sending just aaf file w/o audio files

[paulmmoran]

I received an unembedded aaf from an editor that had the audio files but was missing the aaf activator file. I asked them to resend just the aaf w/o the audio files (we have a slow internet connection). When attempting to relink it can't find the files. When I do a manual relink I can see the files are there but portions of the names are different so it won't relink. Could this be a corrupt aaf or does every time you make a aaf it creates unique file names so you can't just send the launcher w/o audio files.

[Frank Kruse]

Originally Posted by paulmmoran

I received an unembedded aaf from an editor that had the audio files but was missing the aaf activator file. I asked them to resend just the aaf w/o the audio files (we have a slow internet connection). When attempting to relink it can't find the files. When I do a manual relink I can see the files are there but portions of the names are different so it won't relink. Could this be a corrupt aaf or does every time you make a aaf it creates unique file names so you can't just send the launcher w/o audio files.

Maybe they consolidated the audio before sending it the second time which renames the files? Or they sent you the wrong audio the first time.

Hard to diagnose. Do the files it´s looking for have a ".new" in them and your don't? Then they consolidated the sequence. In that case ask for the original version.

[paulmmoran]

The 1st part of the file names are the same and then there is a series of letters and numbers that don't match up at the end. They're all the same length and format just slightly different names.

It is possible they consolidated the sequence the 2nd time. In a email I just received the editor said that when creating the first aaf it didn't make the launcher file. So she re-created the aaf and only sent the activator. I'm guessing when re-making it, it renames the files.

Is there a when to only make the activator and not the files in Avid so that could work in the future? Thanks for the quick response.

[Frank Kruse]

I've never heard of the terms "activator" or "launcher".

I just get an .AAF file and separate wav or MXF media.

The avid usually does´t rename it´s media files (unlike PT) unless you consolidate or the editor batch-imports files that have been lost.

Or he converts the format during the AAF export.

[paulmmoran]

The files do get converted from mxf to aiff so that would account for the renaming. It all makes since now. Thanks a bunch for clearing that up for me. In the future if I want to do that I'll just have them leave it as mxf files and I'll covert it here.

[Frank Kruse]

Originally Posted by paulmmoran

The files do get converted from mxf to aiff so that would account for the renaming. It all makes since now. Thanks a bunch for clearing that up for me. In the future if I want to do that I'll just have them leave it as mxf files and I'll covert it here.

you don't have to convert. PT will play mxf directly. I also would never convert to AIF because you will probably lose valuable meta-data. Use wav or mxf.

[paulmmoran]

True, but I don't like the way mxf files play in my system. It really lags. Also the editors always have mixed-media which Pro Tools doesn't like. Lasty, wav files are much larger and I don't have much use for the meta data in this situation so with the slow internet connection, aiffs are fine. I appreciate the info though.