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Any way to prevent dupes in Premiere Project file?

Participant ,
May 21, 2012 May 21, 2012

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Due to working with both PluralEyes as well as multiple editors on the same project, I deal with importing a lot of XML and PRPROJ files into existing project files that I've worked with.

This, on a large scale, becomes untenable because every time I import another editor's work or a synced sequence, I get duplicates of all my media in the project. I'm trying to figure out if there any way to have Premiere check to see if the media is already imported, and reference that media in the imported sequence? If not, I will just keep getting larger and larger project files with multiple references to the same media, because both me and my other editors are working with the same media, but for different sequences.

As far as I can tell, when you import an XML, or even a sequence from another Premiere project, it creates new master clips for every clip used in the imported sequence. It does not recognize that you may already have a master clip that you're using in another sequence that is referring to the same media.

So if you want to keep both sequences in your project, you need to keep both master clips. If you delete a master clip from your bin, it will not stay in the sequence(s) that refer to it, it will get cut out, leaving a big steaming crater where it once was. Even if the sequence is not currently open. This is one of the things I loved about FCP7. You could delete every single one of your master clips and your sequence would be totally unaffected. You could even recreate the master clips by dragging them from your sequence to the bin.

I think if there really is no way to manage these duplicates, this is a HUGE problem for professionals who are working in environments with multiple editors. This isn't just a "well, learn how to deal with a new editing system" - this is actually a deal-breaker; and actually the only one that I see REALLY preventing Premiere from being the go-to choice for larger post houses. This problem becomes so big so fast that it makes true collaborative editing downright impossible. In my office we might have three people on a project, all editing and revising segments and passing them back and forth. On FCP7 this was easy as pie - we'd just cut and paste between project files and use basic versioning best practices. In Premiere, our project files quickly become nightmares and work is often inadvertently deleted or lost.

I would like to see:

- Smart media handling when importing sequences and projects. Premiere should look at the filenames and file location and attempt to relink any duplicate media. If it stumbles, it should ask for help like FCP.

- A media consolidation inspection feature. I'd love to see an option for inspecting your project for duplicate media references. When found, Premiere should automatically consolidate.

- Streamlined sequence exporting. You should be able to export a single sequence. I know there's some version of this in Project Manager, but we all know it should be easier than this!

Anyone have any ideas on how to fix this?

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correct answers 1 Correct answer

Adobe Employee , Feb 11, 2016 Feb 11, 2016

Experiencing extreme frustration with this even in CC 2015!!! Have filled a bug report, I really hope this can be addressed soon!!!

Hi Darius,

Please file your specific frustrations here in a bug report.

Hard for me to convince large productions to make the switch to Premiere when little silly things like this still exist...

You can avoid duplicates in many cases, but you have to start each project with a few things in mind, especially if working in a collaborative environment.

  • There will be on
...

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Participant ,
Jul 15, 2014 Jul 15, 2014

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Sorry, we seem to be talking about different problems.  I am speaking about, when importing new sequences, the creation of duplicate media.  Your interaction on twitter is about deleting media and not having it be removed from sequences.  The duplicate media issue was fixed in Premiere CC 2014 - when you import, you are asked if you want to create duplicate clips.

If it's loading time you're worried about, I would be skeptical that deleting a clip from the project but not a timeline would speed load - the program still has to load the file because you're referencing it in the timeline.

If you really want better loading times, go Avid, dude, and use some bins.


R    

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Participant ,
Jul 15, 2014 Jul 15, 2014

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Hey Ryan,

We're not talking about different problems. If we could delete the duplicate media created after importing sequences, you and I could each edit birthday party footage from the same clips, exchange our work, then clean up our project files and stay organized.

The new version of Premiere doesn't work as advertised; merged clips are still duplicated upon import.

Re loading/saving times, I've actually tested this thoroughly... it's more related to the number of sequences you have in a project.  I tend to duplicate a sequence when I continue to work on it so I have a backup.  And I clean these up, and I also know that I'm working on a big project so it's inevitable that the project file gets big (btwn 60 and 100MB). 

I ain't scared of Avid, I'm just 3+ years in on this project.  Making that change now wouldn't be smart...

