Copy media to external drives

[Ben Insler]

[cls105] “I was wondering if i can transcode the media to dv (which media manager says i can) and give all the footage to an assistant so that can assemble some segments. Then when he is finished, can i get his project file and relink it to the dvcpro hd media?”

Media Manager does this. I’ve been doing this constantly with a project – Working on it in DVCPRO HD at work and in OfflineRT HD(Photo jpeg) at home. One thing to be wary about. You can’t just transcode your footage and have it link up to both projects – your timelines are looking for DVCPRO HD, but your assistant’s footage will be DV. The scale and format of the image will be incorrect for your assistant (in this case, he/she will be viewing a tiny DV center cut of the overall HD image… and the DV footage won’t play back natively). To fix this:

1. First, make sure that only the project you want to transcode is open. If you’re planning on doing may project, each containing similar as well as different media, this may get very confusing.
2. Choose your Browser window and press Command+A to select all. This will prepare all media in your project to be transcoded through the media manager.
3. Media manage the project with the settings for your assistant using the Recompress option (don’t include render files, by the way). This will convert all media (any graphics… anything) to the setting you choose in “Recompress media using:” as well as alter all sequences settings to correspond to this format.
4. Check “Include Master clips outside of selection” to make sure everything in the project gets converted.
5. Uncheck “Delete unused media from duplicated items.”
6. Base media file names on “existing file names”
7. Check “Duplicate selected items and place into a new porject.”
8. Check “Include nonactive mulitclip angles” if you’re using or planning on using multiclips.
9. Set a Media Destination. This is where your new project for your assistant will be saved, along with a media folder with all your transcoded media.

When this process is done, the Browser window of the newly created project should look exactly the same as the old one, except there may be one extra folder called Master Clips. This folder contains master clip reference of any media that was placed in the timeline that did not have a master clip affiliate in the browser before the media management process, as well as text and other video generators. You can delete this folder, and all the video generator references will clutter up your Browser after you do this process a few times (uaually what I do is just delete all the video generator references, and leave offline clips just to have the master clip reference). Now you can reconnect all the media in the project to the transcoded DV media, and your assistant is good to go. If you knew all this already, then my apologies for making you read all this.

The most important step is on the way back from your assistant to you. Open your assistant’s altered project (either on his/her machine or yours) and DO NOT reconnect any media if it is offline. Select All in the Browser window again, and open the media manager. This time, use the “Creat Offline” setting. The “Recompress sequences” setting now becomes “Set Sequences to:” because we’re just updating the sequence settings, not recompressing media. Set this to the format of your original footage. The follow steps 4-8 above, click OK. Again, no media destination because no media is being converted/created. Once you click OK, you will be asked where to save the project. Save it, and it will open in FCP when finished. Now you can reconnect this project to your DVCPRO HD footage.

This allows for both you and your assistant to have native and full frame playback on both ends with two different types of media. By recompressing it in this way, all media is preserved (it is only converted, but all timecodes, in/outs, etc are all the same), and thus all edits are preserved as the projects pass back and forth from DV to DVCPRO HD. You must go through the second Media Management process for your projects any time you are sending your project to your assistant, or anytime he/she is sending one to you. One more thing – try not to both be working on the project at the same time. If you’re working, your assistant shouldn’t be, and vice versa. Attempting to merge the two projects will result in many clips loosing their affiliation to their original master clips, which will cause many many many files to be placed in the misc. Master Clips folder that is crated by the media manager. You can do it if you have to, but your project/Browser may become extremely disorganized.

Hope that helps,

Ben

[Cee Dee]

at the end of the day it is so we can both work at the same time though.. otherwise i would let the assistant use my computer when im not using it. man its a lot more complicated on final cut.. thats for sure… hmmm

[Ben Insler]

I guess I’m just particular about the way my browser is orgainzed. You can still both work at the same time and then merge the projects, but then if you select a clip in the timeline and hit shift+F, you will not be able to see the master clip in the browser from the sequences that your assistant sent you (or more appropriately, those master cilps will end up in that misc. master clip folder in the browser). You can still match frame, open source footage, etc. You’ll just end up with some duplicates in your browser. Regardless of how you did this in FCP though (even if you and your assistant were both using the same DVCPRO HD footage) you’d be pulling sequences and footage from one project to another, and that always results in master-affiliate disconnection, and FCP cannot just look through the browser and reconnect them. To be honest, this is not a necessary thing. I just like to know that everything in my sequences is organized the way I like it in my browser.

[Cee Dee]

ok i thought of a solution tell me if it would work or not… copy all he media onto a drive and create new project. since all the media is going to be placed in one folder, cant i then just copy that media onto another drive and then just start sending each other project files.. just relinking footage… of course or any other ideas? thanks a lot btw

[Cee Dee]

i too am very particular about my organization… ive been used to consolidating/transcoding to a drive and having all the media relink automatically. even emailing bins to one another and having everything relink. dont want to use the A-word in this forum. hmmm

[Cee Dee]

“bump” ok how about the simple non transcoding method? thanks -c

[Jeremy Garchow]

For today’s lesson:

You have to start learning about XML in FCP. What you should do is recompress the project to anamorphic DV using the same file names ( make sure the browser is selected with nothing highlighted, then use the ‘recompress’ function in the MEdia Manager), and then your assistant will assemble segments. Assistant will then export an XML (which is basically a timeline) and then you will import that XML telling FCP to use the DVCPRO HD settings of your choice. Then, you can relink to the DVCPRO HD media. If Assistant has made any kind of moves, you might have to do some tweaking as dv and DVCPRo HD, as you know, are totally different frame sizes and aspect ratios. What format are you working in? Is it 720p24? If so, you aren’t going to save much space by doing that and might as well set up Assistant with the DVCPRO HD media. Terabytes are cheap these days.

Jeremy

[Cee Dee]

Great response. Its slightly over a terrabyte 🙁 and its 1080i. im going to try the offline rt, hopefully it wont be that bad… Thanks for youre help. I hate to sound lame when I know avid really well. take care -c

[Jeremy Garchow]

Well then, offlining to dv then makes sense. Just make sure there might be some discrepancies in aspect ratio. NOthing that is hard or unbearable though.

Jeremy

[Jeremy Garchow]

Also, I forgot to tell you, that while you are used to swapping bins and stuff in Avid, with FCP, you can export an XML of a bin and import that xml and it’ll show up as a bin in FCP. If you export a timeline as XML, it’ll show up as a timeline, etc.

Jeremy