Final Cut Pro for iPad Pro?! (Feat. iJustine) By Rene Ritchie

- It's been a big week for the iPhone obviously, huge. Hit subscribe and you'll see all the tests and coverage I've been doing on the iPhone SE, but there was another story that got a lot of attention as well. Apple working on pro apps for iPad Pro, namely X Code, Logic Pro and most in line with my personal interests, Final Cut Pro. Now, since Apple announced the iPad Pro back in 2015, there's been an absolutely insatiable thirst for these apps, because pro. And every WWDC and iPad events since, there have been hopes and dreams that we would see them, just shattered, because we didn't. Apple has been thinking about them just like us though, because Apple is filled with people just like us, but, you know, people who'd actually be responsible for shipping them as products.

Meanwhile, we've seen Adobe struggle to bring an even older more monolithic, more multi-faceted code base to the iPad, Photoshop, real Photoshop, if not full Photoshop, the actual same program if not all the same myriad of features. And what Adobe has been struggling with in the open and in beta, that's exactly what Apple has been struggling to figure internally. Not just which features are the most important to the most people, but how to implement those features in a touch centric way and on a device that may be every bit as powerful, more powerful than modern mobile max but still maxes out at six gigabytes of memory, and only on the very latest iPad Pro models, and one terabyte of storage where the very latest max can go to 16 gigabytes, 32, 64, and more, much more, with up to eight terabytes internally and so much more. Did I say so much more easily access? Basically limitless amounts of external storage. If you're interested in talking about X Code or Logic on the iPad Pro, let me know in the comments.

But for right now, I want to focus on the one that I'd use for this very channel, Final Cut Pro for iPad Pro. So I asked Justine Ezarik, iJustine, who literally shipped the app on editing and Final Cut Pro, to chat with me about it while she was on my new podcast. The full audio version of the podcast will be up in your favorite podcast app soon, or if you have Nebula or the early access tier of my Patreon, and yeah I've got Patreon as well, I'm Indy now, remember? You can head on over and watch the entire 40 minute conversation right now, links to everything in the description below. Meanwhile, I am Renee Ritchie and this is Final Cut Pro for the iPad pro - I mean, it's interesting because LumaFusion basically was built from the ground up to be something that is editing on the iPad so stuff that they do it just feels kind of natural to touch. So I'm gonna be very interested to see how Final Cut pulls this off.

Obviously it's Apple so I feel like they've probably had this in their back pocket for quite a long time. And it's also interesting you talk about Logic because I just did, since we talked last, my sister and I did record a podcast episode, we both recorded separately on an iPad using GarageBand. And I kept thinking like, man, I wish I had Logic 'cause I feel like I would be able to do a lot more with it. So that's also kind of interesting that they are thinking in that direction as well. But it really makes sense because it's like if you wanna be using these iPads to make them do more, like you need to have the software, but my concern is file size so because the file size goes very, very quickly especially if you're having proxies or if you're rendering out full versions of this stuff like even shooting 4K stuff now, we shoot a lot using the Atomos, the Ninja, like the separate recorder.

So that footage is huge even though it's still just 4K, but I'm just wondering are we gonna be able to edit from external drives? Like, how's that all gonna work? - I don't know, and that's super interesting to me too because I'm doing, I was doing raw, 12 bit raw and those were huge, now I'm trying 10 bit and it's a Kodak but they're still very big files and while we're talking my Mac is complaining about lack of memory. And that's like, and I know when you did your video for the Mac Pro, you were doing multiple red cameras and that's huge RAM requirements as well and the iPads are still like you can get one terabyte for an iPad, it's nowhere near the eight terabytes you can get on a MacBook Pro now and you can get six gigabytes, but it's nowhere near the I dunno, what do you have on your Mac Pro? I forget the amount. - Oh my God I actually am shooting a video today upgrading it to one terabyte. So, or actually I think 1.5, which is like absurd I mean, for what I'm doing but when I was editing the AK 3 Multicam video, I mean that thing, I mean I think it was the first time I was like, okay this was struggling but I was just editing the raw directly. I didn't do any coding, nothing, I didn't converge the ProRes, so I was like, wow, this is pretty intense.

So obviously I don't think the iPad's gonna be able to handle that, But when I was shooting and editing that little vlog that I did, it was like 15 minutes. I shot everything on my iPhone, so most of it was 4K, but that is not anything that's like too high end of footage I mean, it's from the iPhone, it's still 4K, but what I love about LumaFusion is you can just export that whole package out from the iPad and it'll kind of bundle it all together you can airdrop it to your computer so you can start editing and picking up where you left off in Final Cut. So I think seeing that seamless transition from iPad to, like to the Mac Pro or something like that will be really great. - One thing I keep thinking is I want more tools in Final Cut Pro. Like I would love logic strip silence in Final Cut.

So I could just take this video for example and hit strip silence and all the parts where you're not talking would be cut out, and all the parts where I'm not talking be cut out and then I could match them up so more quickly than having to go through and slice over and over again. But on an iPad, I feel like they would do what Photoshop is doing and that is well not in public, like Adobe is doing it very publicly. Apple would do it privately, but they would go through and take like a subset of features. - Which I think makes sense 'cause I feel like you're still gonna need to do this high processor intensive stuff on your computer, like there's no way about it. So I think it's just kind of paring that down to either do what's minimally necessary on the iPad, to create a video but then with LumaFusion too if you're doing like titles and stuff like that like that doesn't translate over to Final Cut.

