Lost timecode with AAF import – Sony EX1 & AVID

[Dylan Reeve]

There is a video tutorial on the Avid Community site (I don’t think I can link directly from here) check that tutorial.

I can’t test at the moment, but I believe my AAF imports were coming through with correct metadata.

[Rosie Nic cionnaith]

Hi Dylan.. I actually recognise your handle from the avid forums which is a sad reflection of how much time i’m spending on there the last few days!! thanks i had a look at the avid tutorial, i’m going to do a few test runs now but i would have lots of qs regarding the proxy media… it’s a v basic tutorial that doesn’t give any idea what time frame we’re talking here which is important when dealing with several hundred hours of footage to import.. also it seems to be dealing with a camera-edit xfer whereas all our stuff is drive-based by now, still i’ll muck around for a bit.
don’t know how you managed to keep timecode using aaf… we’re banging our heads off the walls here trying to work it out.

[Paul Jenkins]

Would love to know how you got on with this.

I’m about to use EX1 in Russia for a shoot. My plan is to copy the memory cards over to hard drives (formatted as MS DOS FAT 32) using my Macbook Pro with Clip Browser as same format (ie just do the ‘copy all’ command). But then, back at base, what is best way to handle the clips with Avid?? To convert to AAF? MXF??

Any advice really appreciated.

Paul

[Rosie Nic cionnaith]

{Would love to know how you got on with this.

I’m about to use EX1 in Russia for a shoot. My plan is to copy the memory cards over to hard drives (formatted as MS DOS FAT 32) using my Macbook Pro with Clip Browser as same format (ie just do the ‘copy all’ command). But then, back at base, what is best way to handle the clips with Avid?? To convert to AAF? MXF??

Any advice really appreciated.}

Hi Paul..

Don’t think you can use ms dos fat 32 with mac.. we used mac formatted drives.. also it’s not a ‘copy all’ command, you have to drag the BPAV folders from the cards to the drives.. you really need to know your workflow for this.. you need to create a new folder on your drive for each BPAV.. do lots of tests before you shoot to make sure you know the workflow and to make sure it’s working..

Also one area we really stumbled up on was where we shot multiple days on one card or where there were 2 cards in the camera and they switched between, it was very hard afterwards with lots of footage trying to separate them into days shot… we assumed the time/date data would transfer to edit which it didn’t, so be careful if you need to know chronology of rushes..
using AVID the only route to go is MXF don’t mind what anyone else tells you as we had conflicting advice from lots of different people who swore AAF would work – it didn’t. We ended up going Final Cut Pro as we decided that MXF route with AVID was too long as we had a lot of footage, it was going to take approx half real-time to convert. We also asked around any post houses using the system and consensus was FCP is better equipped to deal with EX1 and I had to agree.. we waited around for ages for various avid upgrades that would talk better with sony, and then sony upgrades that would talk better to avid etc.. bottom line FCP and EX1 have been talking to each other since April and it’s a more tried and tested system.. Not saying it can’t be done on AVID, it can, but it’s a much slower load-up process and I just didn’t trust going with AVID in the long run due to all the crap we encountered in the process..

Hope this helps, any other qs give me a shout as we’ve been through all this and had to learn the hard way so we are happy to help out with anyone else who’s having the same probs we had!

[Paul Jenkins]

Hi Rosie Nic,

In Moscow now, starting shoot tomorrow morning…! 🙂

I found that my Mac does read MS Dos FAT 32 and because the Avid I may have to use may be PC based (your points re Avid workflow on it very well taken), I think I’m gonna stick to that.

