Catalyst Browse Rewrap BPAV to MXF

[sophocles]

Content Browser on a Mac with any recent OS no longer works. With Catalyst Browse, there doesn't seem to be a way to export a BPAV as an MXF for NLEs, but instead it all has to be reencoded. This also means you can't trim if you want to retain the BPAV folder. I think Content Browser intelligently rewrapped the content without transcoding....

Is such a thing possible in Catalyst Browse? Am I just missing it?

Thanks

[cyvideo]

I think you may be missing it? It is pretty fast on my systems. I think it is "rewrapping" as opposed to transcoding. The only ay I know in Browse?

Chris Young

Browse BPAV + oulines.jpg

ATALYST BPAV TO MXF.jpg

[cyvideo]

Content Browser on a Mac with any recent OS no longer works. With Catalyst Browse, there doesn't seem to be a way to export a BPAV as an MXF for NLEs, but instead it all has to be reencoded. This also means you can't trim if you want to retain the BPAV folder. I think Content Browser intelligently rewrapped the content without transcoding....

Is such a thing possible in Catalyst Browse? Am I just missing it?

Thanks

Just thinking, painful I know!

Are you editing in FCPX? If so are you aware of this software designed specifically for EX files to FCPX.

Also, I know a few colleagues on Mac use Edit Ready for this purpose.

Chris Young

https://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/pdzk-lt2

https://www.divergentmedia.com/editready

[sophocles]

Thanks Chris, I've been pondering over whether this just rewraps or reencodes for a bit, and thought as you do for a while, but have become convinced that it is truly transcoding; I don't deal with BPAV a whole lot, so my testing on it has been rather sporadic. It is pretty fast.

I recently dealt with some, and had a PC on hand where Content Browser still works.

And, it just isn't as fast as when I do this in Clip Browser. The real clue to me though is the file size. The export from Clip Browser is larger, and matches the file size of the BPAV folder; the export from Catalyst is smaller, often several GBs; altho it's fast, I think it's truly transcoding, which doesn't seem like a good thing when I'm trying to preserve original quality, even if it's perceptually indiscernible.

EditReady looks very interesting. I've written their support to confirm whether their software can just rewrap the footage.

Thanks much for your help!

[cyvideo]

Have you considered running "Parallels" on your Mac? This should then allow you to run and use many Windows apps on the latest Mac OS platforms. Including Content Browser of course. I still use it when I have BPAV footage come in. A lot of EX's still floating around and working out there.

https://machow2.com/best-way-run-windows-mac/

https://www.parallels.com/au/?cjeven...ium=AFFILIATES

Chris Young

[Doug Jensen]

Content Browser on a Mac with any recent OS no longer works. With Catalyst Browse, there doesn't seem to be a way to export a BPAV as an MXF for NLEs, but instead it all has to be reencoded. This also means you can't trim if you want to retain the BPAV folder. I think Content Browser intelligently rewrapped the content without transcoding....

Is such a thing possible in Catalyst Browse? Am I just missing it?

Thanks

What exactly are you trying to accomplish? Why would you need to rewrap footage to MXF in 2021? Anything you throw at your NLE should be handled effortlessly. Why not just use the original files in the original BPAV folder and be done with it?

Just for the heck of it, I did some testing with my Mac on some F3 footage from 2012 inside the original BPAV folder. I found that the footage It is 100% compatible with the latest versions of Catalyst Browse, Resolve, and Premiere. Also, I was able to mark new in/out points in Catalyst Browse and export shorter (or original length) MP4 files in the BPAV folder to MXF files in another folder. I don't know why anyone would bother doing that, but it is easy enough and very fast.

What am I missing?

[cyvideo]

You are not missing anything DJ. The OP originally asked about "Rewrapping" in Cat Browse. Something they were and said they were going to implement in Browse but to the best of my knowledge it never happened. Browse won't rewrap media it only re-encodes media to another format. I don't think he required the ability to export in/out selections or anything like that. He just wanted to rewrap. A fair enough question I guess. As you suggested I think most of us would work natively with the files in whatever format they arrived. It was the OP's rewrap question I was attempting to reply to.

Chris Young

[Doug Jensen]

Hi Chris, when the OP said "This also means you can't trim if you want to retain the BPAV folder." I assumed he meant he wanted to trim the in/out points of a long clip and generate a shorter version. That is something I do all the time when ingesting very long clips that have a lot of unwanted junk. In my case I'm alsways going from MXF to the exact same MXF codec so there is no re-encoding or any other issues. It is like taking a 6' length of rope and cutting off 2' at both ends. The remaining 2' from the middle is exactly the same as it was before cutting.

So, when I use CB to convert an MP4 file in a BPAV folder . . . to MXF in another folder . . . how can I determine if that is just putting it in a different wrapper or if it is re-encoding?

[cyvideo]

Doug. The original OP says:

"And, it just isn't as fast as when I do this in Clip Browser. The real clue to me though is the file size. The export from Clip Browser is larger, and matches the file size of the BPAV folder; the export from Catalyst is smaller, often several GBs; altho it's fast, I think it's truly transcoding, which doesn't seem like a good thing when I'm trying to preserve original quality, even if it's perceptually indiscernible."

I've noticed this too. Even though as the OP says the quality hit is perceptually indiscernible the very fact that the file size can be dramatically different would indicate to me that transcoding is taking place as opposed to rewrapping. It's probably a moot point with regards to any quality hit but there is no doubt not re-encoding is preferable, especially with those little 35 Megabit 420 files from the EX cams. I know I always prefer to rewrap as opposed to re-encode but as you say if you can work 100% natively with any file then all the better to do so.

Chris Young