Andrew Kimery
Forum Replies Created
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[Bret Williams] “So with AMA, I assume it has to transcode like premiere to make handles.”
AFAIK all inter-frame codecs have to be transcoded in order to trim them because of how the compression works. The size of the transcoded files will of course depend on what codec you transcode them into.
Inter-frame codecs store incomplete frame data and rely on the previous and upcoming frame’s information to rebuild/interpolate the missing data. That’s why the file sizes for inter-frame codecs are so small compared to intra-frame codecs (where each frame is a stored as a compete image). Inter-frame is also called GOP (Group Of Pictures) because it requires the information from an entire group of pictures in order to rebuild each individual frame.
This is an oversimplification, but It’s kinda the difference between counting by counting every number vs counting by skipping numbers.
Intra-frame: 0,1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20
vs
Inter-frame: 0, 5, 10, 15, 20
If I want to trim Intra-frame down to just 0-13 the NLE can literally just copy frames 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 and put them into a new file. If I want to do the same with inter-frame the file has to be re-encoded because frames 11, 12, and 13 don’t exist as discreet images. When you put your playhead on frame 13 the playback software creates frame 13 on the fly by interpolating the changes in image data between frame 10 and frame 15. This is why inter-frame codecs are much more CPU intensive than intra-frame codecs (trade off between storage requirements and CPU requirements).
In the old FCP one of my favorite tools to use was Reference Movies (files that didn’t contain media, but just ‘pointed’ to where the media you wanted to reference was stored), but if you were working with an inter-frame codec like HDV and made a Reference Movie you actually created new media (for the same reason you can’t ‘trim’ inter-frame codecs).
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[Bret Williams] “Can you natively use h264 media in Avid now or do you have to compress it to an Avid codec?”
I think AMA (Avid Media Access), which allows you to work with files in their native format, as opposed to ingesting and transcoding into an Avid codec, came out about 10yrs ago.
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[Brett Sherman] “It should also be said even if you have Media Composer, if you don’t have your Avid Project or it got corrupted, you are SOL for accessing the media.”
Maybe I’m misunderstanding what you are saying, but you can playback, edit, etc., Avid media in MC projects that didn’t originally create said media.
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[Shane Ross] “Thank goodness Apple made a new codec (ProRes) where that wasn’t the case, but for how long?”
When ProRes was first released in 2007 it was only made available with Final Cut Studio. In 2008 Apple released a read-only version of the codec for Mac and Windows (but I think it only worked with Apple’s QT media player). ProRes has been out over a decade but Apple has made sure that support for the codec on Windows is spotty at best.
By contrast, AFAIK Avid has released their codecs (both read and write) for free dating back to at least Meridien. Avid also worked with SMPTE to make DNxHD and DNxHR compliant to the VC-3 standard.
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[Bret Williams] “Let’s not forget FCP 7 did this, BUT, only with ProRes media. FCP7 didn’t work with long gop/h264. And if you did happen to jam some in there and use it, it didn’t get trimmed. My understanding is that Premiere will trim it, but it has to transcode it, which makes it 10x the size in the first place.”
It worked with any intra-frame codec (not just ProRes), and it would trim inter-frame codecs but it would have to transcode/create new media (which you have to do due to the nature of inter-frame).
[Brett Sherman] “Long-term archiving is tricky business. And I’m not at all convinced Avid is better at it than FCP X is. FCP X’s weakness is size of archive. Avid’s is proprietary formats.”
ProRes is proprietary and Apple has put more walls around it than Avid has around their codecs.
When it comes to digital archiving the traditional concept of long-term archiving doesn’t really exist. It’s more like a never ending series of data migrations every 5-10yrs into current media types and onto current storage mediums.
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[Oliver Peters] “BTW – This post muddies the waters even more if you bought perpetual versions.
https://www.provideocoalition.com/premiere-pro-6-after-effects-11-ps-13-did...
“I wonder how much of this is legit vs Adobe doing an extremely conservative CYA move because there’s a 0.0000000000001% chance a patent troll might file a lawsuit against an end user someday maybe?
I mean, patent trolls have sued/threatened to sue people over everything from using Wifi to using the scan-to-email feature on all-in-one printers.
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[Oliver Peters] “Well, not exactly. But remember they have a ton of products across live/studio/post audio, video editing, broadcast, news, media management, virtual sets, etc. So its hard to say how this is calculated. I notice in Avid Link that AC3 is still there, but as a separate option.”
Right, I should’ve specified MC instead of saying Avid in general.
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[Oliver Peters] “To my knowledge, Dolby is in a lawsuit with Adobe, but not with Avid. Maybe Avid is simply playing it safe. But, of course, all of this is simply speculation ☺”
Speculation… is what we do here. ????
I’m just trying to look for common ground between Avid and Adobe in this situation.
Adobe offers a suite of apps, Avid does not.
Adobe offers a subscription, Avid offers subscriptions and perpetual licenses and *both* are impacted (so it doesn’t seem to be a subscription-based issue).
What both companies do offer is a back catalog to older versions of their software, and this is a relatively new thing. Typically the older versions disappear from store shelves (real and virtual) and the only places to get them is 2nd hand. Hence my theory that the issue at hand is somehow related to software distribution windows and so Avid and Adobe are officially closing the window on the older software by pulling it off the shelves.
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[Oliver Peters] “Not because of subscription itself, but rather the fact that CC is a selection of apps where you can use a few or all. So calculating how many users actually use the specific apps with this technology becomes difficult.”
But Avid presumably befell the same fate and MC is not a collection of apps like CC.
Maybe it’s not that Adobe offers a collection of apps, but that Adobe, and Avid, continue to distribute past versions of their respective applications to their customers at no extra cost? That might explain why there is a hard cut off date. Maybe the original Dolby deal was for X number of years and now that the agreement is over Adobe and Avid didn’t want to continue to pay to cover old versions of the apps? Or maybe Dolby tried to jack up the price by saying, “Hey, now you are offering six versions of your NLE instead of just one so we are going to charge you a separate fee for each NLE you continue to distribute to your customers”?
There would be a bit of irony in the back catalog offered by Avid an Adobe turing from an amazing selling point to a financial liability.
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[Oliver Peters] “This appears to stem from an ongoing dispute with Dolby that affects any company who included the AC3 codec under previous licensing agreements. The same thing has happened with Avid Media Composer licenses.”
I’m reading that the final AC3 patent(s) expired in 2017. Do you have anymore info/insight onto what the hangup might be?