Using “Relink” to Up-Res from Avid DNxHD to Arri Alexa ProRes 4444

[John Pale]

AMA link to the original RAW media in a new bin. Select the RAW clips in the new bin and then the clips in the old bin. Then attempt to Reliink with “Link to Selected in Bin” turned on.

Sorry, I’m mobile and not in front of a system right now, so I may be a little off in my description but hope it gets you in the right direction.

[William Boodell]

Hi John,

Thanks for your quick reply. Forgive me if I’m not understanding the obvious.

I’m trying to relink the roughly 2 minute sequence to the camera raw by showing the source clips and simply relinking them. For some reason, the original RAW camera footage isn’t in this project. (I just started on this feature today after it has been edited, and I’m helping them with the online process.) Are you saying to AMA link to the hours and hours of raw media from the project in a separate bin? As this is a feature, it will take a while so I want to make sure that’s what you mean.

Also, where is the option to “Link to Selected Bin” in the “Relink” dialogue box?

Thank you,
Bill

[Michael Phillips]

Media Composer does not have a true conform feature where a relink goes out and finds just the clips it needs. You will need to manage that manually. You can do a pull list, or make a list of the camera original file names that you will need to AMA link to (Link to in 8.4) first, to make them available to the project, then do a “relink to selected” as previously stated.

You can make an EDL to see which clips, or put the sequence into its own bin, and so a “set bin display” and “show reference clips” and you will see just the clips used to create the sequence. Sort by master clip, and you will see the files you need to go find that way.

Michael

[William Boodell]

Hello Avideers!

One Method to “Relink” to Up-Res from Avid DNxHD to Arri Alexa ProRes 4444

^^ ^^ ^^ ^^ ^^ ^^ ^^ ^^ ^^

I post this in the hope that it will help others with the same or similar issues. After all, it’s all about getting a general sense of the processes and then extrapolating, isn’t it?

This was done using Avid MC 8.1.0. This fix should work for versions of MC after 6.5.

Problem:

I have clips which were individually transcoded to DNxHD 36 (HD1080p) in Da Vinci Resolve, electing not to include the “Reel No.” (or “Tape” in AVID) source name in the metadata, before I came to the project. The transcoding added a little numbered prefix to each clip because of the settings they chose.

I am taking a sequence that was edited with those DNxHD 36 (HD1080p) clips, and I am attempting to up-res them to ProRes 4444 shot on an original Alexa. I can see the RAW clips in the MC source monitor so that would seem to negate the possibility of the Arri Alexa plug-in not being present or not working. I’ve tried having the “Relink” function search for higher res clips. I get the error pictured: “No clips were relinked.” etc…

I’m simply trying to relink the sequence to the original camera RAW.

How can I get this to work?

Solution:

* First, keep in mind that this is a work-around because the “Reel No.” selection in Resolve was not selected when the footage was initially transcoded so I was working with footage that had nothing in the “Tape” field for video. Also, the transcoder chose to render unique file names in Resolve, adding unnecessary information to each clip name. This fix deals with those issues.

–Rename the “Avid MediaFiles” folder so that Avid doesn’t see the older low res files. Your sequence is now completely offline.

–Copy your edit sequence to a new bin. Choose “Commit Multicam Edits.”

–If you don’t need the audio, Subclip the video only from the sequence and delete the original new sequence in your new bin.

–Right-click and select “Set Bin Display,” turning on “Show Reference Clips.” Hit “Ok.”

–In the OFFLINE clips, erase the Da Vinci Resolve prefixes to the Camroll names and the underscore the comes after it (V1-XXXX_).

–Open up your RAW clips bins, and if there is more than one bin for them, move them all to one bin. Using the Media Tool is a quick way to do this. Close all other bins but that RAW clips bin and your OFFLINE sequence bin.

–Select the “Name” column in the bin and Duplicate that column (Cmd-D). You will get a dialogue box asking you where you want to duplicate this data to. Choose the “Camroll” column in this instance.

–Highlight all of your RAW clips in the bin where you’ve collected them.

–Highlight your OFFLINE sequence and right-click “Relink.” Select “Selected items in ALL open bins.” Choose “Start” under “Timecode” and “Camroll” for the “Source Name.” Your “Video Parameters” won’t be modifiable. At the bottom, you can elect to either create a new sequence of simply change the one you’re using. Now select “OK.”

–Your OFFLINE sequence will now relink with the RAW footage. (Note: It may be possible that dupe detection will have problems if you changed the original file names in the offline clips.) You have created matching fields between the set of OFFLINE edit clips and the set of RAW clips. Then the RAW clips and the OFFLINE sequence can talk to each other and link up using the timecode. Presto.

Thanks to John Moore and others on “The Avid Editors of Facebook” and on “creativecow.net” who attempted to help with the issue, and thanks especially to Vinnie Manierre who was able to figure out a quick, simple way to fix it. He even took time out of his probably busy day (as did John), and he remoted into my computer to take a closer look.

All your help is greatly appreciated.

Please let me know if any edits are needed here.

I wanted to provide a clear, concise and complete explanation of the process to make this fix, especially for people like me who are either new to Avid or getting back into it after working on other platforms for years.

Thanks again!
Bill