[Jeromey Shannon]

I was about to ask a similar question but I just solved it so I hope you don’t mind that I post the answer here. I need to deliver OP1a MXF files with SMPTE 8-track audio to TV stations for broadcast. The SMPTE standard is L R C Lfe RLs Rs and a stereo mix on 7+8.

In an Avid I can select my sequence to be “Direct, surround tracks in SMPTE order” and when I export an OP1a MXF file the tracks are output as 8 discreet mono tracks. This is the easy way of doing it.

These are the ways I tried to do it in Premiere: I can set my sequence to be 8 mono tracks but on export my MXF file has all 8 tracks mixed down in mono on tracks 1+2 and 3-8 are blank. I can set my sequence to 5.1, but then I can only map the tracks to 5.1 channels, not the stereo pair on 7+8. If I choose a stereo sequence tracks 1, 3, 5, and 7 are mixed to channel 1, and 2, 4, 6, 8 are mixed to channel 2 with 3-8 blank.

So what’s the solution in Premiere? (The solution will also work for QuickTimes, and for 16 channels, just add the extra channels you need.)

First, create a new sequence, set your video to whatever your requirement is, but under the Tracks tab select “Master: Multichannel” and number of channels to 8. Create 8 Tracks with the + button. Set all these to “Track Type: Mono”. Set the “Pan/Balance” of tracks 1,3,5,7 to -100 and tracks 2,4,6,8 to +100. (You’ll want to save this as a preset.)

Now open the Audio Mixer and set tracks 1 and 2 to “1+2”, 3 and 4 to “3+4”, 5 and 6 to “5+6”, 7 and 8 to “7+8”.

Now when I export from the sequence I get true 8 channel direct audio tracks with my OP1a file. Phew. What a lot of work!

Jeromey Shannon