Final Cut User

Apple has released the 10.5.4 update for Leopard with a bunch of updates and fixes under the hood. As always if your mid project or do not need a current fix wait for the poor souls eager enough to jump on the new updates. If you have a test machine then go for it. My usual steps are to clone my drive before an update, disconnect all external devices except the keyboard and mouse, get the update via the web download on Apple’s site versus the software updater(there are a few different builds when updates come out) and repair permissions as a just-in case. 

Additional Information

What’s included?

The 10.5.4 Update is recommended for all users running Mac OS X Leopard and includes general operating system fixes that enhance the stability, compatibility and security of your Mac.

General

• Includes recent Apple security updates.
• Resolves an issue with saving and reopening Adobe Creative Suite 3 files on a remote server.
• Includes additional RAW image support for several cameras.
• Addresses an issue that may result in a partially installed X11 application.
• Improves L2TP VPN client reliability.

AirPort

• Addresses AirPort reliability issues with 5GHz networks.
• Addresses AirPort issues that may result in slower performance in Logic Studio or MainStage.

iCal

• Improves overall iCal reliability for meeting requests, cancellation notices, delegation, and syncing with iPhone.
• Resolves an issue that prevents deleting an iCal event without notifying the creator.
• Addresses an issue in which events in all calendars affect availability.  A checkbox now enables information-only calendars to be transparent from free/busy lookups.
• Resolves a UI issue preventing delegated calendars from showing up as a separate window.
• Addresses an issue with copying and pasting attendees from one event to another.
• Resolves an issue in which iCal may not delete events after a specified time interval, even when set to do so in iCal preferences.
• Addresses an issue in which To Dos cannot be marked private.

Safari

• Addresses a potential performance issue when loading secure web pages.
• Resolves issues that may be encountered when accessing secure web pages with client certificates that reside on a smart card.

Spaces and Exposé

• Addresses an issue in which switching from a space with a Finder window keeps the Finder as the active application instead of the application residing in the destination space.
• Fixes an issue in which dragging an application from the list of application assignments in Spaces System Preferences does not assign the application to the desired space.
• Resolves an Exposé issue that may result in only a subset of windows being shown.

   Apple K base article on the update.

Awesome new term listings are up at FXPHD.com for the July 08 term and man what a stellar listing of training you can take. Some of the highlights for me are the Stop motion /Miniatures , Afx 301 with Mark Coleran/Mark Christensen on screen UI , Tim Clapham back with C4D/AE goodness,RED ,Nuke, Matte painting and just way to many good ones to keep listing. All together there about 15 brand new classes with some popular classes being revisited for those new to FXPHD. Those of you worried about having access to some of the higher end software like Nuke and Maya do not worry FXPHD has VPN access for some of the classes on both Mac and PC.

I have said it many times that since joining FXPHD over a year ago that it has been a HUGE plus for me and have made a bunch of friends and contacts. The classes are beyond high end and no one is doing anything near the level that FXPHD does . Being able to have contact with other industry pro’s is tremendous bonus . People have asked to just have access to the forums alone , that says something for the community, professors and staff at FXPHD. Do yourself a favor and check out the info on the main page and keep and eye out for the 0 week class which will probably be up in a week or so . 

July 08 term listing.   

 In partnership with the Executive Producer of OFFF NY, I’m pleased to announce F5, a two-day festival of creativity taking place in New York City. Although the event won’t be until the spring of 2009, I want to put it on your radars now and encourage you to subscribe for updates on the F5 site. In addition to getting F5 news before everyone else, subscribers will get advanced access to ticket sales, which will be limited.I’m not going to say anything more about the event right now, except that it’s going to be amazing. F5 goes beyond just motion graphics into the fields of filmmaking, photography, graphic design, art, music, interactive design, advertising and experience design. The goal of F5 is to change the way you look at creativity, and in so doing, change the way you look at your work and your life.

You bet your butt I will be there and AENY will be supporting Justin @ Motionographer on this venture . Mark those 2009 calendars now it will be here before you know it.

