Smart Bins in Avid?

[Michael Phillips]

You can create a custom column or multiple columns to be used as a place to log “keywords” and then use “Find” as a means to group them all into a single window as the result of a search. But there is no method of creating “smart bins” or in this case, a series of “saved searches” that creates a results bin upon clicking. You have top level folders, which then have bins, and then clips in bins as a structure log against.

The search results window is not a bin, and results can only be loaded into the source monitor one at a time. Saved searches and other similar functionality is part of Interplay. Also, the “Find” function in Media Composer doesn’t look at Markers.

I think the Find function was a promising start, but with limited design and implementation that restricts it from being a flexible and interactive search function. Which is too bad considering all the metadata that can be added to a clip.

An idea to play with, it use ScriptSync to create a list of keywords and then apply spans of clips to those words manually (not via the automated phonetic sync). Then clicking the keyword would allow you to loop play through the different spanned files associated with the keyword. And you get the benefit of “Find” having the ability to search through scripts. It’s a similar method of applying keywords to spans – might get a little tricky when spans have multiple keywords, but since I just thought of it while typing up this response, it is not something I have tried for this scenario. But it is something I have done to match MOS action clips against a script that describes the action.

Michael

[Juris Eksts]

I often use multiple ‘Comments’ columns, put notes in those, and those can be ‘searched’ in alpha numeric order. Combine that with naming clips and making different bins for those, and you can come up with numerous ways of organising your material.
In its day that was one of the ways that Lightworks was far superior to Avid for long-form projects, with the file card you could make bins with any combination of tags, names and comments. (Ah well, sigh.)

[Michael Phillips]

Lightworks also had better actions on search results once found, which I really liked. D-Vision also had a great search tool. It became “edit” for Autodesk, then disappeared. Lightworks is still around and the Mac version should be out this week or next.

Michael