[Richard Herd]

Wow, that’s a huge question.

Video files are huge. That’s why they get compressed inside video and digital cinema cameras. Your first step is figure out the footage details: What codec will you be working with? This will determine how much throughput you need.

The drives containing media are called scratch disks because they used to be so damn expensive, you stored the media on cheap drives until it was time to edit and then you moved the video files to the scratch disk, then when you were done, you moved them off and so on. It was a pain. The term “scratch disk” still remains.

Before you can figure out your system and workflow, you’ll need to know what codec you’re working with. I would assume you will be using some kind of dSLR codec, like H.264; in which case, your workflow is pretty simple. You will still need (and I said NEED) some kind of external scratch disk. I think a thunderbolt drive would suit your needs pretty well (if my assumption is correct). Then, after your shoot it is super important (I said SUPER IMPORTANT) to transfer the entire contents of the card on the dSLR onto the scratch disk. I use folders for example based on client names. Inside of that folder is another folder called “Camera Archive.” Because a shoot can use many folders, inside of that folder is more folders containing the entire camera archive — not just the .mts, for example. You need the entire contents — the camera archive.

Then in premiere pro you navigate the media browser to that folder and PP will recognize what kind of native codec you will be using. Then drag the desired clips into the project pane. Then, and this is importan, right click the file you want to use and create a sequence based on that file.

Because your files are already compressed (again: that’s my assumption), you won’t gain any quality changing them to an uncompressed format. When you “uncompress” a compressed file, you are actually using your computer’s graphics card to interpolate any missing data (frame size, intraframes, etc). What you want to do is edit your piece and then export it to Adobe Media Encoder so your deliverable matches your requirements.

That’s a basic nutshell.

TL;DR: you gotta know what your camera codec is; what files you’re getting from the cinematographer.

[Richard Herd]

Generally speaking, you need to put your media files on a different spinning disk (or SSD) than your system drive. This is true of all pro app workflows. Those different spinning disks are called “scratch disks,” and in the setting panel you’ll need to tell PP where that disk is.

That’s the concept. In practice, people use many types of drives, from RAIDs to SAN to NAS and so on and so forth.

[Richard Herd]

Jeremy, what are you tagging and with what? Client names? Deliverables as (deliverable)?
thanks!

[Richard Herd]

Here, I’m waiting for Aindreas to start his own blog.

[Richard Herd]

[Mark Dobson] “that we have all been participants in a huge BETA testing experiment”

I’ve been saying that since day 1. And we paid to beta test! X could not have gotten to it’s current incarnation in 2 years without the beta test program. In the brave new future, all software will be released early and then rented-out. 😉

[Richard Herd]

[David Lawrence] “Wall Street is a casino”

And who is the house, regarding NASDAQ: ADBE?

[Richard Herd]

[David Lawrence] “problematic in edu where budget for new software is never guaranteed year to year.”

Also bad to update software in the middle of a semester, when hundreds of students are working on a project. Edu software updates happen between semesters. What this means, I think, for labs is it reduces the CC incentive. Frequent (and awesome updates) are not really useful.

I have definitely noticed media students buying their own CC to finish projects “at home” (or really anywhere) rather than the post lab. Doing a bit of math, Adobe can take the hit from universities buying CC for 20 stations, if the student body is buying a license (and many many many are).

[Richard Herd]

[David Lawrence] “they’re still way behind in revenue. They can’t keep bleeding money forever. “

Heard this a few times now. It doesn’t seem to square with the stock price (which opened the year 2014 at $58.06)? How, in your view, is this working out — the stock price continuing to rise and they’re losing revenue?

[Richard Herd]

Thank you!

[Richard Herd]

Expression Sampler. It’s a good place to go.

https://library.creativecow.net/articles/devis_andrew/hidden-templates/video-tutorial

Regarding copying expressions: Edit | Copy Expression Only

Then paste.