Final Cut Pro X for iMovie and Final Cut Express Users: Making the Creative Leap First Edition

So, I just finish becoming somewhat proficient with Final Cut Express, and Apple upsets my entire apple cart with the introduction of Final Cut Pro X. Great. An entirely new piece of complicated software to digest. The first thing I did was to see if Tom Wolsky would be releasing a book on FCP, and I pre-ordered it sight unseen. Why? Because Wolsky got me through FCE, so I figured he would do the same with FCP. I was not disappointed.Over the years I've purchased many books purporting to be the ultimate "guide" to complex software, and most of them I opened two or three times and relegated them to the shelf, where they proceeded to be useful only in gathering dust. Most of those "guides," some of them hundreds and hundreds of pages, proved to be more difficult to comprehend than the software itself. My time was better spent slogging through the programs themselves than becoming even more frustrated trying to read them.Wolsky's guide is different. It is concise, easy to read and to the point. It is actually easy to find the topic of current interest, it is written in plain English, it is easy to follow, and his techniques simply work. It wasn't necessary to read cover to cover (although a first-time user of FCP would find it very helpful). When I wanted to achieve a given effect within FCP, it only took a few minutes to find the appropriate subject and accomplish what I had hoped to do. This had not been my experience with other software manuals, most of which were much more expensive than Mr. Wolsky's publications.In my opinion, this is the only book you need to take the mystery out of FCP. You will be editing your movies while most other individuals will still be reading.

To tell the truth, I hated this book when I first looked at it. It struck me as just a sort of pompous rewrite of the PDF manual. But...when my first long video crashed and burned, I went back to it, and, sure enough, Wolsky was on the problem and had a real world suggestion for fixing it. Maybe I was the pompous one! Anyway, I am now a fan, bnut can;t give it a five because I still find the writing style annoying.

I highly recommend this book by Tom Wolsky. It is a complete semester's course divided into manageable bits, and it is indexed in such a way that you can hit the street (i.e. FCP sw) running! Learn as much or as little as you need to in order to get the job done in the amount of time you have allocated. It's very thorough. There are quite a few choices for manuals on FCPX, but this is definitely the one to choose!

An excellent companion while learning fcpx. Easy to read and follows a logical sequence. I was on the fence between Adobe and fcpx, but after reading this book and learning the techniques I needed to know to edit and grade my videos I won't go back to Adobe. Highly recommended

Well written by an author who will help you out on the Apple Forums too.

Tom Wolsky writes the perfect manual

This is the next best thing to having an actual instructor standing beside you. With this book, you'll find out that author Tom Wolsky really knows his stuff.This is a hands-on practical book filled with step-by-step tutorials to follow along. The instructions are clear, and there are many good tips and shortcuts provided. Coverage is comprehensive.The tutorial files, the sample videos to work on, are available for download on the book's companion website. The thing to note is the tutorial files are created for FCPX version 10.9 and older. However, the author has also updated the tutorials files for 10.1 and newer versions, which is great. Don't download the wrong versions because the files are quite big.The book title gives the impression that this book is something to help you transition from iMovie or Final Cut Express. Well, that's not the case. It is great for beginners with absolutely no prior experience in video editing because it assumes the user has no prior knowledge. It does slips in some tips for users who are transitioning from other software though.If you want a book that shows you the ins and outs of Final Cut Pro X, this is an excellent choice.

Excellent book. Had to contact the author to get the supporting media as it would not download via the published website, hence not giving it 5 stars.