August Meeting Follow-Up

We had another great meeting last night with about 20 attendees and several new faces. Scott Robinson demo'd an unique new plug-in for Final Cut Pro called nVeil. When first seeing it, you'll wonder how you'd use it. Scott did a great job showing us some really creative and smart uses for it.

We had a great discussion on shooting video on DSLR cameras, in particular the Canon 5D Mark II. FCPUG member Roger Muller and I got together last week with his brand new camera and did some shooting. Roger was kind enough to bring the camera to the meeting and let anyone interested check it out. The projector didn't do a great job of showing off the footage, so I've uploaded it to Vimeo so you can watch it without the projector in the way. I've also made the Keynote slides available for downloading as a pdf document. Just find the Downloads link over there on the left in the Navigation menu, or click here. Due to lack of permission for some of the visuals I used last night, some of the slides are different. All of the links to websites are there though, and are enabled as links so you can click on them and go right to the page.

I was very impressed with the 5D Mark II. You can create some gorgeous visuals that just aren't possible on the popular video cameras from Canon, JVC, Panasonic, and Sony. There definitely are some shortcomings to be aware of though as well. For certain types of shoots it could be the only thing you need, but I personally wouldn't want it to be the only video camera I had available. It would excel as a second camera to get interesting shots that cater to it's strong suits and avoid it's liabilities. I think the important thing to remember is this is essentially version one of a new breed of camera. Over the next couple years we should see the DSLR and video converge even more, hopefully getting us closer to the "perfect" camera.

July Meeting Follow-up

Hello Indy FCPUGers! Just wanted to give you a quick rundown on last night's meeting and make you aware of a few things. First off, the meeting went very well, although we did run a little long and couldn't get to everything in the new Final Cut Studio 3. Our good friend Stephanie Joyce from SmartSound did a great job and once again wowed members with Sonicfire Pro 5 and the Final Cut Pro plugin. It truly is great software and if you don't already have it, you need to go get it - you don't know what you're missing!

I followed up with what I believe was the first showing of Final Cut Studio 3 at a users group meeting in the world. We got through Final Cut Pro, Motion, most of Compressor (I forgot one very cool feature), and we talked about the new features in COlor and Soundtrack Pro. We will cover those another month (next meeting if I can squeeze them in).

We then wrapped up by giving away four books provided by Peach Pit Press and Focal Press. I want to point out a new feature to the website  - the books we give away at the meetings will be made available to purchase via Amazon right here on our website the very next day. That way if you see a book that looks interesting at the meeting, but don't win it, you can visit our website the next day and purchase it (or at least add it to your wishlist) before you forget. You can find those books in the left hand column just below the Twitter tracker.

We also gave away $100 credits to Crowd Control, our newest sponsor. Crowd Control is pre-keyed footage of people that you can drop right in your timeline or presentations without having to do anything to key them. We also gave away three licenses for SUGARfx plugins for FX Factory provided by Noise Industries. FX Factory has some of my favorite effects for use in Final Cut Pro and Motion. We gave away Urban, Cinema, and Folding Cards last night.

Stay tuned for more details on our August meeting - they'll be coming soon. We also have some discounts we'll be emailing you really soon, so if you're not signed up as a member, you should do that now!

Final Cut Studio 3 Released!

Apple surprised everyone this morning by releasing an update to Final Cut Studio. The new update includes bumps to all of the apps in the suite. You can read all the details at their website. A few quick notes though: they dropped the price to $999 ($299 for upgrade), it is Intel only, and Blu-ray is now supported.

We will devote the second part of our meeting Tuesday night not only talking about it, but showing it as well. We'll cover what's new and answer as many questions as we can with the time we have. Hope to see you there!

July Meeting Addition

We've got a new item on our July meeting agenda! Stephanie Joyce from SmartSound will give one of the first User Group demonstrations of the highly anticipated new Final Cut Pro/Sonicfire Pro music plug-in from SmartSound. The new FCP/Sonicfire Pro plug-in effortlessly turns scoring markers into fully produced and edited music for your Final Cut Pro projects. SmartSound's always been the only music solution to automatically edit your music selection to any length you need, right from the search engine and they just keep adding even more amazing customizable features. Roundtrip editing with control over timing and instrumentation make music creativity a simple task for every visual producer. Say hello to the new go-to music solution for Final Cut Pro. This is a brand-new and powerful tool for FCP users! One lucky winner will go home with a full version of SmartSound Sonicfire Pro Scoring Edition with the new Final Cut Pro plug in and 2 albums of SmartSound music, a value of $149.99.

Indianapolis International Film Festival

The Indy Film Festival will be running from July 15 - 25. It looks like they have some interesting movies once again. Check their website for the list of films being shown, as well as times and locations.