XDCAM Transfer and Rebuilding offline media in FCP

[Zachary Fink]

I'm just about to start logging my initial footage for a feature length documentary that I've begun to shoot. When I'm done, I'll have around 100 hours of footage from my EX1 for this project alone.

In the fall, I'll also be shooting pre-production on my next film. This got me thinking about something that I haven't seen anywhere in these posts yet.

If I am using sony's XDCAM Transfer tool to log clips and subclips for both these projects, do I have to keep every single BPAV folder referenced on the sidebar of XDCAM Transfer in order to be able to keep the clip and subclip meta data?

For example, say I have a single BPAV folder in XDCAM Transfer, and I log a bunch of clips and subclips with names and descriptions, then export these as .mov files to a Final Cut Pro project, and then remove the BPAV folder from XDCAM Transfer's side bar. If I need to "retransfer" any of those .mov files from the original BPAV folder to Final Cut, is it possible? I tested this, and when I "re-added" the BPAV folder to XDCAM Transfer, none of the subclips, names or descriptions were there.

One of the strengths of non-linear digital editing is the ability to reconstitute a Final Cut project from offline raw materials! I would hope that I don't have to keep every BPAV folder I ever shoot in the sidebar of XDCAM Transfer in order to do so! I'll be searching through them for hours to find what I want.

How are people approaching this? Am I missing something?

[Craig Seeman]

My fear also. I don't subclip for that reason. When you need to convert BPAV back to MOV you may need to keep the same naming convention too.

An awkward alternative is to back up the MOVs too.

Yes, no one mentions how to properly reconstitute a projects. One would hope such logging info would be kept with the BPAV. I'd also love to hear what others are doing in this regard.

[Zachary Fink]

So are you logging your material only in FCP? And making subclips of your .mov files there? Ugh. What a pain! Any other thoughts? How about backing up the XDCAM Transfer preference file and starting with a fresh one for each project, then replacing it when you want to go back? I might test that....

[Zachary Fink]

...So, I made a backup folder inside the folder:

~/Library/Application Support/Sony XDCAM Transfer

Inside the backup folder I'm making folders that have the name of my project, and another with the Trip Number (I go into the field for a few weeks at a time).

If you move the three folders inside the XDCAM Transfer Folder (Databases, Proxies, Thumbnails) into the backup folder of your choice, then open XDCAM Transfer again, it will recreate those three folders and the sources will be empty.

This allows me to log and describe only the SxS cards from a given trip (This last trip left me with more than 50 BPAV folders) or project.

If I want to work with another grouping, I can simply copy the current folder set to the appropriate backup folder (after quitting the app), and copy/move the needed backup folder to the standard location.

A bit scary, but I can't see importing everything in FCP just to log!

[Craig Seeman]

I wonder what the point of the logging info is if it isn't written back to the BPAV folder (as XML?).

I'm under the impression that ClipBrowser 2 might replace the need for XDCAM Transfer tool so maybe Sony is addressing all this.

[Zachary Fink]

Do we know when it's supposed to be released?