 Media Temple which happens to be my hosting of choice for all my sites has gone and done something really cool and set up a beta(private) you can sign up for .(You have to have Mac Sever experience and 10.5 server knowledge). Since TUAW has the skinny on it no need to copy and paste so I will put the links up for Media Temple and Tuaw story. If you are looking at hosting your own server or just some services then check this out very cool things being done with Apple software and dev teams at Media Temple. Media Temple Beta Overview  TUAW Story 

AMD Pushes Mac® Based Visual Computing Beyond HDATI Radeon™ HD 3870 for Mac® & PC Edition offers amazing graphics processing for work and play

SUNNYVALE, Calif. — June 12, 2008 –AMD (NYSE: AMD) today announced the new ATI Radeon™ HD 3870 for Mac® & PC Edition, delivering the power to go beyond high-definition visual computing for work and play¹. Optimized exclusively for Apple Mac® Pro systems, the ATI Radeon HD 3870 Mac & PC edition can help drive productivity with built-in 256-bit 512MB GDDR4 frame buffer memory and 320 stream processors to deliver maximum performance for graphics-intensive applications such as 3D modeling, animation and games. Users also can expand visual workspace using twin dual-link DVI ports to connect two 30” Apple Cinema HD displays®.“AMD is introducing the ATI Radeon HD 3870 Mac & PC Edition to enhance the Mac experience to maximum levels of 3D gaming and HD performance,” said Matt Skynner, vice president of marketing, Graphics Products Group, AMD. “Mac users demand the best when it comes to HD graphics performance, and the ATI Radeon 3870 Mac & PC Edition is designed to meet and exceed that need by delivering The Ultimate Visual Experience™ to our customers’ displays.

”Delivers More Power for Professional ApplicationsSuperior performance and visual quality make the ATI Radeon HD 3870 Mac & PC Edition ideal for creative and professional applications on Apple Mac Pro systems, including Aperture™, Motion and Final Cut Studio®. Users can take advantage of the latest graphics features and drive productivity at an extraordinary price.

Advance to the Next Generation of HD GamingATI Radeon HD 3870 Mac & PC Edition takes HD gaming to a whole new level by delivering a superior immersive gaming environment while enhancing overall image quality. The Unified Shader Architecture provides the ultimate in realistic game play experience. With PCI Express® 2.0 support, users are now ready for games that demand blisteringly fast throughput. Ultimately, with ATI Radeon HD 3870 Mac & PC Edition, Mac users can enjoy a more complete next-generation gaming experience.

Experience Break-through Efficiency ATI Radeon HD 3800 Series graphics processors have break-through efficiency, with up to twice the processing performance-per-watt compared to previous generations of high-end AMD graphics processors². AMD also has added its patented ATI PowerPlay™ technology to the ATI Radeon HD 3800 series to provide increased control over the graphics processor in multiple power states. With PowerPlay technology, users benefit from dynamic adjustment of clocks and voltages depending on their usage scenario, which allows for a cool and quiet user experience.With a manufacturer’s suggested retail price (MSRP) of USD $219, the ATI Radeon HD 3870 Mac & PC Edition is scheduled to be available late June at leading Mac retailers world-wide.

About AMD Advanced Micro Devices (NYSE: AMD) is a leading global provider of innovative processing solutions in the computing, graphics and consumer electronics markets. AMD is dedicated to driving open innovation, choice and industry growth by delivering superior customer-centric solutions that empower consumers and businesses worldwide. For more information, visit http://www.amd.com.¹HD monitor required for full HD enjoyment²2x processing performance-per-watt results based on AMD internal testing comparing ATI Radeon™ HD 3870 to ATI Radeon™ HD 2900 XT

Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. AMD, the AMD Arrow logo, ATI . the ATI logo, PowerPlay, Radeon, The Ultimate Visual Experience, and combinations thereof, are trademarks of Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. Mac is a trademark of Apple Inc. Other names are for informational purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective owners. The inclusion of third party trademarks in this release does not imply an endorsement by the trademark owners.

