Apple offers Final Cut Pro, a video editing platform featuring optimized for a high performance machines and supporting a wide range of quality effects.
$299.99
per license
Frame.io
Score 9.1 out of 10
N/A
Frame.io in New York offers a video collaboration platform, supporting the video editing process by providing creative teams with time stamped comments, annotations and hashtags, and an accelerated sharing and approval process, as well as integrations with popularly used editing tools (e.g. Final Cut Pro) to enhance the editing and collaboration process.
Final Cut really is a great software for video editing (hey, The Matrix was made completely on Final Cut!), but for someone who works heavily in Photoshop, After Effects, Audition and Illustrator- it's probably best for you to stick with Premiere. If you are solely looking for a great editing software for your mac that is a step up from iMovie, Final Cut Pro X would be perfect for you.
The best thing about frame.io (and the reason we subscribed to the service in the first place), is it is very easy for clients to give notes when reviewing videos we produce for them. It allows them -- forces them, actually -- to give frame specific notes, so there is no confusion about what shot they are talking about. The one thing that would be nice would be another area for clients to make more global, general notes, so that both the global and specific notes could all be referenced in one place. But overall, had this service for about three years and still very happy with it.
Simple UI. Its drag and drop interface makes uploading and organizing something that happens inherently. Versioning is a huge issue when reviewing videos and frame allows you to keep old versions while prioritizing updated edits on the same link.
Frame.io allows you to make accurate notes on a video down to the frame - including drawing on a frame to indicate exact details your notes refer to. This allows for your post team to know exactly what the note-maker is referring to.
Privacy settings. Frame has an easy way to manage sharing by providing a "review link" and a "presentation" - this allows you to limit whether a reviewer has access to provide notes or just to review an edit. Simple password protection is an option for any review as well as the option for allowing a file to be downloadable.
Though I love the integration with After Effects, it's a tiny bit buggy from time to time. You'll need to re-sign in once a week (at least, this is what my tests have determined) and there is an issue with timeline jumping. If you click onto a comment, the timeline takes you to the problem area, but if you move the playhead elsewhere and click onto the same comment, it will not return you to the location. You must first click onto a different comment, then back onto the original. It's silly, and to me, a bug that will be resolved eventually.
Frame.io does not provide an archiving feature, so it's a bit of sore spot to delete old videos. When running into storage problems, which you might depending on your plan, you'll need to remove old videos.
Video links play natively at 560p. I don't understand this, as 720p or 1080p should be the standard playback resolution. This means some clients might not be as technologically-savvy, and won't think to click onto the resolution button to upgrade the resolution playback. I've had clients ask why the video was "low-quality" when they needed to change the resolution. This feels like boneheaded development to me.
Final Cut Pro is a great software package for editing, and obviously, good things require training to understand and comprehend what your are editing. I do not give a 10/10 because it would be easier to have a comprehensive manual inside the software, rather that researching or getting yourself trained.
I've used other video review systems, Frame was the only one I didn't question how they allowed you to review - I just started reviewing. It's that simple. It's easy to set up projects, invite collaborators, and then provide a final cut for download. It's naturally built for the kind of work that TV/Film & video production companies do.
Most of the support I need, I find online. While Apple has a Q/A section on their site, it's not always beneficial in answering the questions that I have. With that said, they regularly update the software, and when updates lead to crashes, they usually have another update not far behind.
I've only reached out to Frame.io a few times but they responded quickly and offered achievable solutions. The fact that I haven't had to reach out to them more is proof that the platform is easy to use, reliable, and can run on its own. The only issues we have had were related to uploading issues on our end.
Implementing Final Cut Pro into the organization was a smooth transition from what we didn't had. We felt we went from zero to hero with this software, due to all the great features that we learned. We took some time in training staff on how to use the software but at the end, this was very useful and important.
Final Cut [Pro X] has way more features in a much better layout. Although it is more expensive, I believe the improved performance and advanced level of features is worth it if you are serious about video production and professionalism.
Frame.io is better when being compared to the Google Drive as a platform just because of the usability. Frame.io has a more simple design format, that makes organizing projects and file structures much more readily available when doing a quick search. The ability to review and comment on the different projects is also better in Frame.io as it shows who said what and at what timecode they are referring to.
