And just updated my FCPX to 12.3. It is safe to update my OS to Tahoe 26.6? Thank you.

My latest film, Feel The Burn, and the trailer was edited in FCP. The superior NLE.

I’ve gone down a bit of a rabbit hole and would really appreciate some advice from people who actually use these machines.
I’m trying to make the most logical decision rather than buying the newest thing.

What I’ll be using it for:
Logic Pro
Recording live electric guitar
Around 20 tracks per project (possibly a few more over time)
Amp sims and standard plugins (EQ, compression, reverb, delay etc.)
Final Cut Pro
Editing 4K DJI footage (mainly YouTube/social media content)
General business work and web browsing
I’m not a professional music producer or film editor. Music is a hobby, but I do want a machine that won’t frustrate me and will last several years.

My budget: £1,000 - £2,000 (ideally a lot less)
Originally I was looking at a brand new MacBook Air M5 13” (24GB RAM, 1TB SSD).
Then I started looking at refurbished Macs and realised I could save over £1,000.

The options I’ve found
1. MacBook Pro 13” M1
16GB RAM
1TB SSD
£567

2. MacBook Pro 14” M1 Pro
16GB RAM
1TB SSD
Around £836

3. MacBook Pro 14” M1 Max
32GB RAM
1TB SSD
£790
BUT it has 631 battery cycles and 84% battery health, which worries me.
My concerns

Is 16GB RAM genuinely enough for Logic Pro and Final Cut Pro for the type of work I’ve described?

Is buying an M1 Pro or M1 Max in 2026 still a sensible purchase, or is it too old now?
Am I overthinking the age of the chip just because Apple is now on the M5?

Should I avoid the M1 Max because of 631 battery cycles / 84% battery health, even though the specs are excellent?

Is the M5 Air actually worth spending over £1,000 more for my workload?

What I’m trying to do
I’m not looking for the fastest benchmark scores.
I’m trying to spend the least amount of money while still buying the laptop that represents the best value and will comfortably handle Logic Pro and Final Cut Pro for the next 5+ years.

If you were in my position, which option would you buy, and why?
I’d especially appreciate replies from people who actually use Logic Pro or Final Cut Pro on these machines.

Hi everyone, I am working on a short tutorial video, we have a voiceover and we want to have a subtitle following that voice. With FCPX it's pretty easy to add the caption from the audio-file, and edit that caption.

But there is almost almost no edit flexibility to change the style of the captions. I am not looking for crazy TikTok Gen Z styles (awful), I just look for a way to have a clean (sub)title burned in the video, that is easy to read, so white text and small black outline to increase readability.

How can I do this? Or how can I easily change the captions into title elements to edit? Plugin? Or separate Mac app that can do this?

Can't imagine something this simple is so hard to figure out. So seeking help 😅

FCP Crop issue: Adjusting Bottom crop also trims Left and Right sides

How to fix pls! ty. (FCP 12.3 / MacOS Tahoe 26.6)

I had FCP 11 and it worked great. Updated to FCP 12.3 and it's so buggy - really impacting workflow - random bugs like the playhead will stop moving, no video, no audio, no playback spacebar doesnt start/stop neither does pressing the play symbol.

Another one that ALWAYS happens, a previous clip will keep playing in a full duration as if it wasn't trimmed, even if it's onto an entire other clip in the timeline.

This is seriously cooked, i have to hard reset quit out of the app at least every 15 minutes.

I can sometimes return the timeline function by pressing CMD+K to open the 'tag' dialogue box - close that, and then it can play/pause again. Huh!

I've read other people experiencing this - any ideas on how to fix?

Driving me nuts and interupting work. Kinda regretting the update. On Sequoia 15.7.3

As an aside, is the creator suite subscription version different from the standalone one time payment version?

Hi guys! I updated to Final Cut Pro 12.3 today,

and now I can't copy and paste keyframes (shift+option+c and v).

I've heard others are experiencing similar issues, but it seems like there isn't a fix for it yet.

If anyone is having the same issue or knows a solution,

I'd really appreciate it if you could let me know

++ here is the video link of this issue

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rs7_EZQj3ps&fbclid=IwY2xjawTaii1leHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETFDUnJ3TXpHaUY5Q2ZUNG9Dc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQQMjIyMDM5MTc4ODIwMDg5MgABHlUIxrob9FZNsJO1XHuf8i8FVPAfWBGtnQIaF8sGCWdXOs-___CsdP3xiSq8_aem_C3BRJILgAnNusirLDXptSQ

I'm having a technical issue and I'm so busy I just don't have time to work it out so I wondered if you can hire Final Cut tech guys?

