Hey all, Hope you're keeping well! I have an interesting project that I'm looking for advice with...

Rushes have been shot with a non-timecode camera and I'm trying to conform that into resolve for colour.

All the clips have unique file names, but the timcode of all of them start at 00:00:00:00

The workflow is to transcode and edit offline in Avid, then conform into davinci resolve with the camera originals. 

I try to AAF the offline timeline into resolve, I can see the edits, but everything is offline, with the error message: the clip failed to link because the timecode extents do not mach any clip in the mediapool.

I am able to relink my avid timeline to the camera originals so I do end up with an online timeline in avid but i'm unable to get that into resolve. 

I'm wondering if anyone knew if resolve is able to conform to cameras with non native timecode?

Thanks in advance!

Screenshots

https://ibb.co/MRxCJqV

https://ibb.co/FXZKQrz

https://ibb.co/V3XrBHL

https://ibb.co/XJbkvj6

Sorry never had clips without TC so the following is my best guess from Resolve to MC and back experiences.

Probably not much help this time but I would try testing with a few clips opening camera originals in Resolve and creating proxies from them String those out in a Resolve timeline then export the timeline as an AAF with clips clips into an Avid Media folder.   Drag that AAF into your MC project and edit with those few proxie clips  Export that AAF without media and open it in the original Resolve project.  Your timeline should open from the camera originals. 

Posing your question to the Resolve forum could get you a way to add or change the Meta data associated with a clip that could give you an  easier workflow.

Andrew

Create a timeline of one clip and send that to resolve.  Manually load the clip into your media page.  Take a careful look at it's properties.  Is it the same frame rate and length?  You said they all have unique filenames, but timecode starts at 00...that should in theory still work...if Resolve sees the timecode starting at 00 as well.

If you conform this timeline of 1 using the "conform with clip" function in Resolve, does that put the proper part of the shot into the clip?

If you post a clip, i'd love to take a look.

If you can uprez in Avid to the clips, i would also make sure you are creating your list from the uprezed files.

 

Worst case scenario, you export a full rez file out of Avid and chop it up inside resolve with the help of an EDL, or bring it back into Avid, and chop it up with the subdivde tool, and make a list from that.

Not sure how deep in you are with your project, but we use Shutter Encoder to embed TC into camera media that doesn't include TC. For example DJI cameras. Shutter Encoder is free and has a quick TC embed based on file creation date/time. That way every clip should have unique TC. This is done before ingest to the original camera media (or a copy of the original). The embed process is extremely fast. Takes no more time than it does to copy the media from point A to point B.

FWIW Here is a Resolve forum thread that has a copy and paste script that allows you to modify clips timecodes,by using Resolve's version of Console 

https://forum.blackmagicdesign.com/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=73220

Looks like this needs to be done in the media pool before the clip hits a timeline.  Creating Resolve Proxies with BITC  for my MC editing would make a later conform in Resolve very straight forward.

Disclosure  These days I start all edit Projects in Resolve for media management and offline media creation before an AAF transfer to MC. my final step is an AAF back to Resolve for grading.  All my storage is local shared between 2 PC networked machines.

Thank you all for taking the time to respond... What a FAFF!!

I changed the starting timecode of all of the clips to something different on both resolve and avid so no clip had the same  timecode. I assigned tape IDs, I tried to aaf over smaller sequences... nothing appeared to work. The clips in the resolve timeline would be all offline and I was unable to bring them back online.

I gave up so did a high res export and scene cut detect in resolve.

Doing some further testing today and noticed when I transcode in resolve, ingest to avid, then aaf back to resolve, everything works and the conform goes smoothly. When I transcode in avid, edit in avid, then aaf to resolve at the end, the conform falls apart, and the clips ingest into resolve offline with an error message. Right clicking the clip in the resolve timeline, and hitting conform to selected media pool doesn't work as the clip conformed is in the wrong place.

So... from now on... when I know I will end up in resolve I will transcode in resolve too. But still.. the initial workflow should have still worked. The camera files had the same name, the timecode was correct on both offline and online clips, no changes in framerate between offline and online media

Could MC be clearing some sort of metadata that resolve needs during the transcode? 

Here are the source files from this project: https://we.tl/t-g92Otb4q6q

Hi Phillip, When transcoding in a Resolve Project first do you always AAF back from MC without Media? Since I cottoned on to this, round tripping  became bullet proof.

Philip Kapadia:

Could MC be clearing some sort of metadata that resolve needs during the transcode? 

I think it is more that the Resolve 32 bit float system always works with the original media. So rendering proxies / transcodes in Resolve the proxy clips are named by Resolve consequently Resolve knows the relationship back to the original clips media.

An idea to try could be to keep the original footage in a folder that is common to both MC and Resolve. Link to this footage in MC for the MC transcode.  Add the original footage into a Resolve projects media pool. From MC export an AAF of the cut without media for Resolve. Sorry I wont have time this week to test this theory with your footage. 

AndrewAction:

Hi Phillip, When transcoding in a Resolve Project first do you always AAF back from MC without Media? Since I cottoned on to this, round tripping  became bullet proof.

Hey Andrew, Not really sure I understand this question. My workflow was to ingest in avid, picture lock in avid, then export a linked only AAF from Avid to ingest into resolve and conform with camera original media.

AndrewAction:

An idea to try could be to keep the original footage in a folder that is common to both MC and Resolve. Link to this footage in MC for the MC transcode.  Add the original footage into a Resolve projects media pool. From MC export an AAF of the cut without media for Resolve. Sorry I wont have time this week to test this theory with your footage. 

That's what I did in this initial workflow. The very same media in the same location was in a camera original folder which was transcoded to my offline resolution, then in resolve I relinked back to that media

let me know if I missunderstood, but many thanks for your time! 

Philip, i just did a test with your footage:

-Linked into an Avid 1080p 50 project.

-Transcoded in Avid.  Kept files frame rate, to DNX SQ...randomly picked 3 of the shots.

-Cut a sequence.  Simple sequence, but either way.  All 3 shots, using a section from the middle of the shot.

Exported AAF from Avid.

Imported AAF into Resolve. 

-Told resolve to not automatically import source clips into media pool.

-told resolve to relink to souce camera files.

-Got 3 "offline" clips on my timeline with an error log saying timecode extents didn't match any clip in the media pool.

(considering i don't have any media in the pool...this is to be expected.)

-Closed the log file

-right click on the timeline (aaf) icon in my master bin, and did a "timeline, reconform from media storage"

Told Resolve to conform using Timecode and Reel name using Source file name.

Pointed resulting popup window to the location of your original media.

Timeline populated with proper footage.

 

Glenn

 

Yeah of course it works when somebody else does it!!

Let me try this exact workflow when I get home. 

Managed to get it working by transcoding in resolve initially, but want to see if I can get it to work when starting in avid 

Typically i use Resolve for creating transcodes, simply because it is way faster.

That being said, if there is an issue with transcodes, i would assume it is because they were done in Resolve.

One or two settings in particular can really bugger up your entire workflow. (timecode setting and reel name setting)

Avid (In my experience) will always make it perfectly...at the cost of time.  The only thing you may do to bugger things up in Avid is have it convert the frame rate.  This could present issues, but even at that I find Avid is very good at tracking the proper data.

Hi Glenn, 

This did not work for me? 

I've attached a screenshot here and on my next post. 

attached

maybe post your aaf out of Avid, and I'll see if I can link to that in Resolve.

(and maybe 1 of your Avid transcodes...just a small 1 that is also in your timeline.)

 

Glenn

Having just tried to conform a proper production with timecoded cameras but same workflow... works fine. Just seems to be this project?