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Replacing / relinking to transcoded files with slightly different file names.
TL;DR question: Can I somewhat easily replace DNxHD 115 footage in a project with DNxHD 36 files that have a slightly different name? For example, the DNxHD 115 footage might have a name of 20150901-HWPS.mxf and the DNxHD 36 might be 20150901.mxf.
The longer story…
I’m looking for some guidance on how to best approach my situation.
We have a project that contains hundreds, if not thousands, of hours of footage. We are approximately 75% of the way through filming.
Our workflow was to record .mov and .mts files, transcode those files into DNxHD 115, then edit in Media Composer. Everything that has been shot has been transcoded, and quite a bit of editing has been done.
The problem now is that the transcoded footage takes up ~60 TB of space. If we could do it again, we would start over and transcode everything to DNxHD 36 for editing and then ultimately relink to the highest quality once we are ready to finish the project.
My hope now is to batch transcode all of the original footage down to DNxHD 36 and to relink it inside of Media Composer.
The transcoding to DNxHD 36 will take some time, but it is easy. The hurdle I have is with relinking the footage, since the newly-transcoded files will have different file names than the old DNxHD 115 files that Media Composer created.
The “prefix” of the files will be the same, but when the files were originally transcoded with Media Composer, it added some additional characters to each file. Short of manually matching up and renaming the original files with their transcoded counterparts (which could be extremely time-consuming), I’m hoping to find some automatic or semi-automatic way to link everything up again.
Any thoughts on how best to approach this?
Thanks!
Luke
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20 Replies
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If you are transcoding in Media Composer to DNxHD 36, then it will manage all the relinking. It does not use the filename you see at the directory level, but is managed by its own database. If you have a sequence, highlight and do a relink – at the bottom of the dialog window is a relink to a specific codec data rate, or highest, etc. Give that a try.
Michael
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Thanks for the reply, Michael.
I should have been more specific. The transcoding to DNxHD 36 would ideally be done outside of Media Composer. The reason for this is to be able to transcode such a large volume of files at once. As Media Composer seems to randomly fail while transcoding, if I’m transcoding thousands of files it would take a lot of baby-sitting in order to keep the process going.
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There are other relinking options within MC that might help you out.
When you select a batch of clips in a bin and try to relink it to a specific sequence, you can select other information inside the bin to use to help find your clips. If you create a sequence of a bins clips- 115 version, and try to relink it to a bin of 36 media, you can select items such as matching masterclip duration or matching master clip end might work. (How many clips in your bin have the exact same duration…down to the frame?) I wouldn’t try to relink 2000 clips at once like this, but bin by bin might work for you.
Doesn’t sound like fun, but you could copy all the original names to a new column, and manually remove the extra letters from the name. They relink according to that bin…like i said, not fun, but feasible.
You are worried about babysitting your new transcodes, but your babysitting time might double or triple that of trying to get the relink to work. Setting your transcodes to go in smaller batches might just save you a lot of time in the end.
Glenn
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I guess the problem I’m having now is that I can’t figure out how to get Media Composer to relink to any media created outside of Media Composer itself. I’m wondering if this is because when I manually add an MXF file to the \Avid MediaFiles\ directory, when I look in the Media Tool, the new files show up but there’s no source file or source path for the new MXF file, whereas the MXF file that Media Composer creates has info for the source file and path.
Does Media Composer use the source file information in order to link two clips? Or is there something else Media Composer “looks for” in order to match up two files?
Another question would be, is there any way to effectively select File A and File B and tell Media Composer “Link this file to this file”?
I might still be best off manually transcoding everything inside of Media Composer, but I’m just wanting to do all my homework before I make a decision.
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When you look at the Tape and Source File columns for each of the clips is there a common value between them?
Michael
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Good thinking, but unfortunately there’s not.
For the file I transcode in Media Composer, Source File is “20140228151609.mts” (the original file name) and Source Path is “C:\mypath\.” The Tape field is blank.
All three fields (Source File, Source Path, and Tape) are blank when I “manually” import an MXF file that was created with Sorenson Squeeze.
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I have never made files with Squeeze. Are you getting a single file with video and audio, or separate files for each track? Seeing as it is not a “dailies” type product, I doubt it creates embedded REEL ID etc. It seems that it should export a file that has the same name as the .mts but perhaps with a prefix or suffix?
If you want to send me a small file of both the original .mts and the resulting Sorenson file, I’ll take a look at it. Use a service like Wetransfer.com or filemail.com and sent to michael[at]24p[dot]com
Michael
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I’m actually surprised Sorenson keeps the original files timecode.
If you don’t want to use Avid, try Resolve. You can tell it to add a prefix or suffix to the files you create, so you may be able to match the originals.
The free version should do everything you need for transcodes, and it is quite fast.
Make sure you set up your preferences to include your reel id information. (just do 1 clip and look at it in resolve to make sure you are getting the information you need back in Avid
Glenn
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Thanks for the offer, Michael. I’ll try to upload some sample clips.
Glenn — I had heard people mention Resolve being a possible way to transcode to Avid MXF. The problem is… I can’t really figure out how to use Resolve to do this! Are you by chance familiar with the process?
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