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project transcode?
I’ve been cutting a project in native AVCHD (.MTS files shot on the Sony FS100), with the intention of conforming the media used in my finished sequences to DPX files for grading in Resolve Lite. My question now is: how the heck to I get my sequences out of Premiere and into Resolve? I’m a little new to Premiere, so I’m not sure if I’m overlooking something obvious…
In FCP7, it’s a simple task to open up media manager and transcode the project media to a different format, omitting unused media and adding handles to the footage, if desired. Try as I might, I can’t find a way to achieve this in Premiere. I’m not prepared to go back and batch transcode all my source material to a lossless codec like ProRes as it’s a huge mountain of footage that I simply wouldn’t have space for.
The only way I can see to get my edit into Resolve is to export the sequence as a single file and use Resolve’s scene cut detector to split apart the shots. This is less than ideal for a number of reasons—I have to move all my video down into a single track and strip out all the transitions, for instance, and because the shots have no handles, cross-dissolves represent a logistical nightmare.
Is there another way?
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Andrew Gingerich
Filmmaker -
9 Replies
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It’s the same process in Premiere. Highlight your sequence, go to file->export->media. When the export media window opens, select DPX as the format, select the appropriate preset, make sure the “export as sequence” box is checked, enter a file name and location, and click the export button.
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This generates a single DPX file, rather than a collection of files that I can then export to Resolve/FCP/whatever via XML. This isn’t a viable workflow for color grading because the shots lack handles, so transitions are impossible.
What I’m looking for is a way to transcode all the clips in a project to individual files. Is this an impossibility in Premiere?
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Andrew Gingerich
Filmmaker -
Bring each clip into the source viewer, and with the source viewer highlighted, export media (DPX format), and send to AME (batch processing). Note that you can mark in and out points if you don’t want the whole clip.
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There’s really no way to automate this? That’s a heckuva lot of work, even for a short project with less than 100 cuts.
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Andrew Gingerich
Filmmaker -
Yeah, it could take a whole half hour.
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Not if I’m manually adding handles to all the clips, then manually reassembling them into a timeline and manually chopping off all the handles before exporting the XML. And let’s say my project isn’t three minutes long, let’s say it’s thirty? I’m not against doing a little work, I just find it surprising that a process that FCP’s lackluster media manager is capable of accomplishing with a few mouse clicks takes so much additional effort to accomplish in Premiere.
Isn’t batch transcoding source media something that editors need to do all the time? This is really the best solution?
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Andrew Gingerich
Filmmaker -
I had this very problem recently with a hour long doc I am grading. Very complex edit locked sequence. Many mixed media types. All the things that make grading apps like Resolve unhappy. It was edited in FCP, but I wanted to master using PPro/AE/Resolve. So I did a FCP XML export and brought the sequence into PPro. That was moderately OK. Many of the keyframed image moves were screwed up (position, scale, rotation, etc.).
But I thought I could replicate them with some work.
Next step was to transcode the sequence to ProRes4444 prior to sending to Resolve. That’s where I was stopped. No good way to do this in PPro. There SHOULD be a way, but nothing I could uncover except brute force. And for an hour long doc, that’s not viable.
So I bailed on PPro and unhappily went back to FCP for mastering this project.
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EMB Studios
http://www.EMBstudios.com
Emeryville, CA
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That’s exactly what I’d be doing, except FCP7 can’t handle native AVCHD. Bizarrely enough, I’m wondering if Final Cut X is the solution to my problem. Doesn’t it transcode AVCHD to ProRes 444? So if I could get my timeline in there with 7toX or something, do you think it would know what to do with the referenced .MTS files?
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Andrew Gingerich
Filmmaker -
Feel your pain Andrew. I haven’t opened FCPx so can’t help you there.
Another option might be to transcode all the footage you are using in your sequence to DPX with AME, or with Squeeze via it’s watch folder. That’s probably what I would try. Then when all the needed original footage is transcoded, relink in PPro and you should be off to the races. A lot of extra steps, but should get you where you want to go without the headache of conforming the locked sequence in every NLE known to man. 🙂
If you can wait a couple weeks (assuming CS6 comes out in that time), this type of transcoding chore might be perfectly suited to Prelude?
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EMB Studios
http://www.EMBstudios.com
Emeryville, CA
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