So being able to have that whole ecosystem all in one under the same app, I think will be really cool. So I mean, I'm definitely looking forward to it. So I don't know, it's just gonna be very interesting 'cause I'm just worried about file size. - Are you a big Sidecar user now? 'Cause I use it but it's always as a secondary sort of display I don't do much actively on it. - I don't really do much with it either but I just started using it more for gaming as a second monitor so I can set my iPad right underneath of like my main screen where I'm gaming so I can see if I'm in frame, if I'm recording and be able to hit start and stop but really I don't use it that much.

And I mean, I think if you do have a smaller monitor it makes sense, but I've been using like the Pro display, so I have a lot of screen real estate so I really don't need that extra space but as a second monitor it works very well. - So what would sort of be your ideal? Like if Apple said tomorrow, they called you and said, Justine come meet with the Pro workflows team, we wanna hear what your needs are or if it just arrived and you've got to open it up live on the internet, what would you want to see from it? - I think just, I don't know. So it's hard because even when I'm using LumaFusion, like just that touch it's just so different, but yet now with a keyboard, you kind of have that integration with shortcut keys. So it really didn't feel much different than editing on a traditional Final Cut, but as far as what I'd want, I'm not even really sure. I think just a simplified app that I can still export either the XML or export that library out, airdrop it.

If you have that same footage somewhere whether it's externally or whether it's not, it would just, I can pick up and start working directly on my computer so I'm not really sure. It's just really, it's a difficult question because it's like there's so many different scenarios that this can go. I love being able to import files and stuff now on the iPad but I feel like how are you easily going to get them off of the iPad and have everything restored? 'Cause it's such a different file structure. - Yeah, yeah, no for sure. And I think that there's also, like you said there's so many different needs.

Like someone who's doing really quick YouTube, like vlogs maybe they just want to load their footage up, cut them as fast as they can and get them uploaded, but maybe someone's doing corporate video and they want it like frame IO and they want to make, they're working with a team of people and they want to share the files back and forth and have access to all these corporate assets like Logos and B roll and all these things. And those are very different sort of needs to fulfill. - Yeah and I just recently started using Postlab, are you familiar with that at all? - No. - It's incredible. So it basically makes remote editing so easy and simplified so I feel like if there is a Final Cut for iPad this can easily integrate with that.

So this past couple of weeks we've been using it for all of our remote work. So Jenna, me, myself and Tyler so we've all been working on this one project, so I'm able to, depending on who starts the project they start the library and then that library is updated and uploaded to the cloud and then it can be pulled back down by me or Jenna and then that library is closed on somebody else's computer. So it basically allows you to have this one single library that everyone can kind of be working on. You can open copies so if Jenna is working on something I can kind of just peek in to see what she's doing, so things like that, that integrate with Final Cut is gonna be really amazing. So if that's something that people were looking for remote, it's so great, I just, I can't say enough about it.

- Yeah and it's amazing because if you told me 10 years ago that we'd be sitting outside an Apple event, just on our laptops, uploading footage from our cameras or our phones and producing whole videos. And I know some people, like can know Marquez still carries around his or he was carrying his iMac Pro in a backpack and going back to the hotel and using that, but there were a lot of people just doing videos straight from the show floor, like sitting down, doing it right away. And I imagine like five years from now, when we have tools like Mythical R Max or Final Cut Pro for iPad, and really good connected cameras, it's just gonna be, I don't know, faster, more convenient, something like that. - Yeah I was also thinking it's interesting for people who don't know any thing else, like if they just have an iPad and they just have Final Cut on iPad and that's all they're using, like when you're learning that workflow, you don't have anything else to reference it to. So it's just sort of, that would be their second nature.

Whereas learning all of these different shortcut keys and just different kinds of ways to do things, but it does feel so natural just to reach out and like touch your screen when you want to like make something bigger. I was like, this makes so much more sense. It's so much easier. So yeah, no, I'm definitely excited for it though. - Watch the rest of my podcast with Justine, where we talk about getting started in this business, how she currently works on the iPad, what we still wanna see from the iPhone and tangent our mutual passion for Brazilian jujitsu and oh yeah, this.

- This is actually a story that I've never told anyone but I'll okay so this was crazy. My sister and I were out to dinner, this was like several years ago and this woman was like crying. And this guy was like screaming at her, like saying some of the most, just terrible things that I've ever heard someone say to a person. And this is in public. And I was like, what do we do? Like, should I say something? And so I stood up and I just told him like, maybe she would stop crying, like if he would stop like yelling at her and so I said a few other things and then he like just stood up and like almost jumped over this booth.

- Yeah. But wait, no spoilers. You'll find the audio version on your favorite podcast app soon, or you can check it out right now on Nebula and in the early access section of my Patreon at patreon. com/reneeritchie. When you sign up, you not only get to see the full video versions of these podcasts right now, you get to see scripts for most of the daily shows before they're even shot, as well as discord where we chat about Apple, gear, workflows and more and are even ways to get your name in the description of every video or in the credits.

And of course you'll get early access to future episodes of season one of this podcast as well. So to be even more involved in this community, and to contribute directly to the creation of these videos and future projects, check out patreon. com/reneeritchie. And thanks sincerely for your support. Now hit Like, subscribe if you haven't already,\ ring that bell gizmo so YouTube will actually tell you when you episodes go live, and then hit the comments and let me know, what do you wanna see from Final Cut Pro for the iPad Pro.

Thanks for watching, and don't miss all of my iPhone SE coverage right up there.

Source : Rene Ritchie