Go Big Or Go Home – @Apple MacBook Pro M1 Max Review

i got a brand new macbook pro that is
going to be replacing my
2013 mac
pro now that computer has been a
workhorse and has been reliable ever
since i got it but it’s at the point now
where you know i’m shooting video with
this uh sony a7s3 and those video files
are
humongous and really hard for the mac
pro to deal with so throughout the years
i’ll do a project and i put a little
money aside
and i knew that these macbook pros were
going to come out and there’s a ton of
people that are talking about all the
specs and how wonderful it is and
everything well we’re going to take a
look at the macbook pro m1 max through
the eyes of an animator welcome back to
the channel i’m carlos and in this video
we’re going to take a look at how this
m1 max macbook pro has made my video
editing process just a little more
efficient first let’s take a look at
some of these terms that all of these
people continue to use that really kind
of kind of confuse us if we take a

look
at a computer as a library kids
the library is basically a
paper paper-based
internet back in the day when libraries
were hot you would go to the library
check out a book go through the little
card catalog and make sure that the book
was there now we have the internet so
the libraries are becoming almost almost
like a unicorn if you see one you get
excited and then you and then you just
keep on pushing they’re very helpful
especially when you’re trying to
describe computers so if we’re taking a
look at our computers as if they were
libraries we can describe our hard drive
space as how many books we can keep in
our library or in computer speak how
many applications how many files whether
their videos audio all those files all
of those things they equate to books and
how many books or how many apps you can
have how many files you can have on your
computer ram is basically how many of
these books you can read at the same
time and how efficient it is to read all
of those books at the same time now
let’s talk about cpu or central
processing unit
let’s get away from the analogy of
library and now let’s take a look at
maybe
if we’re making a film or an animation
right cpu would be the director they
take a task they hand it off and then
when that task is completed it’s handed
back to the director and the director
knows exactly what to do next when those
tasks are being handed off by a director
those are going to different teams
whether it’s an animation special
effects
storyboarding whatever it is if we take
that hand-off process and put it into a
computer we’re saying that the cpu is
taking tasks and handing them off to the
gpu the gpu is called graphics
processing unit the gpu is able to then
do all of this processing and then when
it’s done it takes the result and hands
it back to the director or computer
speak back to the cpu so that’s the
relationship between cpu gpu
cpu would be the director the gpu would
be all of the other teams that help
support the director the very next thing
you hear when you’re watching all of
these youtube videos about the macbook
pros and the processors and everything
the next term you might hear is cores
how many cores does your computer have
with the m1 processor you get up to 10
cores of cpu so basically what that
means is instead of just one director
you get 10 directors
and imagine having 10 directors that are
super efficient and know how to work
together and not for anything
but that is also a unicorn then when it
comes to the gpu you get 16 cores of
gpu and as far as ram you can go up to
32 gigabytes of ram now the m1 max has
10 core cpu so you get 10 directors
right off the bat there’s no up to or
anything you get 10 cores you also get
up to 32 court gpu so imagine having 10
directors and 32 animation teams 32
special effects teams
32 storyboarding teams whatever team it
is that you want you get 32 of those
individually so now you have 10
directors telling 32 teams what to do
that’s what creates efficiency now this
is where ram becomes very important
usually in my process i might have
photoshop open i would have premiere
open i would have audition open i would
have after effects open i might have
blender open i might have a browser open
i might be listening to music
all of those things that go into your
process of creativity all of those
things
basically the more ram you have the more
of that you can continue to do and your
computer’s not going to get crushed so
to give you a good picture of what cores
are
here is an example of what a single core
computer would look like and this is
what a multi-core computer would look
like so to wrap that all up the more
cores you have whether they’re cpu and
or gpu the more efficient your process
should be and with all that said
basically what apple has done is it’s
given all of these software companies
enough rope to hang themselves so you
have an incredibly powerful computer
everyone is talking about this is the
most powerful
laptop ever created and all that stuff
well
uh
i just opened up my laptop over the
weekend and i tried to create a new
photoshop file and it literally took a
solid five seconds for photoshop to
create a psd file that i was able to
draw in so what we’re hoping is that
adobe and all these other companies
start to build for the m1 processor and
making everything a little more
efficient a little more stable if you
have a creative cloud membership you
know what i’m talking about stability
stability
okay so now that we talked about the
inside of the computer let’s talk about
the outside of the computer everyone is
talking about how apple has put ports
back into the macbook pro i understand
what apple’s been trying to do making
everything a little thinner a little
lighter but i’m not worried about that
i’m worried about power i need something
that is going to help me edit videos
i’ve been trying a bunch of different
devices to see how i can actually stay
on the move because on this channel
we’re living our life and then we’re
coming together and telling our own
stories and even learning how to do
those things so i need a computer that’s
powerful but yet easy to take with me
wherever i go i don’t want to have to
pull out a pile of cables that looks
like a pet octopus just to do some
editing so these ports are very
important on the new macbook pros we get
three thunderbolt 4 ports and a card
reader the sd card reader comes in handy
when you’re taking a lot of photos and
videos with a regular sd card but since
i’m shooting on a a7 s3 i need this card
reader because this has the opening for
a cf express card and the cf express
card doesn’t fit into this memory card
slot so i’m going to be carrying this
anyway so that’s kind of helpful i guess
if i shoot on a regular memory card but
it doesn’t really help me but it’s nice
to know that it’s there now i want to
talk about my current video process with
the mac pro first i have to obviously go
