C200: XFAVC Workflow in FCPX

A

Anatole Sloan

Member
I've found the XF-AVC workflow in FCPX to be somewhat peculiar in a couple of ways. Wondered whether anybody here has had any experience with it.

1) It seems that XF-AVC footage has to be copied over to the library. You can't link to external files (which is my usual preference).

2) I'm currently shooting a documentary and have about 10 days worth of footage in separate events, one per day. FCPX seems to have repackaged the XF-AVC files into .mov containers for all events except for one; in that one, files retain their .mxf endings but of course don't retain any of the XMLs etc.

(1) is of course the consequence of the repackaging.

What are people's thoughts on the XF-AVC workflow in general? I presume much of the metadata doesn't survive the import process, though I do much prefer the file numbering on XF-AVC over MP4.

Are any C300 shooters able to chime in? You've had long-term experience of the XF-AVC workflow, so maybe you have an idea of what's intentional and what might simply be temporary lack of support from Apple.
 
FCPX handles other codecs the same way. If you're importing files from your card(s), you'll always have to copy them over. If applicable (supported), you can sometimes separate your camera files from the original card structure (like .mts for example) and import them without copying, but that's not recommended.

I don't think I've ever seen any standalone files (which you're not separating from your media) that you're able to "leave files in place" besides .movs and .mp4s.

You can check any metadata (if available) in the 'Info Inspector'. And as far as transcoding to the AVC (or whatever it is), I'd bet the .movs are preserving 99% of the original quality, but are much more efficient for FCPX's overall performance.
 
Can someone tell me how to import C200/XC15 XF-AVC files into FCPX 10.4? After much research and utility downloading, I can't seem to make this work.
 
Thanks guys, that's helpful. Having played with it a few days, it's starting to make more sense.

I'd bet the .movs are preserving 99% of the original quality, but are much more efficient for FCPX's overall performance.
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Yeah it's only doing a repackage, in which case it should retain 100% of the original quality. Seems like some of the metadata disappears – e.g. when you mark the clips in camera.

If applicable (supported), you can sometimes separate your camera files from the original card structure (like .mts for example) and import them without copying, but that's not recommended.
Click to expand...

Working with a lightweight library is in general preferable, since a) it's much easier to hand off footage between editors and b) it's much more feasible when working with large quantities of data, since you can keep rushes on different hard drives and even disconnect them and work just with the proxies. I've also not found any difference in stability or speed in the past.

Separately: am I right that XF-AVC support doesn't seem to extend to Compressor? In order to batch convert files to Prores, I'm having to work with Media Encoder.
 
With library management, it really depends on the workflow and circumstances (like how many people are working on something).

At times, I do prefer to have media on external devices, but sometimes it's easier to simply hand off an icon (a library) and have everything self-contained (now "consolidated"), and not have to worry about any other files anywhere else. So it can either be a 700GB icon/library (example) somewhere, or a 1GB library and a folder(s) filled with 699GBs you'll have to provide.

Personally, I'm not sure about XF-AVC/Compressor...if you provide a sample file I can test it out on my end.
 
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