What I have found using the latest ClipBrowser software (v 2) is that ‘Copy all’ creates a separate folder with date as the first 8 figures followed by a unique 6-figure identifier each time a SXS card (even the same card – I am using 4) is copied accross to the drive. ie it creates folder structure of the type:

drive > 20080930223754 > BPAV > CLPR/CUEUP.XML/MEDIAPRO.XML/TAKR > AAAA0016_01 > AAAA0016_01.MP4

I have set the Userbits in the EX1 to record date, so I guess that is why it is creating the unique master folder in that format each time a memory card is copied accross. I’ve noticed that if menu command ‘Copy All’ is not used, but I simply drag the clips to the drive as displayed inside the Clipbrowser windows, then the master folder with date is not created at all!! CAVEAT!!

I’ve done a screen grab which would like to mail you, so if you can please email me at paul.jenkins@mac.com your address so I can send to you.

On the MXF question, I am sure you are correct. I spoke with a top postproduction house in London which I trust, they are testing the Avid import, and they said that the best way was to use the Mainconcept export – they were using the ‘MXF for XDCAM HD’ setting. MXF seemingly being the only way to link back to the original files if necessary (unlike AAF etc).

Best,
Paul

[Rosie Nic cionnaith]

Gosh sometimes i feel like the dog in the gary larson cartoon – you know where the human is chatting and all the dog hears is ‘blah blah fido’.. !! a bit like techie stuff for me..

yeah we decided to use mac drives with mac to leave option open for fcp, good call as it happened.

“What I have found using the latest ClipBrowser software (v 2) is that ‘Copy all’ creates a separate folder with date as the first 8 figures followed by a unique 6-figure identifier each time a SXS card (even the same card – I am using 4) is copied accross to the drive…..I have set the Userbits in the EX1 to record date, so I guess that is why it is creating the unique master folder in that format each time a memory card is copied accross. I’ve noticed that if menu command ‘Copy All’ is not used, but I simply drag the clips to the drive as displayed inside the Clipbrowser windows, then the master folder with date is not created at all!! CAVEAT!! ”

does this mean date is readable within avid? that was our prob… we could always reference the date via clip browser.. but not with our clips in avid/fcp (we tested both!).. so you’re always going back to clip browser if you need to ref a date.. which is a bit more hassle…

aaf vs mxf – i think it’s a really bad idea not to be able to relink back ever.. you never know.. you wouldn’t begin a tape edit if the timecodes all began with 00:00 instead of as recorded.. stuff goes offline etc! i sure wasn’t going to trust it on a 300 hour project.. !

[Paul Jenkins]

> Gosh sometimes i feel like the dog in the gary larson cartoon – you know where the human is chatting and all the dog hears is ‘blah blah fido’.. !! a bit like techie stuff for me..

Must admit I feel myself falling into some kind of faux techie mode!

> yeah we decided to use mac drives with mac to leave option open for fcp, good call as it happened.

would FCP not read a MSDOS FAT 32 drive then?

> “What I have found using the latest ClipBrowser software (v 2) is that ‘Copy all’ creates a separate folder with date as the first 8 figures followed by a unique 6-figure identifier each time a SXS card (even the same card – I am using 4) is copied accross to the drive…..I have set the Userbits in the EX1 to record date, so I guess that is why it is creating the unique master folder in that format each time a memory card is copied accross. I’ve noticed that if menu command ‘Copy All’ is not used, but I simply drag the clips to the drive as displayed inside the Clipbrowser windows, then the master folder with date is not created at all!! CAVEAT!! ”

> does this mean date is readable within avid? that was our prob… we could always reference the date via clip browser.. but not with our clips in avid/fcp (we tested both!).. so you’re always going back to clip browser if you need to ref a date.. which is a bit more hassle…

Eek! Don’t like the sound of that! But I guess tha main think is whether the Avid reads each master folder as a separate ‘tape’, to use an old analogy!…

> aaf vs mxf – i think it’s a really bad idea not to be able to relink back ever.. you never know.. you wouldn’t begin a tape edit if the timecodes all began with 00:00 instead of as recorded.. stuff goes offline etc! i sure wasn’t going to trust it on a 300 hour project.. !

Me too. I will insist they invest the $500 on Mainconcept!…