ASK & DISCUSS INDEX

12 years, 2 months ago - James Goodenough

I'm working on a project at the moment that was filmed on a C300 and have had no issues. I usually shoot on an EX3 and when I started using PP I had a few glitches, as I used to import footage folders, but if you use Media Browser to navigate to the folder, everything is there just waiting to be natively imported.

But yes, I would reiterate the importance of folder structure with digital work-flows, I used a camera op once, that only gave me the actual video files and had taken them out of the enclosing folder... I highlight that I only used him once!

12 years, 2 months ago - Andre Brito

Michael,
FCP, AVID or Premiere can all deal with MXF quite easily, so this is more likelly a problem with the file structure. Here are 3 options:
1. Take the CF cards with the original footage to your editor. As Alex points out, this should suffice to recover the footage (as long as the data in them is intact).
2, Take the camera and the CF cards: if the data in the cards is damaged (i.e. you switched off the camera while recording, removed the cards too soon, there was a solar storm...), there should be an in-camera option to recover data. Your editor probably knows this and is being helpful by thinking ahead.
3. If the file structure is in fact compromised, there is still a last resort (which I have used more than once and works). It is called "Brorsoft MXF Converter", costs $29 (less than £20) and can recover damaged MXF files whilst turning them into a myriad of formats (Apple ProRes, H264, Mpeg4, raw, etc).

Obviously, there is "damaged" and then there is completely lost. Brorsoft is unlikelly to save you from the latter. One of the common mistakes when wrangling MXF files is to open the CF card in the computer, then open the "Contents" folder and drag everything in it to the hard drive for editing. You HAVE to copy EVERYTHING inside that CF card - without the "Contents" you loose crucial data.

Another thig: your edito should have installed the Canon utility and plug in that comes in a CD with the camera. The utility allows you to copy safely, as well as watch your clips without even opening your NLE. The plug in allow FCP to copy the MXF files onto your capture been just as if they were regular clips (I'm not a FCP X user though, so some steps could be slightly different).

Hope this helps an good luck!

12 years, 2 months ago - Peter Ward

A crucial piece of information: what version of Premiere? CS5 and later take Canon MXF. IIRC they used to ship a plugin that you may be able to track down for CS4.

Also, is the footage still in MXF wrapper? Or were the file rewrapped to MOV by FCP? If they're MoV you should transcode to ProRes in FCP then Premiere can read.

12 years, 2 months ago - Sotiris Alexie

I've been in this exact situation. The camera records in such a way that for the video files to work properly, you need all the other little files that are also created on the card when you record, because all the other files contain structure and meta-data. Basically, you can't use the video files in isolation.

Taking the camera seems like overkill however. Just take the card/s you recorded on over. Or, copy the entire contents of the card/s (without changing the file structure) onto a hard-drive and take that. Premier Pro can read C300 files natively so transcoding to another format would be waste of time and quality. Hope this helps.

12 years, 2 months ago - Phil Macdonald

So I have a c300 and the little editing I do I do on Premiere and one of the main reasons for doing this is its simplicity in use. C300 output MXF files and premiere can read this natively unlike something like fcp where typically you would transcode to prores.

The only reason I can see that your editor is having problems is that the entire contents of the cards weren't given to him by DIT. It is vital to keep that file structure in place, to copy exactly what is on the CF cards direct over to your hard drive. I don't quite understand why he wants you to lug your C300 over, all you need are the original CF cards that you shot on, copy over the entire directory, open up the MXF files within premiere, I normally go via prelude and you're good to go :)

Good luck with it all

Phil

12 years, 2 months ago - Andre Brito

Here is Brorsoft should you need it: www.brorsoft.com/mxf-converter - and sorry about the typos - wrote too quickly!