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Media Browser, best practices and workflow?
Hi all,
Just jumped into CC2017. Projects open slow if they have more than ~300 items. (I’m on a first gen Surface Book w the i7 and dGPU, so I know it’s no workstation but it’s not a slouch either.) So I decide to try out Premiere Pro’s Media Browser.
On first pass, it’s practically useless. Even for a folder with only 10 items, I can watch it “process” each file. This is only 10 items. I have folders with a hundreds of clips (hundreds! /s). It takes too long to process each of those, it doesn’t help it only processes what’s onscreen, and if I go out of the folder, then back in, it has to process the whole thing back.
I’ve never used Media Browser because it was either easier to use Windows Explorer, Bridge, or just dump the whole folder into Premiere and just be done with it. But CC2017 at the moment seems to have different plans. I’d like to think Premiere Pro has some trick up it’s sleeve concerning its built in Media Browser (other than that “Ingest” option, because I see the usefulness in that, but then you’re not really browsing, you know exactly what you’re looking for, and the search functionality is a wash because >90% is all the same type of footage).
So, is Media Browser just not useful, or am I missing something that would actually make it more useful than Bridge or vanilla file explorer? Or, at least as fast as either of those two options?Thank you in advance,
Paul -
5 Replies
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Here’s the big thing about Media Browser (to me anyway).
When I am using P2 media, media from SD cards, etc., Media Browser immediately recognizes the file structure and just gives me the clips. This is also very important for any shoots where shots became spanned over more than one media card. Media Browser understand spanned clips and gives you the single, combined clip. No pokery-jiggery putting them all together.
Media Browser also pulls the audio tracks together for me on media like P2, where audio is in separate files.
I am sure others will chime in. I used to use the CTRL+I shortcut and bring things into the bin via the Windows interface. I routinely pull everything through Media Browser now.
That said, I can understand how your situation would create issues for you. Did you copy over your media – with the complete original file structure – to your media storage?
System:
Dell Precision T7600 (x2)
Win 7 64-bit
32GB RAM
Adobe CC 2015.02 (as of 6/2016)
256GB SSD system drive
4 internal media drives RAID 5
Typically cutting short form from HD MP4 and P2 MXF. -
Hi Paul,
Jon was pretty much on point with the Media Browsers benefits. The biggest advantage in using the Media Browser, is getting all of the file’s metadata. It simply does not all come through using File>Import.
Larry Jordan has a nice detailed write here:
https://larryjordan.com/articles/adobe-premiere-pro-cc-media-browser-magic/
Best,
Peter Garaway
Adobe
Premiere Pro -
Just to let you know you’re not crazy I also had that problem when I first upgraded to CC 2015.3. The files would flash and re-process and if I scrolled down it would jump back to the top and go through the whole conforming bit all over again. It was totally useless to me. Granted I just play around, I’m not a pro so I don’t need metafiles and auto linking of video/audio, so I could just import my files from the project window.
But the reason I’m commenting here is, after a while, the media browser stopped doing all that jumping and flashing. I didn’t change anything in my preferences. It just stopped. Hopefully yours will start behaving as well eventually.
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Thanks all for your input.
I see how this could be useful for P2. My media these days is all hdslr .mp4/.mov so nothing particularly intensive. I’d be interested in knowing what metadata comes across via the premiere pro media browser compared windows explorer.
As for the media browser jumping and flashing, I followed that thread of that issue. It seems the media browser wants it cache on the C: drive . But my C: drive isn’t large (256GB) and it’s not for media cache because I’ve done that and the C: drive fills up in a week after even a light, low asset number project. That’s frustrating.
Ah well. Thank you for sharing your experience and workflows.
Cheers,
Paul -
Using Media Browser, is there a way to import multiple cards at once? Or do I have to select each individual card and import the contents one by one? If I do it one by one, it correctly uses the card structure. If I try to import the top folder containing the cards, it imports as “files” and gives errors on XML files, txt files, etc, and does not correctly import spanned clips.
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