Need help choosing software!!

Ok fixing to go to college this fall for my communications major and i was wondering what would be good software to get off the apple site. Like: iwork, aperture, final cut,etc. By the way am going to get 15in mbp 2.4 ghz.

 

Communications? Any sub category?

Communications has many strands.

 

Final Cut Studio is for professional video editing. Do you plan to do that/does your course need it (Communications is a very broad subject).

iWork will most likely be updated soon, so don't purchase it now. iWork consists of an extremely powerful PowerPoint app called Keynote (better than PowerPoint in my opinion) and Pages is a word processor that has more eye-pleasing features than Word. But as I said before iWork is expected to be updated soon so don't buy it now.

Aperture is a photo management software similar to Adobe Lightroom (Aperture came first). Unless you manage thousands of photos you will most likely not need this application. iPhoto (bundled with all Macs with the iLife suite) will be fine in managing photos unless you're a pro or really want Aperture.

 

You would know if you needed Aperture or Final Cut. I would stick with MS Office for Mac instead of iWork since it gives maximum compatibility if you are going to be doing collaborative work.

The best thing to do is go to class first and see what your professors require you to do.

 

Well am trying get into film industry, so pretty first 2 years going to be book learning then hands on film making. Like history of film, scriptwriting,screen writing,ect. Also still the regular college class's too.

 

Well am trying get into film industry, so pretty much the first 2 years going to be book learning then hands on film making. Like history of film, scriptwriting,screen writing,ect. Also still the regular college class's too.

 

I do plan to video edit, but i dont think ill need it the first 2 years. Well hmm..if i should buy it now what am going to use for reports and notes then?

 

There's lots of alternatives for word processing, for example you could use Google Docs if you like or the Mac equivalent of OpenOffice, NeoOffice. These are office suites that are free.

 

if you want to video edit, start with imovie hd.

if that doesn't fit you, upgrade to final cut express, which is MUCH better.