Book Review: Final Cut Pro Power Skills

For the last four years, there's been only one name I trust for Final Cut training: Larry Jordan. Larry's lynda trainings, live seminars and monthly newsletters are the final word in FCP instruction.

Now, Larry's tips for Final Cut Pro 7 are in handy book form in "Final Cut Pro Power Skills." The 264 page paperback may have a slightly misleading name: from the title you might think it's geared for the heavy Final Cut user. In reality, the tips are presented in a way that's very approachable, assuming you've had some experience with Final Cut, while some of it might also be too obvious or old hat for real power users.

This isn't a book for FCP like several others that set out to teach you to edit. Rather, this books shows tips and tricks from media management/drive setup to solving nagging problems like fades that almost go to black. If you've ever listened to Larry, or attended any of his trainings, you will hear his voice come through in these tips. Each tip is less than a page in length. The book serves as a much thinner and concise version of the old manuals that used to be supplied with FCP, and includes simple to follow, full color screenshots showing how to implement the tips.

If you use Final Cut Pro more than once a week, "Final Cut Pro Power Skills" will help you get the most out of the experience, and might even break you of a few bad habits at the same time (pay close attention to the info on media management.) 

This isn't the book to learn to edit, but it will make your time with Final Cut Pro more enjoyable, and allow you to focus more on editing, than system setup, working around quirks in the software, etc.

Comments

[Ken]

Is this a book review or an advert? I don't see the name of the person who wrote this piece. If it is a review, why isn't the reviewers name on the review?

Thanks.

Ken

[steve]

Sounds like a rip off of the On the Spot series by Richard Harrington

[Ryan Ritchey]

Hi Ken,
The authors on our posts are listed at the bottom of the review, in this case me: RyanRit.