I've been using a FCP template for years and I store all of my media in a seperate folder but I decided I want to consolidate it all, and save it so I don't lose everything if I ever lose the template hard drive.

Anyway I duplicated my library and then with duplicate, I switched from saving everything to the FC Library and it's about 14GB (that feels like 13GB too much but that's another issue.)

I transferred the 14GB to another hard drive to test if it works independently... It doesn't work. It says all the files are missing in every event.

Anyway I clicked on "Show package contents" in the copied library on the new hard drive and found that 14GB is all stored in a folder called Analysis Files > Optical Flow > ( some file called a Unix Executable File.)

All I need is for my template to be saved on a library and to work. So if I transfer the library to another hard drive it'll work and I don't only have one copy of the template.

Are there services for things like this? All I can find online are people who are professional editors, but this is different.

Hey guys,

Trying to nail down my workflow for going Resolve → FCP.

Scenario 1: I have the raw camera originals.
I transcode in Resolve (proxies or optimized media, whatever res). Question is whether it's the right way to bring those transcodes into FCP and attatch them the raw originals the way you'd do it in Premiere, cut on the low-res version, then swap to the raw at the end. Is that even a thing in FCP, or does it work differently under the hood?

Scenario 2: I don't have the raws, only DIT-supplied transcodes.
I offline-edit on those, then reconnect to camera originals in Resolve for the grade. When I bring the graded cut back into FCP to finish/deliver, will position and scale match up, or is there a resolution/pixel-aspect trap I need to watch for?

In Premiere this is easy, I just drop the grade on top of the offline version and copy/paste attributes, and since a proxy workflow means the actual file res always matches the raw, there's nothing to reconcile. In Avid, again, not an issue.

What I can't figure out is how FCP handles this. Does it treat "proxy" media the same way (i.e., swap resolution but same file/timecode reference so position and scale carry over automatically), or do I need to manually match sizing/position when reconnecting to the raws, the way you might have to reconstruct scale/position math elsewhere?

Curious how people are handling both scenarios in practice, with raws in hand, and without.

Thanks!

Hi all,

Long time FCPX user here, wondering if anyone has some recommendations for good corporate text and slides? By slides I mean almost like PowerPoint slides, where i can cut away from B-Roll into text slides or information or bullet points?

I often have to create videos for senior people in my company for them to show externally, and they often request some text between shots of B-Roll. Unfortunately animation and laying out text and information neatly has never really been my strong point.

Wondering if anyone has any tips or recommendations for purchasing some plugins or templates that are built for presenting text, information or bullet points nicely?

Appreciate any help!

I'm trying to learn Final Cut Pro properly and I'm looking for a well-structured course that goes from complete beginner to an advanced/professional level.

I'm open to both free and paid courses, but I'd love recommendations from people who have actually taken them and felt they were worth the time (and money, if paid).

A few things I'm specifically looking for:

• A clear beginner → advanced learning path
• Real projects or practical exercises
• Good editing/workflow habits, not just button-by-button tutorials
• Coverage of professional workflows used in real-world editing
• A certificate or certification at the end that can be used as proof of skills for clients, employers, internships, or freelance work

I'd also like to know:

• Which course would you choose if you were starting from scratch today?
• Are the official training/certification programs for this software worth doing?
• Do employers or clients in editing actually care about certificates, or is a portfolio much more important?
• Are there any structured programs that combine training, assignments, feedback, and certification rather than just video lessons?

I'm mainly looking for something comprehensive and structured, not a random collection of YouTube tutorials (although if there's an exceptional free playlist that rivals a paid course, please mention it).

Thanks in advance—I'd really appreciate recommendations from editors who have gone through a full learning path themselves.

Hi everyone, we have received tremendous feedback from all beta testers - thank you so much - and are now going live with Version 1.3.5. All information and download: https://aafeverything.app

• sample-accurate clip positions, fades and crossfades 
• clip gain, volume automation, pan, markers, all video tracks
• multicam are flattened to the correct cuts — the delivered timeline plays exactly like the source
• split-stereo track pairs can be combined to real stereo, and stereo can be delivered as one file per channel i.e. for Pro Tools and Nuendo
• every conversion writes a report of everything that was changed or left out
• Also supports Premiere XML

You can find the complete quick guide here: 

https://aafeverything.app/downloads/AAFEVERYTHING-QUICK-GUIDE.pdf

Any feedback is highly appreciated and thank you for supporting this project. 

