A few AVID to Resolve questions

[Blase Theodore]

As for the reel names, do they have unique names in the tape or tapeID column?

As you said, if you disable assist, then you’re not really doing anything. It’ll just randomly link up to the first clip with proper TC.

If your 5d clips don’t have tape names (reel names), you can’t batch paste the tape column the way you can the other columns. Here are 2 solutions.. (I’m not an avid guy, so pardon if I miss some of the lingo)

Solution 1: grade the MXF…

If you’re not able to do this because of the 1:1 issue, and that turns out unsolvable, just transcode to 220x, and proceed as follows..

In avid, set bin display, show all the source clips in the sequence.. (consolidate them to a new sequence first for safety till you know what you’re doing.)

Sort the clips by tape name. Select all the clips that have no tape name. right click, modify, source. This will let you change the tape name manually. create a new tape name called “temp”. Hit ok a bunch of times. Now all of your clips have a reel name (tape name) for Resolve. Even though they all have a generic tapename, thats enough to get this to work. Export an AAF and allow it to automatically pull the media in resolve. Everything should come online.

Solution 2: generate an EDL and relink to source clips:

This is more complicated..
First the avid prep..

From a non-consolidated timeline..
Duplicate the sequence into a new bin. Set bin display, show clips.
Choose columns, make sure TC24 and TapeID are present.
sort by name. select the name column. Cmd-d to duplicate, paste the name column into the tapeID column.
Assuming your clip name was something like MVI_3447.mov, the tapeID will now be the same for every clip.
select the “media start”, copy and paste it into the tc24 column.
You now have 24p based timecode.

Use the edl manager to create the edl. Use the file16 or red16 profile instead of cmx3600.
Set the timecode base to tc24. Set the reel name source to tapeID.

You should now have an EDL with proper 24p based TC and reel names.

There’s a good possibility that your clip names weren’t so clean. And hence neither are your reel names.
In the edl you’d want to see:
MVI_3447.mov

but instead you see..
MVI_3447.mov.new.01.blah.exported.whatever

Open the EDL in textedit, and do a find and replace all instances of “.new.01.blah.exported.whatever” with nothing so you end up with clean reel names.

Resolve prep:
Import all your source 5D footage into the media pool. Set reel names to the file name using the /%R trick.
Check that the media pool now has clips with reel names like MVI_3447.mov and comparable timecode values.
The source 5D clips should also start at 00: tc, unless they had been previously modified with QTChange. If thats the case, select all clips and override the TC to 00.

Import the EDL. The EDL events should match the tc and reel #’s and everything should link now.

[Roman Hankewycz]

Thank you for your response. I will check out these workflows and get back to you.
Thanks again!

roman hankewycz
harbor film company // colorist

[David Steiner]

Hi,

I’m trying the Avid to Resolve 8.1.1 AAF export and it doesn’t work.
– I imported AVCHD 1080 25p footage from an A77 into Avid (import, not AMA)
– I edited the master clips into a simple sequence
– I export an AAF of the sequence (with “AAF Edit Protocol” checked in avid dialog box)

Then when I import the AAF in Resolve’s Conform tab (with “automatically import source clips into media pool”, it says “no clips were imported”.

If I look at my /avid mediafiles/1 folder in the “browse” tab, they have no reel name (understandably), and they all have 1:0:0:0 start TC – just like in Avid, that’s normal since avchd .mts files have no TC.

– I tried to add “Source tape names” on the master clips before exporting the AAF, and it doesn’t make a difference.
– The “assist using reel numbers” option in Resolve’s Config tab doesn’t make a difference either.

I suppose the Resolve’s import should be based on file names, so:
– maybe the chinese characters that avid added to the filenames of AVCHD imported footage is a problem? Other people have these chinese characters, but I don’t know if they cause the problem
– since there isn’t anything differentiating the several master clips except file names (and TCs are the same for every file), I have no idea how Avid could relink to new color-corrected MXF files.

Basically, I have no idea, even “conceptually”, how the Avid-Resolve roundtrip could work for non-TC, non-reel name tapeless workflows like 5D/7D/AVCHD.

Maybe somebody got an idea?
David

[Blase Theodore]

Actually the workflow #1 I suggested should work for you..

The problem right now is that there are no reel names (aka tape) in avid, and Resolve needs to see something there.

