DaVinci won’t read Cineform 3D timecode?

DaVinci Resolve

DaVinci won’t read Cineform 3D timecode?

Posted by Ryan Shepheard on March 25, 2011 at 4:25 pm

I was wondering if anyone else has run into this problem:

I’m onlining stereo 3D content to muxed CineForm 3D files, prepping the online sequence in Final Cut, then sending the clips and EDL over to Resolve. Resolve reads the EDL fine, loads the clips into the media pool, pulls the correct reel numbers from the clips…

But it reads the timecode as starting from 01:00:00;00 for all clips, so it won’t relink the clips to the sequence. Opening the clips in QuickTime confirms that the timecode is still there, and transcoding the clips back to uncompressed discrete left and right eyes allows the sequence to relink no problem.

I realize I can probably reset the clips’ start timecode in DaVinci, but I’d rather avoid the hassle. Any thoughts? Thanks for help in advance, specs below!

Ryan

– Clips are encoded as CineForm 422, high quality, muxed left + right eyes
– DaVinci 7.1.1, OS 10.6.5. Cubix chassis, dual Quadro 4000s, Tangent Wave panel, 12 TB Fibre Channel RAID

Anmol Mishra replied 13 years, 5 months ago 3 Members · 4 Replies
4 Replies

Josh Petok
March 25, 2011 at 5:49 pm

This might work. It’s a bit convoluted, untested and completely theoretical. It’s based on a Canon DSLR workflow. They also have an issue with their timecodes starting at the same point. That said, some of this info could be used to further your cause. Here we go…

You’ll need access to these apps as well:

Avid Log Exchange (avid.com)
qtChange (videotoolshed.com)

In FCP, make sure you’re in the root level of your project and select File -> Export -> Batch List

Open up Avid Log Exchange and use these settings (change whatever to suit your purposes) and hit CONVERT:

Open up qtChange:

1. Pick your source folder
2. Select your ALE
3. Alter all your clips

Your clips will all (should) reflect the associated timecode from FCP.

WARNING! This will permanently alter the timecode on all of your master clips. Be careful!

I’m not sure if this is the best/cleanest/smartest way to do it, but it was the first answer that came to me.

Let us all know how it turned out or if you found a better way.

Josh Petok
Online | Color
JoshPetok.com
TheCurrentCut.com
Ryan Shepheard
March 30, 2011 at 4:46 pm

Thanks Josh for the suggestion! I heard back from Blackmagic on this and it’s apparently a little more complicated… Resolve uses the CineForm metadata for timecode instead of the QT timecode track. Even though the QT timecode in my files is spot on, the CineForm TC for everything I encoded starts at hour one. Ugh.

At this point I’m hoping it’s an encoding problem I can fix going to CineForm. No luck so far finding a way to alter the CF timecode itself, but I’m emailing Blackmagic back to see if Resolve can be convinced to see the QT timecode instead.

In the immediate term looks like I’ll be manually re-entering timecodes.
Josh Petok
March 31, 2011 at 4:19 am

That’s a bummer, but at least you have an answer. Hopefully, that issue will be resolved in the next software rev (sorry for the pun 😉

Josh Petok
Online | Color
JoshPetok.com
TheCurrentCut.com
Anmol Mishra
November 9, 2012 at 10:35 am

Did you ever solve this problem ?
I think my XML export from FCP are being rejected by Davinci Resolve as Resolve is looking at the CF Timecode while FCP exports the qt TC.

Ideally we should be able to take the CF metadata TC and use that for the qt TC.
Just not sure how!!

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