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C300 spanned clips crash MC7 when transcoding/consolidating.
Hi everyone.
I’m trying to help a friend out who’s working with C300 footage and MC7. His workflow is to Link to AMA to the C300 files, copied over from cards and then transcode them to DNxHD 115 to preserve disk space.
However, whenever he tries to transcode or consolidate a spanned clip (over 5 min or so), he gets the following error:
I hit continue and get this:
This only happens when attempting to transcode/consolidate spanned clips. Short clips have no issues.
I downloaded the latest versions (I believe) of the MXF plugin and the Canon XF AMA Plugin (2.0.3)
I’ve looked around and it seems other people have had this issue, but most posts I’ve found about it were prior to the plugin update that Canon posted in August which supposedly provided support for MC7.
I know there’s nothing wrong with the clips themselves because of two things. Firstly, the clips import and transcode fine inside FCPX using the Canon plugin for FCP. Secondly, I have a workaround, although it’s a bit of a pain and adds a lot of time to the prep.
Workaround is this: Download and open the Canon XF Utility software and open the clips there. Select the spanned clips and choose the Export to MXF function. In the dialogue, you can choose to merge the spanned clips into a single MXF. This takes a few minutes depending on the length of the original spanned clips. Then you can link to the newly exported MXFs inside Avid and transcode/consolidate to your heart’s content.
Obviously I’d like to be able to avoid this timely extra step, particularly with longer projects, but AMA seems truly broken with regard to this workflow, unless anyone here has it working fine. If so, I’d love to figure out the difference between yours and my systems. This issue’s been duplicated on several of my friend’s computers as well as my own home system.
I’m running Avid 7.0. I haven’t done the update because my friend said when he updated to 7.0.2 on his laptop, he lost the ability to AMA link to any C300 footage. I’m also on a Mac if that makes a difference (it has in the past with various Avid versions).
Andy
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10 Replies
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Canon released an AMA update (2.0.3 I believe). I saw that the one being used was the old one. This old AMA version has issues with the spanned clips and was fixed in the latest version f the plugin.
Hope that takes care of the problem!
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But I installed the 2.0.3 version of the plugin. I didn’t even have the plugin installed on my machine until last night, so I have no idea how I’d even get ahold of the old version. Here’s the link to the page where I got the plugin (in the software section towards the bottom). This is the correct one isn’t it?
Andy
https://www.timesavertutorials.com
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Odd. It may be 7.0 compatibility with the AMA plugin. That version works fine on the older versions of MC. I may reach out to someone I know with a c300 and using 7.0 – havent heard any complaints about it. We use c300’s and may be upgrading to 7.0 soon, so I would like to see this issue cleared as well.
Have you rached out to Canon and report a potential bug in the AMA? Also, is it possible to download an older version if the plugin to see if that one works?
Something also to consider (though time-consuming) is a full re-install of Avid and download the latest version of all AMA plugins.
If you could keep this thread posted as you find out things that would be great.
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I haven’t gotten in touch with Canon yet. It’s a good idea, but difficult to navigate their website to find the right people to contact. I’m actually worried that it’s an Avid issue, not a plugin issue. I mean, it properly links to AMA inside Avid. Spanned files show up as single clips like they should. I can load clips and edit with them. It’s only when I consolidate or transcode where the problem happens.
I’ve actually already done the full reinstall route so that doesn’t help. I’ll post back if I hear back from Canon or Avid on the matter.
Andy
https://www.timesavertutorials.com
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Unfortunately it isn’t an Avid issue …. they say … they have washed their hands of “third party plugins” and say it is the manufacturer’s responsibility to make their equipment/software/plugins function properly within Avid.
We downloaded/installed everything we could get our hands on specifically regarding Canon spanned clips. I believe we have one system finally working but cannot determine what we did right to make it work. It is very confusing and I realize we went about it the wrong way (as far as determining what worked and what didn’t) because we were not patient, did not have time to correctly solve the issue … we acknowledge that!! It is complicated at best for ‘basic editors’ – it seems, in this evolving technology, we need “Avid Engineers” who have an understanding of Computers, Software, Hardware, Drivers, a background or doctorate in IT/IS systems and functionality and an understanding of applications (specifically Avid) in order to function smoothly.
If I find what we did right then I will respond … we are trying to duplicate the working machine on 5 other computers.
Ricky
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A shorter workaround is to step into the folder structure and link directly to every individual .MTS file and transcode then stitch them back together.
Ricky
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[Ricky Barrow] “A shorter workaround is to step into the folder structure and link directly to every individual .MTS file and transcode then stitch them back together.”
Forgive my ignorance but stitch them back together how? Presuming of course that I want to keep a viable online file to reconnect to after the online stage.
Andy
https://www.timesavertutorials.com
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We had a long camera roll that created 3 MTS files (buried in folders down to the “STREAM” folder. The tell-tale sign was that we had 00005.MTS file at 2gb, 00006.MTS at 2gb and 00007.MTS at 954mb —- the file size limit of our Canon is 2gb, therefore I knew from the consecutive files and sizes that these 3 files were “spanned”. I linked to the 3 files, transcoded and then edited them in a sequence to create the “one” clip just as the camera had recorded.
Granted it was not ideal but it worked. I’m not sure what you mean by a viable online file to reconnect to after online …. we just keep the camera originals if we need the footage later.
Ricky
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[Ricky Barrow] “I linked to the 3 files, transcoded and then edited them in a sequence to create the “one” clip just as the camera had recorded.”
Ok. That’s what I thought you meant. I was wondering if you had been talking of a way to combine the spanned clips into a single clip inside the Avid.
What I mean by viable online files: In an offline/online workflow where the AMA clips are transcoded to a low bit rate DNxHD file, I need original files to be able to reconnect to at the online stage.
The problem with your solution is that I’m forced to work with 3-4 times the number of clips because each time a clip is spanned, I have to live with multiple files for a single “shot”. Maybe there’s a useful “in-avid” solution that doesn’t have me editing with tons of sub-sequences. Perhaps a group clip or multi clip solution? I don’t use those features much (at the prep level) so I’m not sure if there’s an easy or timesaving solution to stitching the spanned clips together that isn’t going to cause headaches in the online.
Andy
https://www.timesavertutorials.com
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I haven’t used this workflow myself, but could you transcode using Resolve Lite as a work around?
Best
Paddy
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