The solution if indeed none of your clips have reel names is to give them a generic one. (“temp” for example) See above for how to do that.
Export a new version of your aaf (this one will now have generic reel names for all the clips)

Import the aaf into resolve and tell it to import media. Either way it will import a bunch of clips, but depending on your situation it may not actually connect to them. At that point check the media pool to see if the imported clips have reel names. Hopefully they should. If not, right click, set reel, manually type in “temp”.

That should be enough to make it work. In my experience, resolve is in fact using the clip name in the aaf (the reel and TC are bogus.)

[David Steiner]

Hi,

I found the cuprit. Resolve uses direct file names for relink, apparently.

Source Tape: the “source tape name” doesn’t make a difference. I tried again exporting the sequence containing the “source-taped” master clips, and it doesn’t make a difference.
The reel name is still void in Resolve, and I can’t even change it manually.

AVCHD Import Chinese Characters: the problem was the chinese characters that avid 6 creates when importing AVCHD (the original file name didn’t contain any, of course. cf https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/45/883016)

Without those chinese characters, Resolve’s AAF Import finds the files. (using direct file names, I suppose)

Back to Avid: Going back to Avid, I can’t relink. Which isn’t surprising since in the Resolve-created MXF file, there isn’t any reel name/tape name/source file name to relink with.
In Resolve I did use the option “Avid AAF Round-trip” but I have no idea how it should work for relink.

I wish Avid and Resolve provided a little more background info on that. I heard a white paper is being prepared but it’s being prepared for months now.

Good luck everyone!
D.

[Roman Hankewycz]

Thank you Blase,
Both of your workflows worked, i just wish they didn’t require so much manual labor. I can’t imagine doing this on a feature.

One thing I’d like to point out. In resolve, I tried linking my offline AAF to the original 5D files by importing the original files into the media pool and then modifying the reel name pattern to suite. As a result I was able to get my session to link to the original 5D files within Resolve!
However, when it came time to send back to AVID, things went awry. When I imported the new AAF into AVID my sequence linked to the offline DNxHD media, not to the newly created DNxHD media from resolve. I have no idea why this happened but it’s a huge bummer. Any thoughts?

roman hankewycz
harbor film company // colorist

[David Steiner]

I gave up on the “going back to Avid part”, it’s possible with a lot of EDL/reel name-from-tapeID work, but I figured why not have Resolve as a finishing system 🙂

Here is my workflow:
1) any codec/container that ends up with dnxhd sequence that have a “source file” column.
(in my case, it’s Sony EX3’s xdcam ex fast-imported, edited into a sequence, and then sequence is transcoded to dnxhd since Resolve doesn’t read xdcam ex – this transcode does preserve the “source file” column, so we’re good)

2) select sequence and export to AAF (with Edit Protocol), linked media (in avid mediafiles)

3) import that AAF in Resolve’s Conform Tab
-> I get the sequence in Resolve reading the MXFs in avid mediafiles
-> in Conform EDL, we see that the reel names are the “source file” column of the sequence’s masterclips

which is Good

4) -> it is good, because if grade a little in Resolve, then change my edit in Avid then re-export another AAF, Resolve transposes all grades to the new version/resolve session (thanks to reel names from Source File column)

So basically that’s why I want: the creative freedom to be able to edit, start grading, change the edit, and continue grading without starting over

So the finishing system is Resolve: when I have my final edit and my final grade, I export the master/DCP/whatever directly from Resolve

comments welcome!

[Stig Olsen]

Hi Avid-users. For months Ive had the following problem with going back to Avid; I do work in normal range, rendering MXF normal range and dropping the databasefiles in the bin. Now, I registrate major gamma issues. In Avid the material looks flat, dull, less black and less white on my calibrated monitor. It looks crispy on the monitor when working in Resolve. IN Avid I need to make some lift/highlight adjustments on the top layer to make it look like it did in Resolve. I would love if someone can help me out. Thanks.

[Onno Varekamp]

I use a very simple workflow for grading 5D out of Avid:

– output an EDL, check Source File in the Comments tab

– In Davinci Project settings check Assist using reel numbers, Source clip file pathname, Pattern: */%R????This will make the filename your reelname by removing the last 4 charaters (.mov) with ???? after R. Very cool!

– Browse: import all your 5d footage (raw camera files) into the Media Pool

– Conform: Load edl and you’re done. Grade the raw H264 files!

[Erik Eliason]

Sounds like you are using a different color profile in Da Vinci than in Avid?