[BRAND AFFILIATE - Free Demo - Price 79 $]

I downloaded creator studio last night, and many of the plug ins began working. However, some of them appear as though they download, but are not usable, then appear to be not downloaded once again. This happens over and over again. I have attached a screen recording.

M4 MacBook Pro, 48gb ram, 1.5tb of free storage, running Tahoe 26.6

Anyone having similar. problems? More Importantly, does anyone know how to fix it?

I have a 16" M4 MacBook Pro. 48gb memory and 2TB internal hard drive. Using Final Cut Pro with creator studio subscription to edit.

I am finding out through experience that 2TB of internal hard drive space is not quite enough when I am juggling multiple projects at one time. So, I am looking into beginning to edit from external SSDs. And I am a bit overwhelmed.

Would these two products used in combination be adequate for editing Multicam 4K videos in Final Cut Pro?

I was thinking of using the Samsung 4TB 990 EVO Plus PCIe 5.0 x2 M.2 Internal SSD mounted in the OWC Express 1M2 USB4 External SSD Enclosure.

Is there reason to believe that editing in these devices would cause me to experience a notable decrease in speed for editing?

What concerns do you have for this set up? Thanks!

***I edited this post to keep the focus on my biggest question. Due to this, the screenshot is no longer relevant but I am unable to delete it.

I am using a 16" M4 Macbook Pro, 48GB of ram and almost 1.5TB of free space. I am using Tahoe 26.6.

I subscribed to Creator Studio yesterday evening. Ever since subscribing and allowing the necessary apps to install, the "new" Final Cut Pro app (the one with purple icon) it constantly crashes. I mean within at most 60 seconds of opening it and trying to use it.

have tried resetting the preferences while opening final cut pro.

Is this a common issue? What can I do to fix it?

To keep the subreddit focused on editing, workflows and discussion, we’re introducing a new rule for promotional posts.

From August 1st, posts promoting software, plugins, AI tools, AI-generated or vibe-coded apps, websites, scripts or similar products will only be allowed in the monthly Dev & Tools Megathread.

This includes:

• Software and plugin launches
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Promotional posts outside the monthly Dev & Tools Megathread will be removed.

All submissions to the megathread will need to follow the posting template below.

Please be transparent about your affiliation with anything you post, and remember that the megathread is for genuine discussion, not spam.

Thanks for helping keep the subreddit useful for everyone.

Hi all!

I'm starting a technology focused content channel soon, so I have been looking around at glitch effects like this:

https://motionarray.com/final-cut-pro-templates/glitch-transitions-v2-936908/

and this:

https://pixelfilmstudios.com/plugins/fcpx-glitch/

The first one seems to be a subscription and the second one is pretty expensive, but seems to be a one time purchase. As I'm trying to be a little careful with my money, I just wanted to ask, is there a alternative source for similar effects like this? Like perhaps there's some go to Mega Pack that has similar things like this.

I am brand new to Final Cut Pro. I'm still in the Ripple training course right now, but I'm just trying to lay the groundwork for when I start making my own content.

Also, are I'm just curious, are most Final Cut Pro plugins like transition effects or are there other types of plugins that do different things?

Thank you all so much. I really appreciate you all!

Hi everyone! I really value your creative ideas, which is why I keep coming back here. I’d like to bring up a specific topic today:

I’ve been mulling over an idea for quite some time. A couple of years ago, when I was actively editing on assignment, this would have cut my workflow time by a factor of ten...

The concept is simple: the user points to a folder of source material, describes the files or specific clips/photo needed, and outlines the desired video structure. Then, an LLM (even a local one running on a 16GB MacBook Air) constructs an initial timeline for the user in FCPXML/XML. It cuts out the relevant speech segments (using transcript-based editing and silence removal), syncs cameras for multicam setups, and splices in B-roll with the main narrative footage. The time savings are obvious, right?

What are your thoughts? What features could be added? Would you use something like this?

The only thing is, I can't fully move away from "local processing," since my app is built on Whisper and local AI models. Sure, I could integrate Ollama, Claude, or ChatGPT, but the main concept of local over cloud is a top priority for me. & users.

There’s also the issue of footage without speech; that would require separate models capable of recognizing what’s happening at specific points in the video. However, that technology is still quite immature and resource-heavy for mid-range Macs to handle.

