When copying from SD card to computer for back up, back up whole file structure?

[Sam Young]

Hello folks,

Currently I have been making backups of the footage from my HM100 by backing up at the "private" level. Can I just backup the "clips" folder and expect everything will be okay when I drag clips into FCP?

Thanks!

Sam

[Eric Deyerler]

I save only the clips, but when I want to save
it back on SDHC-card I save it with the privatefolder.

[Simon Lucas]

Originally Posted by Sam Young

Hello folks,

Currently I have been making backups of the footage from my HM100 by backing up at the "private" level. Can I just backup the "clips" folder and expect everything will be okay when I drag clips into FCP?

Thanks!

Sam

Yes, you can back up that way. FCP does not need any other data than that which exists in the movie files themselves.

The INFO folder holds xml files, one for each clip, which have information about the clips, such as codec, data rate, frame size, frame rate etc and audio settings and timecode.

for example the video codecType for one of my clips reads:

'MPEG2_VBR35M_1920_1080_30P_MP@HL'

Also the MEDIAINF.XML file has a list of all the movieclips.

I suspect that this information is only used by the camera – i.e. probably for playback and record keeping and is therefore be needed when using the camera for playback. In fact placing a lone clip back on a re-formatted card will produce a 'Video Management File damaged' error in the camera.

[Bob Richardson]

Yes, I back up the entire contents of the card with the "Private" folder as the top level. The extra files take up very little space, and if I ever want to put the files back into the camera (for example, to use the camera as a portable playback device), I know all the needed information will be there for it to play.

I have multiple SDHC cards and I have them all numbered. When I save files to my video drive for a project, I put them in a raw footage folder for that particular project, with a subfolder with the date and the card number. For example, "Card 4" on today's date would be "20091101-04". The reason I store the card number is that if I ever notice any corruption in the files (I haven't yet) or other file structure related trouble, I have a clue as to whether a particular card correlates with the problems.

[Dan Magnafichi]

Being new to this "tapeless" format your comments on this thread have brought up some questions. If after a shoot, I download all the clips to a folder on my i-Mac, can I then import them into FCP and then copy them to a Data DVD for archiving, thereby freeing up the SDHC card for another shoot? Then, when I've finished the edit can I delete the files from the i-Mac folder, freeing up disc space and knowing that if I have to remount the project I can bring the footage back in from the Data DVD?

Sill trying to figure this all out!
Dan

[Maurice Bernard]

Hello,
I am interessé by this camescope ( HM100) but I have some questions concerning the acquisition!
I work on Premiere CS4, for the users of this soft, how procedez-vous for the acquisition in premiere, can you advise me?
Thanks to you for your advice(councils).
Cordially
Bernard

[Simon Lucas]

Originally Posted by Dan Magnafichi

Being new to this "tapeless" format your comments on this thread have brought up some questions.

Sill trying to figure this all out!
Dan

Dan,
You sounds to me like you have a thorough grasp on all this. I can only confirm what you are saying. In this sense it is far easier to recreate an FCP project using the tapeless format than it is to recapture from tape.

If you cannot reproduce the project's original file structure exactly then FCP will simply ask to be reconnected to the original media files when you open the FCP project file. But it is most likely you will have backed up the whole project anyway.

Simon

[Simon Lucas]

Originally Posted by Maurice Bernard

Hello,
I am interessé by this camescope ( HM100) but I have some questions concerning the acquisition!
I work on Premiere CS4,

Bernard,
I tend to use FCP but recently tried editing JVC HM100 XDCAM QT files in Premiere CS4. No problems. I simply created a new project and then chose the XDCAM preset that corresponded to the movie clip settings from the camera. That's it.

Simon


As an aside, I like Premiere as it is the first video editor I ever used and so am interested in using it more now that i have re-discovered it. I like the compatibility with After Effects very much. My only criticism so far is it's reliance on Adobe's Media Encoder which seems poorly designed. Does anyone have any suggestions how to avoid AME altogether?