XDCAM EX files in Vegas 8.0?

[Skipcam]

Anybody know how to get files on an SxS card into Vegas 8.0 via the SBAC USB cardreader? I can play the clops in the XDCAM clip browser, but when I try and export them via MXF I get a "unsupported file format" window.

[Douglas]

Go to the Sony website and download the newer version of Clip Browser. The one that comes on the CD-ROM doesn't work right. That should fix it.

Doug
www.VortexMedia.com

[BluesCam]

Isn't it a bitch that Sony Vegas doesn't natively accept those files? For some reason they chose an MP4 wrapper for the EX1.

[Douglas]

Isn't it a bitch that Sony Vegas doesn't natively accept those files? For some reason they chose an MP4 wrapper for the EX1.

BluesCam, don't worry about it. What difference does it make anyway? EVERY video clip on the EX1 is buried in it's own folder with four other support files. So even if you could read the native MP4 files, you'd still have to go through some kind of a process to exract all those MP4 files from their own folders and put them into one place so you could work with them more conveniently.

The unwrapping from MP4 and re-wrapping to MXF or MOV happens automatically during the transfer and it doesn't add even one second of time to the transfer time. There's no transcoding or anything else, it's more like just re-naming the file.

So what's the big deal? It may seem that way until you work with the camera, but once you've seen how seamless it is, you never give it a second thought.

There's a few things to dislike about the EX1, but that's not one of them.

Doug
www.VortexMedia.com (http://www.VortexMedia.com)

[Skipcam]

Doug: You're right. I downloaded the clip browser from Sony Biznet and it was version 1.01 while the version that came with the camera was version 1.0. It now exports MXF. Great job on the DVD. I had the Z1U and PDW350 versions so I knew what the quality level was. Anybody recognize you on the street and ask for autographs?
Cheers!

[Douglas]

That's not me in the video. I hired a homeless guy for $20 to stand-in and memorize the lines. You get what you pay for.

Doug
www.VortexMedia.com (http://www.VortexMedia.com)

[Canonman]

That's not me in the video. I hired a homeless guy for $20 to stand-in and memorize the lines. You get what you pay for.

Doug
www.VortexMedia.com (http://www.VortexMedia.com)

Yeah that guy in the video looks like he came right off of skid row. :D

cm

[BluesCam]

BluesCam, don't worry about it. What difference does it make anyway? EVERY video clip on the EX1 is buried in it's own folder with four other support files. So even if you could read the native MP4 files, you'd still have to go through some kind of a process to exract all those MP4 files from their own folders and put them into one place so you could work with them more conveniently.

The unwrapping from MP4 and re-wrapping to MXF or MOV happens automatically during the transfer and it doesn't add even one second of time to the transfer time. There's no transcoding or anything else, it's more like just re-naming the file.

So what's the big deal? It may seem that way until you work with the camera, but once you've seen how seamless it is, you never give it a second thought.

There's a few things to dislike about the EX1, but that's not one of them.

Doug
www.VortexMedia.com (http://www.VortexMedia.com)

Good to know Douglas. I just remember the Sony rep saying you could not work with the files directly and that there was a software step in the middle. I'm glad to hear it's not as big of a pain as it sounded like. He said that Apple with FCP had "stepped up early" and could use them directly.

[Douglas]

I've heard that SpeedEdit and maybe Edius (don't quote me on that) can work with the native MP4 files without re-wrapping to something else, but then you still have the problem of the MP4s being scattered all over the card in their own folders.

I'm sure that someone will come up with a simple utility program to go through the card . . . extract all the MP4 files it finds . . . and copy them all to a single folder someplace on your hard drive where you can manage them better.

But utimately, that's really no different than the workflow we already have, so what difference does it make. If re-wrapping degraded the footage or took a lot of time, that would be one thing, but it's invisbile and non-destructive.

I'm very happy with the workflow between the EX1 and FCP, and I'm not hoping for any "improvements". If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Doug
www.VortexMedia.com

[BluesCam]

So you are primarily using FCP not Vegas. I have been looking at FCP, but for now I think I'll stay with Vegas. I hear FCP has to render almost everything. Tooling up on the MAC would be more $$$ than I want to spend right now. Still looking though.

[SimonW]

FCP doesn't have to render everything. It can play back the timeline in realtime just like Vegas. Stuff only needs rendering if you want to guarantee realtime playback on complex effects. In this respect it is exactly the same as Vegas. In fact, as much as I love Vegas, many things in FCP play back better in realtime because FCP uses the GPU of the graphics card I believe to speed things up.

[BluesCam]

Well that's good to know. Maybe worth a look. Thanks.