This IS the Avid L2: RE: [Avid-L2] Legacy XDCam workflow seems iffy?

Monday, August 31, 2015

RE: [Avid-L2] Legacy XDCam workflow seems iffy?

Today I got some more play/research time. I got a sequence cut from the XD Direct clips and tried to do an uprez. I can decompose and then start to batch import the clips but when it asks for a certain disk by "disk label" when I insert the drive and say OK I get an error message"

I then went ahead and took 7 disks I had for the uprez and did a legacy proxy Avid import of all of them. I was then able to relink to this proxy media clips. Then when I decomposed that sequence and went to do a stand batch import for the uprez everything worked as expected and it worked. Clearly there is something about the XD Direct clips that is different. I'm thinking it's a drive path related issue given the XD Direct is on a PC with 4 XDCam drives and I'm on a Mac perhaps there is some confusion.

This should just Fing work but NOOOOOOOO somebody in Silicon Valley(or a cyber bunker) has once again made it his/her mission to mess with John Moore. I know they're out there and when I find um, I'll...I'll huff and puff and then politely ask them how to make this work. ;-)

---In Avid-L2@yahoogroups.com, <kwikpasta@...> wrote :

Yup, no problems playing back xdcam at full res. We're doing full res 4 way multicam at XDCAM 50 off an ISIS and we're fine.

Avid doesn't add a tape name on import, but there should be an option for disk label at the bottom of the import dialog. However, I've found manually modifying clips to have a tape name after import greatly increases your ability to decompose properly.

I would keep doing what you're doing in terms of decompose>batch import>sequence is now online. There's no need for the AEs to be deleting any media or clips after that point, it just adds confusion. Keep it simple. If I ever have any problems with a clip not batch importing I will AMA to that roll and give the AMA clips and the matching reference clip a common disk label (the roll number) then relink the AMA clips to the sequence using relink to selected items and choosing start tc and disk label as my relink options. I tick Ignore Extension and the place a . (period) in the ignore characters after last occurrence box so any .new clips will still relink. I untick Match case when comparing source names and I choose to relink to Any HD video format (not specific resolution), relinking to Highest Quality. This method will allow me to pretty much relink anything to anything 99% of the time.

We're all on HP machines so maybe the hanging is a mac thing, I've definitely seen crashes every now and again, but nothing that would concern me. I don't know if people would agree, but I've actually found macs much less stable than the Z820's and Z840's which absolutely smash through transcodes. But that's another story I guess.

Andi

To: Avid-L2@yahoogroups.com; bigfish@...
From: Avid-L2@yahoogroups.com
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 2015 19:18:43 +0200
Subject: Re: [Avid-L2] Legacy XDCam workflow seems iffy?

Adrenaline age. Outdated

Bouke

Sent from mobile

Op 31 aug. 2015 om 19:17 heeft bigfish@... [Avid-L2] <Avid-L2@yahoogroups.com> het volgende geschreven:

One question I forgot is about transcoding to a DNX resolution. I read in an Avid XDCam workflow guide that in order to play back full quality mode the XDCam media needs to be transcoded to DNX. I'm thinking my XDCam guide is perhaps out of date on this? Perhaps it's from before Avid started handling XDCam native?

---In Avid-L2@yahoogroups.com, <bigfish@...> wrote :

The clips appear identical in length and start time code. There are no tape names as these were XDCam proxy imports. Avid doesn't add a tape name during that process does it?

You are correct about the glutton side of my tests but given the multitude of AEs that work at our place I'm trying to emulate different possible approaches that may conflict or coexist. As has been pointed out it's ill advised to use legacy XDCam import along with ama XDCam workflow on the same project.

We have already had issues when for whatever reason the Batch ingest from XD Direct created a few clips that were offline. Fortunately we were able to the batch import just that clip while still in Avid thereby maintaining consistency of metadata with the rest of the clips.

