[Nick Anderson]

3) I recommend that you never nest any sequences, when you are thinking about roundtripping with Resolve. They become a nightmare and you have to spend a lot of time conforming. What I mean is, never put a sequence on your timeline. You can however just make one “Twixtor sequence” and put each of the twitor clips into it and export them individually. Yes, you Don’t need to export them with the exact same name. Instead, you should simply replace the original clips in the timeline with the baked in ones. This is because the Relink function in CS6 is unlikely to let you relink to the new clips because they won’t be identical. I recommend that you use either Prores or DNxHD since you are only working with 1080p. However, DPX is the best format to use if you want to be 100% lossless. I do all my work in those formats or the native formats for RAW cameras.

4) In the task bar, there is an option called “Project Manager”. It is under either file or edit, I believe. I think its location may have changed between CC and CS6. You can choose to create a new project with only the clips used on the timeline as well as renaming files with non-unique names so that they are unique (which is necessary for resolve). This copies all your used clips to a condensed folder and creates a new project file that is linked to the new clips. Also, you can choose to just export the portions of your clips that are in the sequence, which I wouldn’t recommend unless you are really needing to save space. This whole process can take 10min-3hours depending on your project. Also, with CS6 I did have a problem in the past when I did this process from one FW800 drive to another, so either make the destination folder on the same drive or on the desktop.

5) At this point, I would create a duplicate of your master timeline and remove any and all effects (not including transitions). You should preempt this and bake in any effects you can’t create in Resolve. That way, you are able to start from scratch in resolve. However, with sizing issues, I think that if you make all the 2.7K footage “resize to frame” THEN do your resizing, the sizing will translate into resolve (just a theory though). Either way, the goal is to get as little XML issues as possible. If sizing doesn’t transfer over, then why include it in the XML and get a funky resizing that needs to be changed anyway. Regardless, this is not an XML issue, it is Resolve that works in a single framerate and resolution timeline. All clips are conformed to that resolution, so you could set it to 2.7K and have the 1080 clips upscale. Just have that in mind for resizing and try to start all the clips from a standpoint of being at the same resolution. With Resolve Lite 10, they have actually lifted the resolution limitation, so now the only difference is the ability to add multiple GPUs and RedRockets.

6) For maximum quality, DPX is the codec to use, but it is huge and difficult to manage. It sounds like you are on a PC, so I guess Prores is not an option. DNxHD is basically identical to Prores in terms of quality. If you download the free trial of Avid Media Composer, the zip file will contain an installer for the Avid Codecs, which will give you all the DNxHD codecs if you don’t have them. These work like Prores, but the higher the number is after the DNxHD the higher quality (possibly mb/s, not sure) it is (unlike Prores which uses color space). Lossless formats like Blackmagic and others are much like cineform, from my experience, where they work well with proprietary programs, but generally have flaws in their design (excessively large file sizes or inferior quality).

On another note, I highly caution anyone from using the Cineform codecs. There was a point a few years ago when I got into using them, because of the metadata control. However, the quality is not even close to “virtually lossless”. From doing my own comparisons, I found that I was losing up to 20% of the details sometimes, if I zoomed in. If you are wanting the best quality, I wouldn’t use those codecs. You will be able to fix any of these issues in Resolve anyway (though it isn’t as simple of an interface). Instead use either DNxHD or Prores, as they will give you the best quality for 1080p when starting from a H.264 codec. Also, the myth about transcoding a 4:2:0 colorspace to 4:2:2 for more color control is completely false. All it does is make the footage look blotchy, since it just fills in the extra color with repeats of what is around it (which is even more visible with Cineform), so just stick to a 420 color space.

7) So, you export using the roundtrip setting and then go back to the edit page, select your timeline, then go to the task bar and export .XML to get the roundtrip XML (if you didn’t know that part yet). Anyways, as I’ve already stated, DNxHD,Prores, or DPX are the way to go. However, with Adobe Premiere CC, DNxHD is far superior, since you can “smart render” which dramatically reduces export time by eliminating the need to render (as long as you don’t have any effects). When you export out of premiere, choose the Vimeo preset that matches your clip, but check the boxes for maximizing render quality.