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Adobe Employee ,
Jul 15, 2014 Jul 15, 2014

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Hi Cyrus,

I saw your interaction with Al on Twitter so we do know about the issue. To get a fix in place sooner, let's try and get more people to file a feature request. That's the best way of going about it.

http://adobe.ly/feature_request

Everyone on the thread, please make the request if you have time.

Thanks,

Kevin

Kevin Monahan - Sr. Community & Engagement Strategist – Pro Video and Audio

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Participant ,
Jul 15, 2014 Jul 15, 2014

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Kevin,

Thanks for the reply.  Definitely have filled this request out before.  I'll fill one out again, but I hope you don't prioritize this feature based on the number of requests you get for it.  You should be fixing this issue promptly because it is fundamental to media management.  Professional editors have enough problem-solving to do, we shouldn't have to fight an otherwise amazing editing program (and suite) on something so basic to what we do.

Cyrus

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Adobe Employee ,
Jul 15, 2014 Jul 15, 2014

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Cyrus,

I totally agree with you and I will advocate for this fix along with you. Let's try and get more users encountering this issue to also file feature requests. They do read them, as they recently indicated at the Premiere Pro World conference.

Thanks,
Kevin

Kevin Monahan - Sr. Community & Engagement Strategist – Pro Video and Audio

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Participant ,
Jul 28, 2014 Jul 28, 2014

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*******Enhancement / FMR*********

Brief title for your desired feature:

Link Master Clips to media on drives, not to sequences.

How would you like the feature to work?

"The selection you are deleting contains clip references in one or more sequences. If you continue these clip references will all be deleted. Do you want to continue?"  In short, I never want to see this warning again. I *need* to be able to delete master clips from my project without having media deleted out of sequences.

Why is this feature important to you?

Editors need to stay organized from the beginning. Professional editors don’t edit birthday parties; we often have large quantities of different kinds of media, need to know where it is, need to access it quickly, and don’t need unnecessary things in the way.

Organization exists in one place: the project panel.  The less that’s in the project panel, the smaller the project file size is, the faster the project file opens, closes and saves, but most importantly: the easier it is to find what you need, fast.

The reasons for working in multiple project files are endless. When you import a seq from another project, you also get the clips used in it. Often times these clips are already present in the project, which is why you now include a “don’t allow duplicates” checkbox in your import dialogue box (which btw doesn’t work when we’re working with Merged Clips painstakingly built in other project files).

While you might fix that Merged Clips bug, I still don’t know why you won’t just let me clean stuff up myself. Why are you trying to save me from myself? I know where my media is and Premiere knows where my media is: on my drive.

A professional editing program should not try to save people from themselves. It’s why I left FCP for you. You have a great, powerful suite of programs (that I’d pay a lot more for than I do now btw)… but I need to stay organized, not be unnecessarily prevented from doing so.

Please listen to us and make this fix.

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Community Beginner ,
Oct 22, 2014 Oct 22, 2014

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Hi Kevin,

I have written several emails, had several conversations on the phone and also chatted online to your support regarding this. This is obviously an across the board issue from people working across multiple projects and drives which hasn't been fixed on the latest update as i have discovered. Duplicate Media is still being imported into the project with the new method of importing from the media browser.

Why can't Adobe create project file like Avid so you can access bins or be able to open multiple projects like FCP7 and then not create a sea of duplicate clips that you can't delete without it disappearing from the timeline. It's 2014 the technology to do it in the way that FCP7 or Avid deals with Media has been about for nearly  , and if Premiere wants to be known and used more often within larger projects i would suggest it  invests in the same coders that were able to do it for Avid and FCP had in 2006 and work like we all want it to work like.

The fact Adobe have invested in all this other technology like being able to use DPX etc is very Cart before Horse. Such a fundemental feature that's been overlooked and not fixed still, yet all these other features for being able to play high res media and output DCP's. Who do you have advising you on this ? Because i find it hard to believe any editor would rather have this then have a project which becomes unmanageable.

