XDCAM Transfer crashes Suite 1.6 on import

[Floh Peters]

What OS version are you using? Which version of the XDCam tools? If the XDCam files are converted, can you import the converted files into Media 100? What framesize and framerate are your files in? This definitely should not happen.

[Jay Ryscki]

What OS version are you using? SLep 10.6.3

Which version of the XDCam tools? Vers 2.12

If the XDCam files are converted, can you import the converted files into Media 100? Need to test this, but if this works, not the best scenario.

What framesize and framerate are your files in? 1920×1080 at 30P

This definitely should not happen. You’re right about that…

[Floh Peters]

This works for me, at least with 25p footage. Can you post a short clip somewhere to have a look at? Or get in touch with Techsupport, maybe they can help here looking at your Crash Logs…

[Gregg Michaels]

I’m on Snow 10.6.3 and Suite 1.6, and I’m importing XDCAM-HD footage OK via XDCAM Transfer.

The footage is 23.98Psf though.

GM

[Olof Ekbergh]

I use EX footage all the time in M100 suite 1.6 OS 10.6.2. No Problems at all.

My procedure:

1. Transfer from SxS using latest XD-cam transfer.

2. Open all the clips in FCP.

3. Pick the clips and parts of clips I need for project and export by reference (not self contained) from FCP.

4. Import the ref clips into M100 transcoding to ProRes422. Don’t try to change the clips to SD at this point it does not work.

Usually this is all you need to do.

5. If I need to turn clips into SD (to use with a legacy project) I make a dummy timeline and drop the clips into it and conform them all at the same time. Then you can pull them out into bins labeled SD.

This may seem round about but it works great for me.
The nice thing about the FCP step is you can view the clips on your AJA/Matrox etc. external monitor and really do a good job shot sheeting.

I also archive all the clips at this time, and enter the info into a DB.

I hang on to the FCP projects and keep them with the SxS .movs I got from XDcam transfer.

Olof Ekbergh

[Olof Ekbergh]

Actually I have 2 suites on 10.6.3 and M100 1.6. On 8 core Nehelam and an older 4 core.

Olof Ekbergh

[Jay Ryscki]

I did the FCP>M100 workaround earlier and I know it works. Problem is that it adds time and reduces drive space for a process that should be one step. I work with the calibrated software plugin in FCP which eliminates the need to recompress the source XDCAM BPAV data. I have to recompress at the 422 codec to see the files to import them into M100. While this works, it is what I call janky at best, and broken at worst.

So, I went back and retested the direct from XDCAM Transfer to M100 after all this and it did import a small batch of short clips with no errors ( 5clips all less than a minute). Now I will clear all the test media, reimport the source, and see if it chokes.

[Jay Ryscki]

It appears that my system(8core-2.8-12gbRAM) is hanging on clips over a minute long. The other thing going on is that it is writing two video movies for each clip imported.

One is a smaller file: Apple XDCAM EX 1080p30 (35 Mb/s VBR), 1920 x 1080 (1888 x 1062), Millions
16-bit Integer (Big Endian), Mono, 48.000 kHz
16-bit Integer (Big Endian), Mono, 48.000 kHz
117MB

Other is Big file: Apple ProRes 422 (HQ), 1920 x 1080, Millions
717MB

Not sure where these files work within the environment, but I do know that FCP has 1 .MOV file related to each XDCAM source file. When I import the same clip as a file from FCP I get the video and two audio .mov files in the M100 media folder.

[Olof Ekbergh]

The Apple XDCAM EX 1080p30 (35 Mb/s VBR), 1920 x 1080 (1888 x 1062), Millions, is the rewrapped EX file. This is basically what XDcam Transfer app does.

THe Apple ProRes 422 (HQ), 1920 x 1080, Millions, is the transcoded ProRes file, always much larger than the original mpeg 2 file from the camera.

The two audio files is the audio, the way M100 splits audio and video files.

I have not tried the M100 internal XDcam trans. But like I said you can transcode hundreds of files at once from the rewrapped mpeg file to ProRes as long as you don’t try to conform them in any way at the same time, by importing into M100. I do this every day, it works great. If you try to conform at the same time M100 will choke. At least Suite 1.5 did.

Try just doing it this way, if it does not work then there is some software problem in your computer. If it works, then there is something wrong with the M100 XDcam plugin.

When I get time I will try to import straight from a SxS card into M100. Busy right now though.

I always use a MBP SxS slot to transfer the files to an external HD with the XDcamTransfer app. Then hook that drive up to my suite and transcode as I outlined earlier onto a RAID5 for editing.

I hope this helps you trouble shoot.

Olof Ekbergh

[Jay Ryscki]

This is what I also find to be true. I also suspect that the problem is with the way M100 and XDCam Tx play together, in this case they do not.

It is so much more streamlined as far as file size and sheer numbers of items in FCP. While I could live with the audio being split off as it has forever, I can’t justify the additional overhead of using two programs to do the job of one, and look at a 1.4GB file in M100 while the same file in FCP takes up 225MB. Not a very friendly equation. Unless there is some way I am missing to get the final M100 file sizes down coming out of XDCam Tx, then it just does not compute.