Customer Reviews

Focal Easy Guide to Final Cut Pro 5: For New Users and Professionals (The Focal Easy Guide)

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I just was not going to buy any books on Final Cut Pro. I mean, anyone of us who has ever set foot in this section of the bookstore knows how overwhelming and technical editing software manuals can be. But the fun, unique, cover of this book compelled me to open it. In it, you'll find a conversation between two friends, one who obviously knows a lot about his craft. That's the way it's laid out...like a friend who is sitting next to you in the cutting room as you are panicking because you've suddenly forgotten how to realign those out-of-sync clips or how to time-remap without pulling your hair out. Rick Young is a friend to all editors, new and tenured, who need information without information overload. You can pick up this book in the middle of the day or the middle of the night when you feel like you want to throw your Mac and it's friend, Final Cut Pro, right out the window. In it, you'll discover those little light bulb moments that mean the completion of a successful and fulfilling project.

I have been trying to teach myself Final Cut Pro recently, and was making some progress. However, using lots of trial and error and referring to the voluminous Help guide was taking up a whack of my time, time I would rather have spent just getting stuck into the editing. I wanted a book that would lay down all the groundwork for me. This book fits that requirement perfectly.

It's really nicely designed - easy on the eyes, lots of screenshots and step-by-step instructions, and an intuitive structure. The writing style doesn't treat you like an idiot, but it is simply written, clear and concise. It also shows the shortest and simplest ways of achieving things. The shortcuts that I've learnt alone have saved me a lot of time.

Some important points about the approach the book takes: firstly, it isn't a 'project-based' approach. I bought another book which used a CD with files on it to walk you through the step-by-step process of achieving an exact final product. I hated this approach - it made the book very difficult to use as a general reference. With the Focal guide, I just use the index to find out information on what I want.
Secondly, it is far more functional than stylistic. By this I mean it shows you how the various tools work, not recommendations on the effects you can achieve. You're left to do the monkeying around with all the filters and things to figure that part out by yourself - but at least you should be comfortable at the controls.
Thirdly, it's not going to teach you how to edit, in terms of the types of shots to cut together, framing, and so on. Either learn this somewhere else, or use your own creative instincts.

All of which adds up to the book delivering exactly what it promises: a guide to the software, for beginner to intermediate users. More advanced users will want more detail. Good price, great book, will get you up and running fast. Buy it.

Very fast, get you up and running, book. If you need to start editing with FCP RIGHT NOW, then this is a great resource, sort of like taking a one day immersion course in FCP editing. Its not focused on teaching you the ART of editing (there are other books that do that), but it assumes that lots of great (and potentially great) editors frankly just need to know how you get a clip from the Viewer to the right edit point in a Sequence. Did I mention that its also cheap?

I really looked forward to reading this book, as I have been thinking of buying Final Cut Studio and a MAC to run it. (not cheap in Africa I can tell you) I was dissapointed ... all these 5 star reviews led me to expect more, instead, I found a book that is just plain average. Example ... In Adobe Premier & Avid Liquid I use the ripple tool quite a lot, this book does not cover it in useable detail, I had to borrow some time on a FCP suite to find out for myself. The book contains a lot of "history" about "how you would have done something 20 years ago" ... who cares!!!? I certainly don't ever want to see a half inch Lo-band umatic machine for the rest of my life. The colour illustrations are great but the detail and user tips are lacking, making it pretty ... but basic.

The first time I opened this book I was hooked on it.

It has a lot of pictures and real world terminology. I'm an audio engineer looking to get into post production and this book also used and explains a lot of production terms I never knew.

The other thing I like about this book compared to other Final Cut books is that it teaches you how to use this NLE from start to finish instead of jumping around, teaching you the video editing process out of order.

This book starts with setting up the program and optimizing FCP for yout computer. Then it go's onto capturing al the way to the finsihed product.

Definetly worth the small amount of money you'll pay for it...

Unbelieveably small, yet complete. Easy to understand. Easy to find what you are looking for. Makes a complex, powerful software package serve you. This book is the perfect beginner's guide yet by the time you have exhausted its potential you will be nearly an expert.

How is it that some authors can distill the essence from complexity when the people who wrote the software can't?

I have used every version of Final Cut Pro since 1.2, and I wish I had discovered Rick Young's book earlier. Although I have the edition just before this one, I found it to be one of the best books on how to actually use this software to do what you want that I've seen. Fantastic, it's a shame it's not available everywhere. It's what you need.

This guide to Final Cut Pro 5 is excellent. Like it says it is geared toward the learning but adds trinkets from professionals. I am a producer at URTV public access Channel 20 here in Asheville,North Carolina and everyone at the studio depends on all productions to be worked out through Final Cut Pro. If you are just starting out -this is the book for you. Carry this as your new bible. If you are a professional -there is still plenty for you to learn..maybe different approaches but well worth the amount you'd pay for a copy. A great compliment to a great piece of software........

This book is nice and concise. It's a short read but don't expect to be a Final Cut expert once you're done. You'll only get a basic overview with some nice tips along the way. I recommend this book if you are completely new to Final Cut. Note: This book won't be of use to anyone using the latest version of Final Cut X released last month.

With plenty of help and multiple ways to achieve the desired aim, it might seem that an "Easy guide to..." is a waste of time in current software. Well, I have used this Focal Guide to get me over a few humps with Final Cut Pro, starting with page 125, the Effects section. I skipped over Audio and got to Multicam where the directions not only reduced my fumbling around, but demonstrated how truly useful syncing can be when using one fixed location camera for continuity and one or more handhelds for close-ups. I like to work with stage action and without a script in hand, post-production can be challenging. Working with the multiple live screens and 'live-edit' using the mouse makes a lot of hard work seem much less a problem. For me those pages were illuminating. I keep it handy to my workspace as a reference. If you are totally new to digital filming, the first few chapters will give you an excellent grounding, but for me, after using FCP for some time, it justified itself completely on two chapters, and that is fine by me!