Dual Monos from OMF not Recording?

[brianbobcat]

Hello all,

Full disclosure, I'm an editor, but I'm trying to troubleshoot for our sound mixer. I had 8 ISO audio tracks in Premiere Pro CS6 and exported an OMF for our sound mixer. The OMF was Separate Files because the file size, 3.3GB once exported, was too big to be an Encapsulated OMF. I got a call today that he's having issues with the OMF and was wondering if you could shed any light to me please.

Issue 1: Files came in as Dual Mono when they were just mono in my timeline.
He called me and told me that everything came in as stereo pair files, which I found weird. Once I asked if he could change them to be dual mono instead, that's when he clarified that they're already dual mono. I guess he's trying to add reverb to some tracks, but that can't be done with dual mono tracks. Does this sound right? My ProTools experience ended on version 6 or so, so I'm deferring to someone here. Can reverbs be applied to dual mono tracks?

Issue 2: The mixer is trying to bus all the tracks together and record that, but he tells me when he does that, nothing records.
Again, does this sound normal? It sounds like now he's trying to blame them coming from an OMF as the issue, but I know that ProTools has been able to handle OMFs without anything else needed since version 9, and he's on 10, so I don't know why the OMF is an issue. This is the first time we've worked with this mixer, and he was supposed to get everything built yesterday before the clients came in today, but didn't and now he's running into these issues.

I've Googled and read many articles here about turning mono tracks into Stereo, but haven't read anything that would explain what he says is happening. If anyone could shed ANY light on either issue, I would be eternally grateful.

Thank you,
-Brian

[Chief Technician]

Originally Posted by brianbobcat

Hello all,

Full disclosure, I'm an editor, but I'm trying to troubleshoot for our sound mixer.

Full disclosure - I don't use Premiere Pro CS 6.

Originally Posted by brianbobcat

I had 8 ISO audio tracks in Premiere Pro CS6 and exported an OMF for our sound mixer. The OMF was Separate Files because the file size, 3.3GB once exported, was too big to be an Encapsulated OMF.

Do you have the option of exporting the media as separate files (not embedded)? Do you have the option of exporting an AAF?

Originally Posted by brianbobcat

I got a call today that he's having issues with the OMF and was wondering if you could shed any light to me please.

Issue 1: Files came in as Dual Mono when they were just mono in my timeline.
He called me and told me that everything came in as stereo pair files, which I found weird. Once I asked if he could change them to be dual mono instead, that's when he clarified that they're already dual mono. I guess he's trying to add reverb to some tracks, but that can't be done with dual mono tracks. Does this sound right? My ProTools experience ended on version 6 or so, so I'm deferring to someone here. Can reverbs be applied to dual mono tracks?

You could apply a reverb to a dual mono track. Whether or not that is a good idea or practical is another matter.

Originally Posted by brianbobcat

Issue 2: The mixer is trying to bus all the tracks together and record that, but he tells me when he does that, nothing records.
Again, does this sound normal? It sounds like now he's trying to blame them coming from an OMF as the issue, but I know that ProTools has been able to handle OMFs without anything else needed since version 9, and he's on 10, so I don't know why the OMF is an issue. This is the first time we've worked with this mixer, and he was supposed to get everything built yesterday before the clients came in today, but didn't and now he's running into these issues.

I suspect operator error. That problem should be independent of the OMF you provided.

Originally Posted by brianbobcat

I've Googled and read many articles here about turning mono tracks into Stereo, but haven't read anything that would explain what he says is happening. If anyone could shed ANY light on either issue, I would be eternally grateful.

If these dual mono files have the same name with the exception of a .L and .R, he could drag them to a stereo track.

[Kasper]

Brian, the Chief seems to be on it but I'll add ...

Don't get hung up on mono, dual mono or stereo - - it's doesn't matter.
If you have dual mono, just delete the dupes and mix it.
If you have it on a Stereo track, break it out to 2 mono tracks, then delete the dupe.

"apply" reverb is nebulous - - do you want to destructively burn the reverb to each element, creating a new file (Audio Suite)?
Or are you adding reverb to the final mix?

OMF files can easily become corrupt. I've seen it many times from Final Cut, AVID and Premiere.
SO, I won't cast aspersions on your mixer .... just yet.
But it seems like he's cocked it up somewhere if he can't get a mix happening.

Are you looking to get this sorted out ASAP?
ie: hire another mixer/editor?
If so, I may know someone to help you out

Seriously, I'll take a look at one of your OMF's (gratis) and we could go from there.

kasper

[brianbobcat]

Originally Posted by Chief Technician

Do you have the option of exporting the media as separate files (not embedded)? Do you have the option of exporting an AAF?

It was exported as separate files because when I tried to do embedded, it said there was a 2GB limit for those types of OMFs. As for the AAF option, no, it was greyed out so I could only do AIFFs (I believe that was the output format).

Originally Posted by Chief Technician

You could apply a reverb to a dual mono track. Whether or not that is a good idea or practical is another matter.

The audio that we have, it was a concert, was mixed live and I thought mixed quite well to begin with. I don't know ultimately what pushed them to get everything remixed and I certainly don't know why they'd want to add reverb, just that I got call after call saying the mixer couldn't add it.

Originally Posted by Chief Technician

I suspect operator error. That problem should be independent of the OMF you provided. If these dual mono files have the same name with the exception of a .L and .R, he could drag them to a stereo track.

Our director ended up calling another mixer he knew with these questions, and your first assessment sounds more appropriate. Since these all started as mono files, he could've deleted one of the tracks and been left with just a mono file as well, or so we were told.

I got a call today to ask how I would like the mixed files exported, so I think we're good now, but it was my first time in a while making an OMF and although there were very few options I could change in Premiere, I'm relieved that these issues weren't or even couldn't be caused by coming from an OMF. Thank you Chief and Kasper for your replies. The musicians themselves were in supervising the mix that was yesterday and today, so it's all done now, but I have definitely learned some info and will be able to share some of it with our director when I get the final mixed audio back.

Thanks much,
-Brian

[Chief Technician]

Originally Posted by brianbobcat

Thank you Chief and Kasper for your replies.

Glad to help!