Specifically relinking the batch import clips to the decompose clips is a way of confirming that both approaches result in compatible clips. If none of the clips relinked I'd say they are different clips entirely just like importing the same graphic twice will create two individual clips that don't relink to each other, but given two of the clips relinked video only there seems to be some commonality. Ultimately for an online uprez getting the clips online is the objective but like we've already encountered there are going to be times when we will have to reimport media in a manner that will hopefully relink to existing clips.

I did find the XDCam Legacy Import a bit iffy or inconsistent. It hung on me a couple times and left some stranded media in the avidmediafiles folder. I don't know why the import process stalled but after CMD + "." to stop it I could see some clips and delete the media but the clip it stalled on didn't appear in the bin so I had to go to the avid media files folder to delete the .mxf files that got stranded. Also even though I have "ingest proxy media on disk insertion" checked it never seemed to happen. I always had to go to file:XDCam Proxy Import.

---In Avid-L2@yahoogroups.com, <kwikpasta@...> wrote :

"is this a limitation to master clip relinking..."

As far as I know you can only use these extra options when relinking clips to a sequence, not clips to clips. It's always been like that but it would be great if this got changed so you could always use all metadata fields regardless of what you are relinking to, be it sequence or master clip.

Are you sure the decomposed clips are the same length? When you decomposed, you gave the clips 24 frame handles in the handles dialog of the decompose menu, if you are batch importing the sequence do your batch import handles in the import settings dialog match what you gave the decompose clips - my import settings handles default to 30 frames but my decompose handles default to 50 - might be worth checking?

Do the import clips of your sequence and your decompose clips match exactly? And do they both have the same tape name? Given that you are forced to relink via start tc and Tape Name/Source File ID do your clips all have the same tape name? If not then you'll have to modify that.

My main question i s why are you even trying to relink to the decomposed clips when you had the sequence online from the first batch import and then you had it online again when you batch imported the sequence? Glutton for punishment springs to mind! ;) I've got to say, I've never found this workflow iffy, works great for me.

Andi

To: avid-l2@yahoogroups.com
From: Avid-L2@yahoogroups.com
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 2015 08:31:26 +0000
Subject: [Avid-L2] Legacy XDCam workflow seems iffy?

As my recent threads indicate I'm new to the nuts and bolts of XDCam workflows with Avid. It's been complicated by XD Direct but tonight I experimented and tested the Legacy XD Cam workflow on my new edit computer at work.

I'm working on a MacPro 2010 Reconditioned 12 Core 2x6 3.33GHz. OS 10.8.5 Avid Ver. 6.5.4.7. 1080P 23.976 project

I enabled Legacy XDCam in the ama settings. I then created a bin and with the bin highlighted then File:Import XDCAM Proxy was no longer greyed out and it worked. I had it convert the proxy audio to 48K. I imported three disks this way and then cut a simple sequenced together bringing along all 8 tracks of audio.

I was then able to decompose with 24 frame handles and then I could batch import the decomposed clips and voila uprez to the 50Mbs XDCam. I deleted the media for the decomposed clips and then did a batch import of the sequence. This worked and created new clips in the sequence bin and left the original decomposed clips offline. I figured it should be no problem to relink the offline original decompose clips to the new clips that resulted from a sequence batch import but only 2 of the 9 clips relinked and none of the audio relinked even on the clips where the video linked. Now the sequence is online b ut I don't see why the previous decomposed clips won't relink the batch imported clips. I tried to use some of the newer choices under the more category but all of them are greyed out. I can see disk label as a choice which seemed like a good place to start but it's greyed out. I tried turning of legacy XDCam to see if they relink choices would become available but no go. I also tried to relink to highlighted clips in open bins but I could not get that radio button to activate. Perhaps because I'm relinking master clips that isn't available but the bottom line is why won't the sequence batch imported clips media relink to the original decomposed clips given they are identical in length and time code. I know master clips are very persnickety about relinking but all the bin info is identical.

Is there something about batch importing the sequence that breaks the link to the XDCam material. If so why did two of the clips video relink and why are the more expansive choices for relink under the more category greyed out? Again is this a limitation to master clip relinking? Confused, Inquiring and Tired minds want to know.

John Moore Barking Trout Productions Studio City, CA bigfish@...