I have been a ATI fan for a while with them being able to support more bit depths then Nvidia has in the past and just having more luck with Motion and Color liking the ATI support. Alot of people feel (and I am one of them ) that Apple always skims on the selections for serious graphics card choices for power users(games and post production/3d). With the new technology Apple is adopting from Nvidia it will hopefully get more interesting next year. Hey Apple and Nvidia I am still waiting for SDI cards available for Mac…. 

Apple has a new Xsan 2.1 update and as always the case make sure you are not in the middle of a production or serious work when updating especially in a San environment unless you absolutely need a fix brought by the update.  Kbase article on Xsan 2.1 update Download Link Xsan 2.1 

About Xsan Filesystem Update 2.1The 2.1 update is recommended for all systems running Xsan 2. This update includes general file system fixes, as well as specific fixes for:- metadata controller reliability- using and validating file system Access Control Lists- upgrading from Xsan 1.4

Important: Read before installing

• Xsan 2.0 and Mac OS X 10.5 or Mac OS X Server 10.5, or later, is required in order to install Xsan 2.1. Mac OS X 10.5.3 or Mac OS X Server 10.5.3 or later is recommended for this update.
• If you are setting up a new Xsan deployment, please see this article for the proper installation order.
• Be sure that all Metadata Controllers (MDCs) are updated before you make any configuration changes.
• Before installing, please review the Xsan 2 Migration Guide.
• During installation, do not change any Xsan settings, whether using Xsan Admin or a command-line tool.

Good friend’s of  AENY and FinalCutUser have some new vector packs out .GO Media makes some amazing Vector packs , Textures, Fonts and other design and motion graphic related design elements to be used from everything in moving images to print. I have been using the Vector packs for some time now and they are indispensable at time when you need some really good vectors without having to spend time in illustrator or another app making them . Some of your favorite band tee shirts you wear just might use this design elements and you didn’t even know it. The packs are broken down into different sets you can pick and choose what works best for you and the price ranges about $53.us for a set with 7 or so packs in the set.Vector pack 11 looks great and everyone needs some skulls . 

Location -  We have a new location that can sit up to 400 people!!!!PS 41@ 116 West 11th St., NYC(corner of 11th Street and 6th Ave.Date: Thursday, June 26th, 2008Time: TBD - but probably around 6:45 PM-9PMThe new space is just in time too because our lineup is insane!!!! Guess who coming to dinner?

• Visual Designer, Marc Coleran, whose work has been seen in films like  The Bourne Ultimatum, Domino, Alien vs. Predator, The Bourne Identity, Blade II, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, The World Is Not Enough - just to name a few.

• Visual effects artist John Montgomery -  co-founder of the online visual effects news site fxguide, as well as the training site fxphd. His Clients and Credits include Super Bowl commercials for McDonald’s, Disney as well as work for Budweiser, Miller, Hallmark, Sears, Moen, Gatorade, Morgan Stanley, and the ESPN and CBS television networks.

… And more prizes than you can possibly imagine (unless you can imagine a lot, and then it’s roughly the same amount of prizes you can possibly imagine).Keep your eyes on Aeny.org for more info.Your pals at AENY,Jim Geduldick,Dennis Radeke& Aharon Rabinowitz

One book I can’t wait to get my hands on is Ron Brinkman’s Second edition mega book  The Art and Science of Digital Compositing  Amazon Link . Ron has been in the compositing software game for a while being part of original Sony Imageworks employees then co founding Nothing Real which if you have followed Apple and compositing software Nothing Real created Shake which was then bought by Apple .I was fortunate enough to finally meet Ron and NAB and he couldn’t have been a more pleasant guy to talk to . Ron left Apple little over a year ago(similar when Shake stopped getting updates) and he is now working with The Foundry on Nuke(amazing compositing software).If you need some summer reading I would have to say pick up this book as Ron describes it this is the book he had wished he could have made with Vol 1 because of the updates to high quality photo printing . So if you are serious or interested in getting into visual effects as a career and need some knowledge pick up this book when it comes out .(seems shipments have been pushed back a few weeks to 1st week of July )Oldie but goodie interview back from 2002 with Ron done by Mike Seymour at Fxguide.com  Fxguide interview Ron’s Blog