out and shoot the videos and then i have
to transfer the videos to my computer
then i bring those videos into premiere
then i have to create proxy files and
the reason i have to create proxy files
is because again these video files are
too big for the mac pro and so it starts
to choke and hiccup sometimes you hit
the space bar and it might take a second
or two for the video to start playing in
premiere pro and this is not just a
premiere pro thing this is for pretty
much everything if your video files are
too big and bulky for your computer
that’s a computer problem not
necessarily software problem not letting
software developers off the hook though
sometimes it does make a difference
premiere pro sometimes chokes and from
what i understand davinci resolve
handles it just a little bit better so i
don’t know but we will be taking a look
at davinci resolve in the future so
after i create my proxies i then edit
the videos you have to remember when
you’re editing in premiere pro
even if you have your proxy files laid
out if you start doing color correcting
premiere will automatically turn those
proxy files back into the high
resolution files so if you’re doing
color correcting editing and everything
and you’re trying to figure out why your
proxy files are skipping or or having
dropped frames and stuff chances are
premiere swapped out your proxy for the
high resolution files so just be aware
of that and then when you’re done with
your edit you can then export your video
and that is yet again another reason why
having multiple chords for a cpu and a
gpu comes in handy because if you have a
lot of effects and you start stacking
things like luts or lookup tables if you
start stacking all those things up in
premiere all of those things affect how
long it’s going to take premiere
and your computer to render out these
files from what i understand with these
macbook pros we might not necessarily
have to create proxy files anymore okay
quick interruption i wanted to show you
guys
this is what i’ve been working on this
is the video that we’re all watching
together right
i wanted to show you guys i did not
create any proxies or any anything and
the playback current video process with
the mac pro
see what i mean so
even over here where it has the playback
resolution i have it set to half because
i’m not trying to get crazy but i can go
ahead and click and go to full
and even still i’m able to come over
here
a7s3
and you see if shoot on uh
if you have worked in video editing at
all on a subpar machine and you see this
you know the excitement that i’m feeling
right now
but it doesn’t really help this is full
resolution
full resolution
sony a7s 3 footage i don’t have any luts
or anything
put on this not yet but
still i honestly don’t think that is
going to make that big of a difference
exciting times are here folks now let’s
talk about some of the other things that
come with this macbook pro for example
magsafe i don’t know if you guys have
ever had a computer with the power cord
that’s magnetic but that is a game
changer i loved it when apple came out
with magsafe years ago and i’m so happy
that they brought this back and it has
nothing to do with if you trip over your
cable it unplugs itself and your laptop
won’t fall to the ground
that’s cool but basically for me the
highlight is when i go to plug something
in a lot like when you’re trying to plug
in a usb a cable you always put it in
and it doesn’t fit so you flip it and it
doesn’t really fit again you flip it
again and that’s when it fits the
original way that you’re trying to plug
it doesn’t that drive you crazy now if
you’re dealing with magsafe now all i
have to do is take the magnet and put it
anywhere near the charging port and it
snaps right into place
that saves a lot of time the screen on
this thing is absolutely beautiful it
says here that the screen is a liquid
retina xdr which stands for extreme
dynamic range promotion is apple’s fancy
way of saying these screens can move up
to 120 frames a second so again going to
animation terms we usually animate at 12
frames a second maybe 24 frames a second
now imagine an animation at 120 frames a
second is going to be incredibly smooth
the 14 inch macbook pro has 3024 by
1964 basically 5.9 million pixels the 16
inch has a resolution of 3456 by 2234
and that’s 7.7 million pixels now this
is one that’s a little frustrating to me
because i don’t understand why everyone
is making such a big deal out of it
these computers come with a 1080p web
camera i don’t know about you but i’ve
seen some logitech web cameras that come
in at a whopping 4k so there’s a lot of
people that are all excited about 1080p
and i’m like
so the new macbook pros come with
spatial audio built in so you’re going
to need some air pods if you haven’t
tried spatial audio yet it’s pretty
incredible not gonna lie you put your
headphones in and when you turn your
head the sound continues to come from
that location if you want a really good
example of spatial audio get yourself
some air pods and then go on apple tv
and check out ted lasso it’s a really
cool representation of what you can do
with spatial audio so to wrap up this
video i got the 16 inch macbook pro m1
max with a four terabyte hard drive 64
gigabytes of ram
why because like i said earlier i
usually have photoshop open sometimes
i’ll have illustrator open sometimes
i’ll have a browser window open i’ll
have premiere i’ll have audition i’ll
have after effects all of this stuff is
open all at the same time and if you do
that on a computer that’s not ready for
it you’re going to crash your system and
it’s it all of that gets in the way of
you getting content out what you’re
trying to do is minimize the amount of
waiting that you have to do when you’re
creating content one of the challenges i
had was connecting my cintiq to my
macbook pro the video signal that was
coming out of the cintiq was mini
display and this guy doesn’t really
accept anything except thunderbolt 4 or
even usbc so what i ended up doing was
opening up the back of the cintiq taking
out the mini display cable and replacing
it
with this dvi to hdmi and now the video
out connection for my cintiq is actually
hdmi and not mini display and if you
guys want me to do a video on how i did
this i’d be more than happy to do that
and now i’m going to be creating all of
this content on the new macbook pro and
i’m gonna be sharing with you guys a lot
of the experiences the bumps the bruises
or lack thereof when it comes to dealing
with a macbook pro hopefully this video
gave you enough information to make the
best decision that’s right for you until
then i hope this video finds you healthy
and i hope this video finds you safe
i’ll see you in the next video take care
i’m carlos and in this video we’re going
to take a look at how the m1
max
mac
they could have named it something
different
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you