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Adobe Employee ,
Oct 22, 2014 Oct 22, 2014

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Hi Charlie,

Sorry this feature didn't make it to the current release. The team knows about it, evidenced by the conversation with Al on Twitter. We need more feature requests to really push this one over the top. Everyone on this thread who has not already done so, please file a feature request: http://adobe.ly/feature_request

Thanks,

Kevin

Kevin Monahan - Sr. Community & Engagement Strategist – Pro Video and Audio

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Participant ,
Oct 22, 2014 Oct 22, 2014

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At this very moment I'm cleaning up a project file due to this problem so I actually can work.

Kevin I have submitted feature requests on this multiple times.  Does copy/pasting the old one matter?  Do I really need to repeat myself, or yell, to influence your team's decision on this? 

Premiere Pro's performance is DIRECTLY RELATED to how cluttered a project file is. This isn't even taking into account the time wasted sifting through massive amounts of clips that cannot be mass-deleted for fear of deleting that ONE frame of media a bin contains that is in use in a sequence.

We need to be able to delete unwanted/duplicate clips in project files without having them removed from sequences. 

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Adobe Employee ,
Oct 22, 2014 Oct 22, 2014

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Hi Cyrus,

Cyrus Dowlatshahi wrote:

At this very moment I'm cleaning up a project file due to this problem so I actually can work.

Kevin I have submitted feature requests on this multiple times.  Does copy/pasting the old one matter?  Do I really need to repeat myself, or yell, to influence your team's decision on this? 

I asked for all others who have not filed a feature request yet, so it's probably not necessary. We need to get other people to fill out a feature request. I know that some of our prerelease users have also been requesting this feature, along with other media management capabilities.

Cyrus Dowlatshahi wrote:

We need to be able to delete unwanted/duplicate clips in project files without having them removed from sequences.

I agree. Hopefully, we can get others to file more feature requests.

Thanks,
Kevin

Kevin Monahan - Sr. Community & Engagement Strategist – Pro Video and Audio

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New Here ,
Nov 28, 2014 Nov 28, 2014

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Kevin, this is an asinine response. This whole thread is a feature request, and it is more than two years old.

Please reply with an answer to our question: How are multiple editors supposed to collaborate on the same project?

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LEGEND ,
Nov 28, 2014 Nov 28, 2014

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I'm not sure why you feel a need to accredit Kevin's response with the term "asinine". Personally, I don't see it. He's not the person responsible for the program or the decisions of the lead for PrPro or that guy's main design team. Kevin primarily reports back & forth between them and "us" the users, and the Adobe design teams work pretty "internally" from what I can tell. Due to company policy and also laws concerning publicly traded corporations and "insider news" he's rather limited in many things we (and/or he) might want to say. He's all the way encouraged people to write feature/bug requests on many things including this so they will rise up the vast list of things to do for "the team".

"Asinine"?

Sorry, just don't get it. Is the lack of movement on this and MANY other things a lot of us users would like or need dang frustrating? Oh, my lands yes. I've had me own knickers in a bunch over a number of issues.

And in all, Kevin has been a wondrous resource for the users here and I would have a serious guess he's probably at least at times seen as a pita by the design folks on account of his pushing "our" things up. Flicking him crap over things he has no control of is just childish or ignorant. In my personal opinion, of course. Now, making comments about the lack of response or this or other features or NEEDS ... that's fair game & have at it.

On most things you want I'll probably yell along with you. But at the right people ...

Neil

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Adobe Employee ,
Dec 04, 2014 Dec 04, 2014

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Hi Loaves,

Loaves wrote:

Kevin, this is an asinine response.

Asinine means "extremely stupid." I don't believe asking people to file a feature request for an important feature is "extremely stupid." I am usually not motivated to assist people that speak to me that way, but perhaps you do not know that I am actually your advocate here.

One thing I can't do is snap my fingers and provide a change in Premiere Pro, but I can provide communication to the team on your behalf.

Loaves wrote:

This whole thread is a feature request...

The engineering team aren't engaged in these forums very often, so, in fact, the best way to communicate with them is via a feature request. I'm sorry if you didn't understand that.

Loaves wrote:

...and it is more than two years old.

This means that it is a difficult problem to solve. Sorry.

Loaves wrote:

How are multiple editors supposed to collaborate on the same project?

We are working on ways to add features and workflows for multiple editors quite recently. It sounds like you have some good ideas in the preceding posts which should assist your goal of collaborating with multiple editors.

