When the two Steves started Apple back in 1976, they dreamed of making a computer that people could use as a tool to change the world. In 1999, Apple released Final Cut Proa program worthy of the founders' vision. A worldwide community has formed around this tool, and people are making movies who weren't able to before. Final Cut Pro changed the way stories are told, because it changed who's telling them.

In 2003, Apple debuted Final Cut Express, a lower-cost, entry-level, nonlinear editing and effects program built using the same code base as Final Cut Pro 3; followed by Final Cut Express 2, which is based on Final Cut Pro 4are you starting to see a pattern here?

This book covers Apple's third program version, Final Cut Express HD 3.0, known as Final Cut Express HD (or just "FCE HD" to its friends and fans). FCE HD offers a light sprinkling of refinements throughout the program and another significant bump in real-time performance. FCE HD's big news is indicated in the application's name change: Limited high-definition video (HDV) capture, edit and output via FireWirewithout an additional hardware card.

FCE HD also ships with two significant helper applicationsLiveType, an animated titling program, and Soundtrack, a kind of musical Erector Set you can use to generate custom tracks from loops. LiveType and Soundtrack had previously been available only to Final Cut Pro users.

This book, Final Cut Express HD for Mac OS X: Visual QuickStart Guide, is adapted from my Final Cut Pro HD for Mac OS X: Visual QuickPro Guide. This edition describes the operation of Final Cut Express HD. I've carefully revised the Final Cut Pro HD material to accurately reflect the way Final Cut Express HD works, so if you are using an earlier version of Final Cut Express, you might want to seek out a copy of an earlier edition.