Pt 8.1 & mxf

[Frank Kruse]

Polaris,

thanks for the info. I'll forward this info to our cutting room asap. Do you know if it's possible to convert a project in the avid to bwav after it has been started? In my case they have been shooting for a couple of days already.

Thanks,

Frank.

[Polaris]

Sorry Frank, don't know the answer to that one. I do know that the Avid can handle both mixed in a project. The show we are on now has a few dozen MXF files (second unit...injested incorrectly) which we have just been living with without too much pain. PT seems to handle a few in a session without much of a delay.

Best of luck

[Frank Kruse]

Originally Posted by Polaris

Sorry Frank, don't know the answer to that one. I do know that the Avid can handle both mixed in a project. The show we are on now has a few dozen MXF files (second unit...injested incorrectly) which we have just been living with without too much pain. PT seems to handle a few in a session without much of a delay.

Best of luck

I talked to our assistant editor. He said that the big advantage of using MXF audio in the AVID is that you can organize the media in different folders which is not possible with OMFI (WAV) media which can only live in ONE OMFI media-files folder on a given drive.
It helps them keep a project tidy. But it´s no problem to change over to WAV via a batch-import of the original files.

I´ve sent them a link to MediaMover so maybe I can convince them to use BWAV instead.

frank.

[Polaris]

Good on you Frank, thanks for the info. Considering the pain we went thru with MXF, I would say having the audio files in one big folder is a small price to pay. Just my 2¢

Some day when digi fixes this we'll all look back and laugh...

Cheers

[jglasgow]

Hi Folks,

We did improve MXF session open times in 8.0.4, and also added additional optimizations that apply to things like editing and batch processing in 8.1. Obviously, it sounds like we still have some work to do here. Polaris, I would recommend trying 8.1 if you can. I've heard from other users that its better than 8.0.4, but still needs work.

I'd like to put out a request for sessions that exhibit these problems. Because MXF files can have a wide ranging variety of metadata embedded, its important that we test with your sessions to make sure we're really fixing the issues. If you have a session you can send, please contact me at jordan [dot] glasgow [at] avid [dot] com.

Lastly, I'd like to clear up a few things mentioned in this thread:
1. Its true that Media Composer does not store MXF files in OMFI Media Files folders, however they are stored in similar Avid MediaFiles folders. So, using MXF won't necessarily help keep your project more organized, although the MXF files are separated from the OMF, WAV, and AIFF files.

2. Media Composer DNxHD projects do default to MXF for audio, but you can switch to WAV if desired.

Best regards,
Jordan Glasgow
Product Manager, Post Production
Avid

[pneyrinck]

Originally Posted by nucelar

Hi Paul,
We are recently receiving mxf files instead of digibeta tapes. Just video and 4 audio tracks. We are currently using Calibrated mxf import to open the files in Final Cut and export the video and audio to work in PT. We don't have mojos and don't plan on having them. How would your software work? I suppose I will be able to import the media in PT directly?
Thank you

Our software will provide OP1a import and export utilities. OP1a import will operate as an Audiosuite plug-in or as a Quicktime component. After editing, you can lay back to OP1a files with punch in/out using an audiosuite plug-in. You can reach us at support at neyrinck dot com.

[markuse]

Hi,

very interesting topic!

Did anybody of you actually succesfully manage to convert the MXF to Wave and preserve all of the Meta-Data? I tried converting via session data import with 7.4 and 8.03 cs2 and lost channel names (7.4) and also scene and take data (8.03), maybe even more, I didn't check everything.


Best,
Markus

[Polaris]

Hey Markus,
We may have had a similar problem when we converted from MXF to BWF. After several attempts, we came up with a method that worked well. What we did was create an empty session; drag MXF files from the workspace browser to the region list (a painfully slow process and it feels like the whole mac has crashed but be patient and it will complete the task) then Save session Copy In... with audio to a BWF session and all metadata came across just fine. We found you had to do it this way if you want to preserve the scene/take "region name" (for lack of a better term) from the avid. If we just converted the files at the finder level, the region list will show (and sort by) the avid long filename. Scene & Take info could still be viewed but at the tail of the very long avid filenames which was not very convenient.

Good luck.

PS:

[markuse]

Wow, that sounds like a very special way and a lot of research!
Thanks, Polaris!

If I get you right, you keep the timeline completely empty during the conversion? If so, how do you get the actual session set up including the regions in the timeline after the MXF to BWF conversion?

Markus

[Polaris]

Ah that's where the fun begins! Once we converted the entire dailies library to BWF, we would then convert each individual reel AAF to a PT session, referencing the MXF files. Then Save Session Copy In... to a BWF session, toss out the newly created BWF files and reopen the session, pointing it to the BWF library (via link by name only), and start cutting. A huge time waster as it had to be redone with each turnover but we simply couldn't spend the stage time (30min+ per reel) to open MXF sessions.

I wish I had better news but I'm hoping Digi is able to sort this out. In the mean time, we've tried to be proactive with future projects and get the first pix assistant to use WAV from the get go.

good luck.