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  #1  
Old 08-03-2017, 08:07 PM
koo_koo_bonkers koo_koo_bonkers is offline
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Default What is the current state of AAF export back to Avid MC ?

Hello

Long time Pro Tools user here.

Lately I have been working with a large digital studio that have their own (picture) editorial team in house. They use primarily Avid MC version 8.5 . The challenge here is that they want audio to contribute to story board, pre-vis and layout / blocking all the way through till final renders. As the team naturally changes the cut they want sound to support that editorial process and follow the changes.

Knowing they were using Avid MC I expected an AAF export to "just work". After several attempts the lead picture editor and I gave up. The Avid MC system was simply unable to import my stems ( 5 stereo pair aprox. 4min in duration) I'm looking for the closest integration between the picture edit and my audio session possible.

Is it possible at all to practically "round trip" audio in this way, where I pass stems to the picture editor , they import my stems and edit the new cut, then send the edited stems back to me ?

What is the current status of the AAF export from PT and import into Avid MC ?

In the past I've always (well most often) received locked picture, or if there have been changes to the cut those changes are very well communicated.

Any tips would be great .. Cheers !
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  #2  
Old 08-04-2017, 01:58 PM
philper philper is offline
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Default Re: What is the current state of AAF export back to Avid MC ?

This is supposed to work...like as well as it does Avid>PT....?
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  #3  
Old 08-04-2017, 05:44 PM
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mfranken mfranken is offline
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Default Re: What is the current state of AAF export back to Avid MC ?

This works but in a very limited fashion. You can send stems, I'd recommend making sure that they start and end on frame edges as MC can't handle sub-frames and the AAF export will contain small sub-frame clips and media. Create your stems in PT then select the tracks to export (highlight track names) and select export AAF. From memory you just need to select MXF as the media type and set the handle to 0 as there is none.

I'm currently working on an animation film doing the same thing daily. We also found that the name of the session you export the AAF from becomes the TAPE name in the metadata of the media that comes back to you from MC once it's done the round trip. This can be used to expand tracks in PT when your stems come back to you in an AAF. This can allow you to say create 5.1 stems that you keep and create stereo stems for MC - so when the stereo stems come back in an AAF you can expand these to find the 5.1 stems, or whatever material you want to expand. It's a bit of work as you need to manually set the TAPE name of your WAV files with an app like Wave Agent, but can really help make this kind of workflow work.

Hope that helps.

Mark
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  #4  
Old 08-05-2017, 02:53 PM
koo_koo_bonkers koo_koo_bonkers is offline
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Default Re: What is the current state of AAF export back to Avid MC ?

Hey Mark Thanks for taking time out to reply. I'll have a look again at the docs' regarding exporting tracks to AAF, you mentioned MXF which I have never considered an option.

The thread title might have been a bit misleading, my goal is to establish a practical workflow with the picture editorial team so sound is constantly updated.
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Old 08-05-2017, 08:42 PM
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mfranken mfranken is offline
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Default Re: What is the current state of AAF export back to Avid MC ?

Hi koo_koo_bonkers,

Now that I'm on my main mac here's some more info for you...

These are the AAF export settings I use to export stems and animation dial recordings to editorial:
  • Enforce Media Composer Compatibility
  • Target Project Timecode Format: 24
  • Format: MXF
  • Bit Depth: 24
  • Consolidate from source media (only option available when Enforce… checked)
  • Handle size: 0 milliseconds


If you want to 'expand tracks' on any AAF clips that come back to you - so that you can get unlimited handles or find an alt track with the same metadata you need to set the following:

- Create new PT session - in this example we name it XYZ
  • Check Interleaved in session setup if required
  • Import stems to be exported
  • Arrange clips so that unique material doesn't overlap - so it has a unique timecode
  • Consolidate one more WAVs
    • Start and end the consolidated clip/WAV on 24FPS frame edges
    • Make sure that the WAV file created isn’t larger than 4GB (WaveAgent has a 4GB load limit)
  • Name WAV(s) something useful
  • Select all tracks to export
  • Export as AAF using settings above

- In Wave Agent set metadata of each file created above as follows:
  • TAPE: Pro Tools:XYZ.ptx (Note space between ‘Pro’ and ‘Tools’. Bold chars must match name of session above)
  • Frame Rate: 24ND
  • Track Info: Set something useful to ID the contents of each 'channel' when expanding
  • Click ‘Save’

Creating media in this way allows you to for example expand a returned AAF clip to select a different mic of an animation record, or obtain extra handles if the returned AAF isn't linked and has handles set.


Quote:
Originally Posted by koo_koo_bonkers View Post
my goal is to establish a practical workflow with the picture editorial team so sound is constantly updated.
If you want to re-cut/re-conform your sessions containing clips and automation to match the stem clips returned in an AAF you could use EdiLoad to extract the edit info from an AAF - you need to load the AAF into a session and then load that into EdiLoad. This edit data can then be used to re-cut the applicable tracks of your session that was used to create the stems you sent to editorial.

So in effect you can edit sounds in PT, create a stem of it and send it via an AAF to editorial. Editorial edits those stems and then you extract the edit info from an AAF and apply that back to your original edits. BTW instead of getting the edit info from an AAF you could instead use an audio EDL. If this is the kind of thing you'd like to do and need more info, let me know and I'd be happy to walk you through it.

Regards,

Mark
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Creator of 'EDI' applications for sound post editors
www.soundsinsync.com
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  #6  
Old 08-10-2017, 07:59 PM
koo_koo_bonkers koo_koo_bonkers is offline
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Default Re: What is the current state of AAF export back to Avid MC ?

Mark .. this is so incredibly helpful .. I really appreciate you taking time out to explain how you're doing this .. I'll have another go at this next week.
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