8) I’m a little confused here. You do HAVE to export from Resolve, since the color is not transferred using metadata. What you get is a new timeline that is linked to the new colored footage and not the originals. Also, there is noise reduction within Resolve Lite 10 as well as the ability to use NeatVideo within resolve. I am a bit confused by your workflow though. Everything that is going into resolve should typically be the finished version, which all effects baked in. Any effects added afterwards will be harder to do with the graded clips. If you want the grade on the clips when doing effects, you can import the clips into resolve early on, grade them, and then export LUTs. Then, you can use those LUTs in Premiere and AE (Use LUTBuddy from RedGiant, which is free) to work with the color non-destructively, then remove the LUT before exporting the XML. That way, when you bring the clips into resolve, you can just apply the LUT there. NeatVideo works better before grading, since manipulating color breaks apart the codec and harder to repair than if you applied the denoising before color. There should be no reason to use AE after you have graded. Setting an exact order of operations is one of the most important parts of a workflow, so you don’t over complicate your project and make it unable to alter if you need to. For example, you should always sync audio before doing any else, because it is significantly harder to sync audio after the edit has begun. The same is true with altering your timeline after you have begun working in Resolve.

On the FYIs:

– Again, this is not true since version 10. Even 9 would work with any resolution, the only limit is export resolutions. My theory is (because there have been several projects that have imported sizing no problem) that, because resolve always conforms to a single resolution, if you make your premiere sequence conformed the same way the sizing will translate. You can do this by making all the clips “scale to frame size” before doing any resizing. You will see that all the clips will start from the same base level in the effects settings, instead of being set to what would normally be the starting value for scaling to that size. Also, the clips are just automatically resized in Resolve, but not transcoded or reinterpolated. So, you can still expand the clips and use the stabilizer in Resolve.

– Again, I am asking why you are using that codec at all. I understand the draw and I felt the same at one point. The only use I see for Cineform is in time based competitions like 48 hour film fests, since you can color without having to export, which saves tons of time. However, this is eliminated for me with Adobe CC because of the new Speedgrade roundtrip. However, you should try and find a way to have pro tune applied to the clips before transcoding to any other format, since it is far superior for grading. There is also no reason to think that any Cineform metadata won’t appear in any program, since the way the codec works if within the file and so programs just read it like it is a normal file with the metadata changes burned in. It was a good notion to try and have a single codec throughout your workflow though, since that simplifies things.

Let me know if you have any other questions, hope this helped.

[Nick Anderson]

Typically color goes with a colorist and QC/Deliverables go with an operator. This would be Dailies Operator if you are handling dailies or DI Operator if you are dealing with the final picture. Sometimes I have even seen QC Operator, but I would go with DI Operator.

[Nick Anderson]

I have had 100% success with all types of footage using this simple workflow.

1. Edit in Premiere with a Resolve friendly codec. If you are using something like AVCHD, transcode before editing or relink later. DO NOT USE NESTED SEQUENCES!!!!!
2. Bake in any effects that won’t translate via XML.
3. Open the Project Manager and use it to create a condensed version of your project with only the clips you are using and give them unique file names if they don’t already. You can also choose to rename the files to what they are named in Premiere. This will consolidate all your files into a new location of your choosing that is perfect for Color and Sound.
4. Open the new project file and export and XML (as well as all other timeline formats just to be safe).
5. Open Resolve and go to the project settings before importing any footage (VERY IMPORTANT!!!). Set your master timeline frame rates and select for mixed frame rates to be interpreted as Final Cut 7. Otherwise, you will get false IOs due to Resolve interpreting your 30fps timecode 23.97fps (creating a slight slow-mo effect).
6. Import your XML and make sure all the setting match your premiere timeline.
7. For any clips that don’t link up, just import them into the media pool manually and they will automatically relink (no window will pop up, they will just show up in your timeline)
8. A WORD OF CAUTION: If any two clips have the same name, for example a RED clip and an MOV proxy, Resolve will associate with the first one.
9. When you are done, render out your new clips with the FCP Roundtrip preset in whatever codec you want and then export out an XML from Resolve.
10. Import the new Resolve XML into Premiere and your timeline w/ graded clips will import.

I have used this workflow on many projects with RED cameras and HACKED GH2s and it has work very well.

[Nick Anderson]

I had the same problem. I thought of all the possible things it could be. I am on a 64gb Mac Pro 12core, so I definitely have the RAM needed. I turned off render multiple frames and it worked fine. If I stop the render, it shows the same error message, but I can see it rendering now, which it didn’t do before. Before, it would just not do anything and when I clicked stop it would show me the error. Hope this helps.