So with WWDC going on this week and public NDA viewings of  10.6 beta Snow Leopard a few things have sparked my interest that directly relates to media creation and distribution on the Mac platform.(Sorry for the copy and paste tags it is very late…)

Since 2001, Mac OS X has delivered more than a thousand innovative new features. With Snow Leopard, the next major version of the world’s most advanced operating system, Mac OS X changes more than its spots, it changes focus. Taking a break from adding new features, Snow Leopard — scheduled to ship in about a year — builds on Leopard’s enormous innovations by delivering a new generation of core software technologies that will streamline Mac OS X, enhance its performance, and set new standards for quality. Snow Leopard dramatically reduces the footprint of Mac OS X, making it even more efficient for users, and giving them back valuable hard drive space for their music and photos.This looks like Apple is really concentrating on making the next OS update really solid as opposed to just throwing alot of bells and whistles on top of things that should have been fixed back in early 10.X days. 

64-bit-To accommodate the enormous amounts of memory being added to advanced hardware, Snow Leopard extends the 64-bit technology in Mac OS X to support breakthrough amounts of RAM — up to a theoretical 16TB, or 500 times more than what is possible today. More RAM makes applications run faster, because more of their data can be kept in the very fast physical RAM instead of on the much slower hard disk.Some of us thought we would see 64 bit across the board in 10.5 but alot of applications cannot even utilize this technology yet. Just think of FCP, Motion or Soundtrack Pro being able to really access gobs of RAM for added real time playback , imagine the amount of particle systems and replicators you could group.

Media and Internet-Using media technology pioneered in OS X iPhone, Snow Leopard introduces QuickTime X, a streamlined, next-generation platform that advances modern media and Internet standards. QuickTime X features optimized support for modern codecs and more efficient media playback, making it ideal for any application that needs to play media content.Because Snow Leopard delivers the fastest implementation of JavaScript to date, web applications are more responsive. Safari runs JavaScript up to 53 percent faster with Snow Leopard.So what is Quicktime X and what does this mean for editors,visual effects artist’s ,cinematographer’s and content creators alike ? Could this be the real Quicktime Pro we have been asking for ? I hope we don’t have the same issues that have plagued Quicktime in the past. (please no more Gamma issues in QT X)

Multicore-“Grand Central,” a new set of technologies built into Snow Leopard, brings unrivaled support for multicore systems to Mac OS X. More cores, not faster clock speeds, drive performance increases in today’s processors. Grand Central takes full advantage by making all of Mac OS X multicore aware and optimizing it for allocating tasks across multiple cores and processors. Grand Central also makes it much easier for developers to create programs that squeeze every last drop of power from multicore systems.Multicore support has been getting better alot of applications can now take near full advantage of the processors in alot of today’s machines . A 8 core Mac Pro today would have been a super computer just a few short years back in essence it is its own render farm or server(hence dual gig E ports )

OpenCL-Another powerful Snow Leopard technology, OpenCL (Open Compute Library), makes it possible for developers to efficiently tap the vast gigaflops of computing power currently locked up in the graphics processing unit (GPU). With GPUs approaching processing speeds of a trillion operations per second, they’re capable of considerably more than just drawing pictures. OpenCL takes that power and redirects it for general-purpose computing.

Open CL seems to be the Nvidia CUDA technology  which Apple has been testing since the SDK Mac version came out . This technology is based more off of parallel processing instead of the multi core processing currently used in 10.5 Leopard . All of these little tid bits Apple has made public are exciting to see as they develop and makes me wish I was at WWDC to check out the tech talks and demos. As time goes on and more info comes out this has me thinking alot of what the next version of FCP Studio may have in store and with all the new technology will we one day see a Shake predecessor that has been rumored for a while now ? Who knows but Apple does sure like to keep us on our toes.Here are some links to get you up to speed.

 Snow Leopard @ Apple

 Parallel Processing @ Wikipedia

 Cuda Zone @ Nvidia