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Audio Sync problem when Reconnecting
Hey
We have an offline editor based in LA, we are based in London UK. When our offline editor returns projects to us they will upload the FCP file and all audio files that they’ve used to our FTP. These are then downloaded and we reconnect the project to all the rushes and the new audio all placed on our XSAN.
However a good number of the audio files (downloaded from Audio Network and Universal) will throw up the incorrect timecode error when reconnecting and if forced to reconnect anyway will playback ‘out of sync’ (as it’s music by ‘out of sync’ I mean that beats don’t match cut points and the tracks start/end in completely the wrong places)I have had a sample XML sent to me so I can look into it further, I’ve noticed that while the sequence and project settings are accurate and show at the top of XML that everything is set to 25fps further into the file when I look at the sections attached to individual files a lot of files have a < timebase>30< /timebase> and < ntsc>TRUE< /ntsc> which as far as I’m concerned it shouldn’t happen.
I’ll try to upload the XML if you guys need it.
So as far as I can tell, and apologies if I’m barking up the wrong tree, FCP is giving these new files an NTSC/30 timebase when they should in fact have a PAL/25 timebase. I’ve checked our offline editor’s machine via screen share and for the life of me all settings look to be setup for 25fps.
Is it at all possible that the files themselves are causing the problem? Audio shouldn’t carry a timebase as far as I know?
I’m at a bit of a dead end right now so if anyone has any ideas I’m all ears.
Many thanks
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5 Replies
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Thank you for the reply.
I’m in the process of separating the offending files but I can say for certain the two of the original sources are Audio Network (https://www.audionetwork.com) and Universal Music (https://www.unippm.co.uk/). I know that these files are both AIFF’s and WAV’s however until I can separate all of the files we have problems with I can’t say if it’s more one or the other.
I did a very quick test with one of the offending files last night where I pulled just the audio file into one of our Final Cut systems, placed it on a xdcam 50i timeline and exported an XML. It showed 25fps and ntsc false throughout the XML which leads me to believe it can’t be due to the file itself. However it was late and I could probably do with doing another test to double check.
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Sample rate has crossed my mind but I’m sure we’ve tested that, how it was tested I can’t quite remember now.
The audio is mixed, I’ve certainly seen 44.1Khz and 48Khz.Is there a straight forward way to check this? Re-convert all our audio to a particular standard?
Something that’s sticking out for me is that we’ve only seen these problems when coming back from this particular editor. We are fairly used to having a mix-match of all formats in house and we try to conform all video and audio to certain standards but somethings get through the net and still don’t cause these issues.
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Most likely the editors Easy Setup was on NTSC even though sequence settings were 25. This always stamps imported wav files with the wrong timecode. This is by far the most common sync error in FCP and I recon I have personally answered this one over a hundred times.
The best description has been done by Matt Lyons. Recently he updated his original observation with a new cute work around using Sound Devices Wave Agent software.
https://forums.creativecow.net/readpost/8/1178226
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Hey
Thanks for the link. My thoughts are that it’s something to do with FCP giving the files an incorrect timebase or them having one in the first place. I’ve checked all setting on FCP including Easy Setup and they are all set to ProRes 422 1080 50i which is our usual editing codec.
I’ll check out the software though as it sounds like it might help.
Thanks -
Thank you for the help guys
We have apparently fixed the issue however not 100% sure how. I think the simple act of resetting all of FCP settings and deleting pref files did the job, just had to wait for the latest project to come back to see if it all worked and so far that seems to be the case.
Thanks for the help, really appreciate it.
Regards
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