth the extra money :D

169 of 286 people found this useful

Final Cut Express 4.0

FCE4

Written by HH

06-Feb-2008

WICKED! does the job !

92 of 212 people found this useful