Off The Tracks is a documentary about Apple’s popular video editing software, Final Cut Pro. The documentary goes on to talk about the major transition from Final Cut Pro 7 to Final Cut Pro 10/X, but also how the software has changed the film and video industry, and where they see the software going in the future.Â
What I really liked about this documentary is that it included many behind the scenes clips and the little animations of showing how Final Cut Pro works. On top of that, it showed them putting clips of the documentary into their Final Cut Pro file as the documentary was being edited. To me, that’s super cool.
When it comes to the technical aspect of it, I like how that some of the scenes were shot with a GoPro Hero 4 camera. The wide lens camera is really nice, especially when conducting and recording interviews since you can get the whole picture and room around you that fits adequately on the screen.
One of the things that was noted that I never thought about until I watched this was that iMovie is designed to be an easy and seamless transition to Final Cut Pro. Based off my personal usage of Final Cut Pro, this is absolutely true.
Another part of the film that I liked was that one of the creators said that Final Cut Pro was made for the creators and filmmakers of tomorrow, and that there is no excuse in today’s society with nearly everyone having a smartphone or camera on them to make a video, short film or regular film.
It also goes on to say that anyone can use this software, whether you are good at computers or not. Final Cut Pro was designed so that even the most computer illiterate people can use it. That, of course, does not go without saying that it’ll be completely easy if you are computer illiterate.
One of the things that I have been told a lot in college while majoring in journalism is that people like me have to learn Adobe Premiere Pro since it is the “industry standard.” However, I completely disagree with that since Final Cut Pro works a lot better than Premiere Pro, has better features, easier to use and that anyone can use it.
In my experience with Premiere Pro, having to constantly move the video, photos, audio and graphics, and then to not have those things move with the timeline itself is just too confusing and I feel like you end up working backward.
The Off The Tracks people actually did the research and testing and it turns out that on average, it takes Final Cut Pro about 17 minutes to render a video, whereas Premiere Pro took around 30 minutes. Obviously, this depends on how long the video is, but these were just averages given in the documentary.
Final Cut Pro is available in the Mac App Store for only $300 and is available to students through Apple for $199, but along with Final Cut Pro, students will also get Logic Pro X, Motion 5, Compressor 4 and Main Stage 3.
All in all, I’m giving the Off The Tracks documentary 4/4 stars. It is probably the best and most informative documentary I have ever watched, and it should be watched by anyone who enjoys filmmaking, modern-day technology and software, people who want to get into the movie business, people who want to get into YouTube and/or someone who has an interest in Apple and their great history.
Rating: 4/4 stars
 [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7Wzxiefbig&w=560&h=315]
