June 9, 2025

Beginning NEXT week, I'm starting a three-part webinar series on reading video scopes and color grading. Final Cut Pro on June 18, Premiere Pro on June 26, and Resolve on July 2. Registration will open next week, once I know my website is stable. 

I've always enjoyed presenting these color sessions. If you've been baffled reading scopes or trying to figure out which knob to twist, these sessions will be invaluable.

I have five video tutorials for you this week. I'm looking forward to writing new ones when my engineers are done repairing my website.

First, here's a tutorial on a variety of ways to organized media in Final Cut Pro. This video tutorial showcases many of them, with an emphasis on keywords.

There are thirteen features in Adobe Premiere Pro 2025 that use AI. Here's the list, plus a demo on how Media Intelligence works.

One of the challenges of using an iPhone for video is that creating smooth zooms are almost impossible. Until the iPhone 16. Here's how zooms now work.

One of the really helpful features in Final Cut are drop zones. These are regions where you apply effects first, add video later. It's like an "effects template" for video clips.

But, what do you do when you need that drop zone video to start in the middle of a clip?

And, for you Resolve fans, the Color page in DaVinci Resolve has color tools that don’t exist in either Apple Final Cut Pro or Adobe Premiere Pro. This short video showcases the differences between using Lift – Gamma – Gain versus Shadows – Mids – Highlights to change the gray-scale values of a clip. These differences are significant, powerful, and highly useful

Later today, Apple presents its keynote at the annual WWDC. Rumors about what it will - or won't - contain are running rampant. But, in a few hours we'll know. 

There's a lot of debate on how much AI will feature in their presentation. Thinking about that, I saw an infographic on LinkedIn over the weekend. "Become a solo-entrepreneur," the headline read. "Let AI build your company." The graphic then listed two dozen websites that would us AI to ideate; create a legal structure for your company; conceive the initial minimum viable product; develop, program and support that product; then do the sales and marketing once the product is released.

"Create your personal company - just you and an AI team."

I couldn't imagine a more depressing scenario. One of the joys of the creative process is collaboration. Working as part of a team is one of the key reasons I got into this industry. The joy of engaging with others to create something greater than one person can create alone. AI can only iterate, it can't create. It just memorizes patterns and predicts the next word.

Apple released a study over the weekend, "The Illusion of Thinking." They took the most advanced "reasoning" AIs - OpenAI's o1 & o3-mini, DeepSeek-R1, Claude-3.7-Sonnet-Thinking, Gemini Thinking - and made them solve classic puzzles. Beyond a certain complexity, every single model's accuracy collapsed. They couldn't follow simple instructions. They couldn't "reason," they could only repeat.

Creativity comes from thinking outside the box. Overcoming obstacles. Creating something new. AI can enable, it can copy, it can automate routine tasks. AI can be a powerful tool, but it can't create. Something to keep in mind as you talk with clients about their next project.

Until next Monday, stay safe, stay hopeful, and edit well.

TUTORIALS & REVIEWS

» How to Organize Media in Apple Final Cut Pro (Tutorial)

  » A variety of organizational tools, with a special emphasis on keywords.

» AI Features in Premiere Pro, with a Demo of Media Intelligence (Tutorial)

  » Adobe is committed to creating tools that enhance editors, not replace them.

» Create Smooth Zooms Using an iPhone Pro (Tutorial)

  » How to use the new multiple lenses and zoom features in the iPhone 16 Pro.

» Using Drop Zones in Apple Final Cut Pro (Tutorial)

  » Drop zones are templates for aplying effects to video - with one key gotcha.

» How Lift/Gamma/Gain Differ From Shadows/Mids/Highlights in Resolve (Tutorial)

  » The differences are significant and worth knowing.