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EX1 BPAV folder workflow advice
Hi All,
I am working on a documentary film project and am trying to create a good workflow. We are shooting mainly on a Sony EX1 that has 2x32GB cards with a little bit of supplementary material being shot on a little HDV prosumer Canon HV20. This is a project that will run over several months and involve lots and lots of fly on the wall footage.
I run a MacBook Pro 2Ghz intel core duo with 1.5gb Ram and Mac OSX 10.5.8. I have a couple of lacie big disk terrabyte drives and a lacie rugged terrabyte portable drive.
I have cut a promo on FCP (6.0.5) but am not sure if the final edit will take place in a post house running avid, fcp or on my little MacBook Pro so want to know the best way to archive all my rushes i.e. BPAV folders.-Are there any particularly good naming conventions, file structures people have used?
-If I move clips around from folder to folder in Sony EX Clip Browser V2.6 (2.06.00) will the ‘master clip’ on the drive be moved between folders?
-Should I be using Sony EX Clip Browser to trim down my rushes, removing material that seems obviously never going to make it to the final edit.
-Does naming clips in EX Clips Browser cause any potential problems at a later date with reconnecting media?All advice is greatly appreciated.
Walter -
4 Replies
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Any changes you make to clips in Clip Browser are written to the master clips when you click the “update” button at the lower right of the preview window. Dragging clips from one location to another creates duplicate copies of the clips in the new location. It’s a good idea to go into CB preferences and check the CRC check option. This forces CB to check that the any clip copies are good copies.
I structure my folders by having a parent folder for each project. Within that is a folder for each day of the shoot and within that a folder for each card. The BPAV folders are inside the card folders.
With a long term project it is essential IMHO that you make 2 duplicate copies of your material on two separate hard drives. Even a rugged drive, if dropped can easily fail at least with two copies you have a backup. IT people will tell you you should have 3 copies!
Trimming clips is up to you, but unless you absolutely have to do it, I would not. It’s is just another way you could accidentally corrupt a file, so unless you believe there is a strong reason for doing it, I would not trim the clips.
Alister Chapman
http://www.xdcam-user.com -
Personally I like one set on a optical disk format (DVD-DL, Blu-Ray, XDCAM disc). Get GOOD (NOT office supply store) disks. They’re slow to back up but you can verify after the backup and the disks aren’t going to “crash.” Good Blu-ray can survive scratches even. Sure people debate the longevity but if it holds for 10 years that’ll get you through most projects I’d say.
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Thanks Craig and Alister. That is really useful advice. A few more questions:
Are there naming conventions you choose to follow when labeling clips in clip browser? Do you then stick with these clip names when importing over to FCP or Avid?
When backing up to media like DVD’s or Blue-Ray how do you manage the BPAV folders / clips? The BPAV folders are often very big – too many GB’s to fit on the media. Do you sort your clips into smaller folders?Thanks for your help.
Walter
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My naming convention starts in the camera. I use the clip title prefix setting the first 2 digits to represent the shoot, so for a recent Norway shoot I used “NO”. Then I used the third character for the month, 1 to 9 for Jan to Sept, then O, N, D. The fourth character is the year, 2011 being 1.
Alister Chapman
http://www.xdcam-user.com
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