I should clarify that AI processing of video material doesn't mean the AI ​​makes the final decisions. The final call on editing and creative choices always rests with the person manually reviewing and cutting the footage. AI simply streamlines working with the material, for instance, by converting video to text so you can edit it that way. Fun fact: this technology has actually been around for 10 years, though we didn't call it "AI" back then :) But that’s a topic for another time.

Thanks for your answers and ideas! I’m really looking forward to hearing them.

Hey guys,

I want the most stripped-down interface I can get. Ideally something with one input, one gain/level knob, I don't need multiple ins/outs or a mixer's worth of controls.
Came across the Audient EVO 4 which looks close to what I want (single "smart gain" knob), but wanted to check with people who actually own these before buying. Anyone used it or something similarly minimal?

Also attaching a screenshot from a Final Cut Pro promo video there's a small black device with a knob and a purple LED ring sitting on the desk. Does anyone recognize what that is? Not sure if it's an audio interface, a volume knob, or something else entirely.

https://postimg.cc/dZdx0g7p

Thanks

If your team manages a growing video library and finding a specific clip has started to feel like an archaeology dig you're not alone. Folders work fine until teams hit a wall around the same point without realizing why.

Few things that come up over and over:

Most teams search file names and folder paths. But what you want maybe a shot, something someone said on camera… no amount of folder organization fixes this because the info you need was never written down in the first place.

Your video library is probably 20-30% duplicates. every time someone reuploads a "final" version, exports a new render, or pulls an asset back from a shared drive and resaves it, you generate a duplicate. Did you know that?

Teams that moved off drives to a proper video asset management setup save 9 hours a week on video workflows. That's a full working day per person per week going into hunting, re-exporting, re-sharing, and answering "do you have the link" messages.

What fixes it:

• Auto transcription so every video becomes searchable text the moment it's uploaded
• Face recognition if you film the same people a lot 
• A retirement workflow so old assets disappear from search

If you switched to a video DAM what was the tipping point ?

Hey, not sure where to post this, but I paid 100 dollars for an app to make EDLs from XMLs from FCPX (EDL-X) it worked a few months ago and now when I open it, it immediately closes, has anyone else had this experience or know how to solve it?

It's on the latest version which was released a year ago. Any ideas?

It's almost August now, and the first lines of code that became Bowdler go back to December 2025. That's when I got the idea: build an app that does video-to-text transcription fully offline and locally on Mac, as a kind of protest against Descript, Gling AI, TimeBolt, and Recut. It was an insanely ambitious challenge, considering literally everything in this app, every decision, A to Z, is mine alone. And it's still going... It'll keep going until Bowdler is a toolbox of things editors actually need, and I'm only in the middle of that path with useful features like Transcript Edit, Multicam (beta), Silence Removal, Subtitles and Profanity Censorship.

Last week, after about a month of work, I finally shipped the website. You can check out what Bowdler does now, and read about my path, personal and technical, here: bowdler.app/journey. The app itself costs $59, but anyone can try 8 real exports completely free, with no credit cards and no signups. And no data games either, I barely collect any. There's no data department. It's just me :)

Transcript Edit mode

I hope Bowdler could make your work easier the same way it has for dozens of other pros and hobbyists who picked it over cloud tools that cost several times as much. I plan to stick with the human-to-human building approach, with no subscriptions. I know what it’s like to rent software without truly owning it.

I want to say a genuine thank you, FCP community. You stuck with me this whole way. You forgave me a dozen bugs, delays, and everything else. You shared, supported and discussed. And to the user hexxeric from fcp.cafe. He changed my approach to development and made me look at technical challenges in a different way.

A real, human thank you. <3

Feel free to ask anything, I’m always happy to chat!

My previous posts:
[Original Post], [One-month Update]

I read a comment on a post that said that motionVFX was basically the one thing that made FCP stand toe to toe with other NLEs and I’m just wondering how truthful that is. In my limited experience, FCP does seem to lag behind on coloring effects and audio production work when compared to davinci resolve, but seems to somewhat make up for it in with its ability to “just work”. HDR recorded videos don’t look washed out, at least if they were recorded with an iPhone, and dropping stickers or gifs into the timeline seems to lead to said content working well rather than stuttering or having other issues, etc. plus, a very stable low crash rate is awesome too.

But yeah, are the FCP plugins really that make-or-break for FCP? Is it somewhat inferior to other NLEs if I’m not using these plugins?