XDCAM Reality Television Workflow
January 11, 2010
XDCAM blows. What initially seemed like the greatest invention in the history of video production should NOT be used for any high end video production.
10. Digitized XDCAM clips cannot be imported, and imported XDCAM clips cannot be digitized. Neither can be relinked to the other, modified, or manually imported. I’ve spent hours and hours to prove it can’t be done.
9. Avid’s Symphony Nitris can not playback the XDCAM’s native HD video format. It must be transcoded to DNxHD in order for it to play correctly.
8. Avid cannot export “Long GOP” media, such as a quicktime reference of an imported XDCAM clip. It must first be mixed down from MPEG-4 525 to a more familiar video format such as 10:1m.
7. Avid’s function “Import XDCAM Proxy…” will not import clips longer than 10 minutes to a Unity drive without giving you an STD.
“Exception: std::exception, what:[MainThread] Threads::SendThreadMessage: Thread message queue full XDCAMMPEG4Processor FifoSpaceAvail”
It must first be imported to the internal hard drive, and then copied over to the Unity.
6. XDCAM proxy media will only come into the system 16:9 anamorphic.
5. XDCAM proxy audio is not the same quality as 10:1 audio. It’s much worse. And when going to online, all the low quality audio must be recaptured (not a usual step in a television workflow). Producers and editors may also complain about the audio quality.
4. When the XDCAM setting “Batch Import Hi-Resolution Media” is turned off, it still batch imports Hi-Resolution media.
3. It got my hopes up, the spirits of those around me, and then smashed my head in.
2. There are probably even more Avid issues when dealing with XDCAM proxy media I have not yet discovered, whereas working 10:1 has been proven in the past.
1. According to the Line Producer, it was a waste of money to shoot in XDCAM.
We will be digitizing XDCAM tapes as opposed to importing to avoid all these issues, saving us no time at all and probably costing us more in equipment rentals vs. shooting in a different tape format.
-Matthew Rittorno
I agree, the XDCAM proxy-import-then-reimport-the-high-res-for-online-and-mix workflow blows big time. And yet it seems so entrenched, it’s like Sony thought it up, developed it, and created an entire infrastructure around it before anyone caught wind of it to tell them it sucked.
However, I love working with XDCAM in a digitizing workflow. For the most part, it’s just like working with another tape format like IMX or digibeta, but when you batch capture anything, some decks like the PDW-1500 will instantly cue to the pre-roll point. No shuttling around for minutes on end. I can uprez an entire 43-minute program in two hours.
I agree with Brad. The instant cueing feature almost single-handedly makes XDCAM my favorite “tape” format. Plus the proxy files can be quickly imported directly into Pilotware for logging and viewing by the producers. Other things I love – knowing exactly how many clips are on the tape and being able to jump to the beginning of each one; being able to reformat a disc very easily; being able to see the video on the deck’s LCD screen without patching the video to a monitor.
[...] Matthew Rittorno – XDCAM Reality Television Workflow [...]
With all due respect, seems like most of the problems you have faced are related to a lack of understanding as to the proper workflow. Avid works really well with long gop media (AMA or otherwise), and as long as you know the rules, you can play to win. I would be happy to explain more, and even show you a demo. The use of tape based media is on the way out, and as comforting as JFIF codecs are, the future is file based / proxy.
What do you recommend, I’d love to learn of a better workflow. #5 is the biggest reason we chose not to import XDCAM tapes so that the editors and producers wouldn’t complain about the audio.
[...] solutions at this point. For more information, here’s an article I wrote awhile back, http://rittorno.wordpress.com/2010/01/11/xdcam-reality-television-workflow/ . If new technology scares you, write a line in the budget for two decks, tape stock, and a night [...]