I know this is primarily a support forum, but here’s a bit of musing for fun. Hopefully this type of discussion on these forums is allowed, if not I apologize. "Is Premiere Pro due for a full code rewrite?” By no means am I saying this is an easy task (on the contrary it’s probably the hardest thing for any software company to do), and by no means am I stomping my foot and demanding it. That said, I do think it’s a fair question to ask. Unless I’m mistaken, Premiere Pro’s last full code rewrite was 2003. A lot has happened in 17 years, and while Adobe has done a good job of expanding upon their foundation, there are some artifacts that I feel are the result of hanging onto the dated foundation. Rec 709 and the changing video landscape In 2003 Premiere Pro (and all NLEs I guess) were primarily used for broadcast and cinema. YouTube wasn’t even created until 2005. The landscape of digital video production has changed drastically since. Not everyone using Premiere Pro is using a Broadcast Rec 709 workflow. The fact that people frequently cite issues with “desaturated exports” is noteworthy. While Premiere is doing nothing wrong and is fully working as intended, this identifies a clear issue that editors may not be given the opportunity to define the intent of their workflow, or be able to convert between color spaces for footage and/or export. Presets, configurations, and the editor's perogative to personalize. The way presets and configurations are managed seem very much like a relic of 2003. There is no clear manager for presets, and there are inconsistencies between how things are modified. Effects Presets, Workspace Layouts, Track Height Presets, Sequence Settings, are all managed differently and in different locations. The local storage of these settings is baffling as well. The directory differs depending on if you have synced to CC or if you haven’t synced to CC, and sometimes the wrong directory is referenced when upgrading (My 2019 -> 2020 update referenced my outdated non-CC directory as the foundation for my 2020 settings). A unified in-app manager tied to a single directory on your machine would solve a lot of this. This is critical because I'm sure many editors, like myself, like to define our work environment. We setup our panels, our keyboard shortcuts, and our presets so we can focus on the task at hand of creating stories rather than spend time fussing with the software. Workspaces to accommodate newer Premiere features The customizable workspaces in Premiere have been a highlight feature for me, but seem to have suffered some drawbacks over time. For example, project panels consistently do not load in the correct location when working across projects, assumedly a result of Adobe adding the ability to open more than one project at once. There was also the dreaded “workspace reset” issue that was ultimately addressed by preventing default workspaces from being deleted or modified at all, which was a bit of a band-aid than a fix. A new system that helps workspaces work consistently with newer features in mind would be top notch. Performance This is a bit more vague, but one of the more common complaints about Premiere is performance and stability. Adobe has taken a tougher stance on this and personally I have noticed gains in this space in 2019 and 2020. Still, would a code rewrite allow for this to be even better when compared to building off of a foundation from 2003? I genuinely don't know, but again: food for thought. I have been using Premiere Pro since 2015 and to date I still think it is one of the best NLE's around as far as overall editing functionality and interfacing goes. I enjoy using it to this day, especially alongside other Adobe apps that help with workflow. None of the above ultimately ruin the experience for me, but in an era where competing NLEs like Resolve and FCPX are vying for editor interest by leveraging foundations that are nearly a decade newer than Premiere, the question still remains: are we due for a recode? I would imagine Adobe has learned a lot in the past 17 years and could incorporate a lot of that learning into a new NLE framework built for the modern era. Curious to hear others' thoughts, especially considering I am severely underqualified when it comes to software development. Cheers!
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