In 8.1, there was one major feature related to what you have been asking for: working with sequences and clips from other projects AKA "being able to open more than one project like FCP."

What users want in working with multiple editors in a single project has been partially solved by allowing editors to open other projects, sequences, and clips from other projects—say, a string out done by an assistant editor. One can open that sequence (in a Read Only manner) and use elements from that sequence in your current sequence, for example.

More details here: Reuse clips and work across multiple projects | Adobe Premiere Pro CC tutorials

This solve a lot of issues regarding working with other editors. Don't you think?

Note that duplicated clips are not added to your project unless those clips are not included in your own project. This feature does not totally satisfy those that work with multiple editors. Some have said that they want "read/write" ability for working with clips and sequences from other projects, as well. This feature is not available, so a request for that would certainly be apropos.

Thanks,
Kevin

Kevin Monahan - Sr. Community & Engagement Strategist – Pro Video and Audio

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Participant ,
Dec 04, 2014 Dec 04, 2014

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Thanks for your help, Kevin.

As I noted above, this specific problem - dupes being created - was solved with the 2014 release of CC, so although there are still improvements to be made, we've come a long way from where we started with this thread.

It's also worth mentioning that the only collaborative editing software that allows read/write permissions to be set for sharing are high-end avid systems, which are extraordinarily more expensive than the value one gets from a CC subscription.  What adobe has done in the last several years have been great.


R

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Explorer ,
Dec 21, 2014 Dec 21, 2014

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Can't stop duplicate files from happening when importing clips from a sequence even though the files are already in the project.

Using CC2014.2 8.2.0 (65) Build on Mac OSX 10.10.1 (Yosemite)

I followed the workflow in the video:

Reuse clips and work across multiple projects | Adobe Premiere Pro CC tutorials

Still get duplicate clips. Copy/Paste, Drag/Drop (from sequence & media browser).

UPDATE - duplication happens with RED Files, not MOV. hmmm.

Any solutions?

Kyle

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LEGEND ,
Nov 28, 2014 Nov 28, 2014

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I've kicked in my own ... again. But thanks Kevin, appreciate your work here.

Neil

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New Here ,
Jan 21, 2015 Jan 21, 2015

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Dear Kevin,

I've been continually frustrated with Premiere since I've migrated from fcp7 two years ago, and although the last version of CC 2014 had some significant improvements, this issue is both tremendously important and hugely disappointing that it has still not been yet resolved. As a member has pointed out already the sheer number of people posting deep concerns over this issue should alone be enough to escalate this. What's worse is I tried to report this and when I reached the feature request page this came up:

Screen Shot 2015-01-21 at 7.00.36 PM.png

If this is a joke I am definitely not amused. And by the way it's just crazy to think that fcp7 STILL all this time later is able to out-perform Premiere in 2015 in so many ways. Ridiculous.

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New Here ,
Nov 30, 2023 Nov 30, 2023

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Hi community, it is funny to read this 10 years later and guess what: The problem has not been solved yet. I spoke to the cusomer support today for 1.5 hours and they acted as they would have never heard about the problem of clip doublictions. Later they send me a link to this chat here which I had sent to them (!) to solve (or not solve) my problem.

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LEGEND ,
Nov 30, 2023 Nov 30, 2023

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LATEST

Please ... start a new thread, maybe as a 'bug',  with the details of your system, and especially the workflow patterns that get the duplication.

 

We'll all be happy to upvote it ... as well as offer any practical solutions that might get you by much better for now.

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New Here ,
Dec 01, 2014 Dec 01, 2014

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So I am migrating a documentary from FCP 7 to PREMIERE PRO CC.  We have sequences with dailies, and editing sequences (using the same media).  We set up the project by character, and inside each character folder is a series of footage folders, as well as a few edited sequences using media from footage sequences.  Making an XML highlighting the entire character bin of footage and sequences, I could import directly into Premiere, but I would get duplicated footage like everyone else on this form, because I had multiple sequences referencing the same media. 

I was able to skirt the duplicate media "annoyance" when migrating to Premiere by performing a FCP command FIRST before generating XML.  (In FCP, right click on ALL your edited sequences and choosing MAKE SEQUENCE CLIPS INDEPENDENT command.)  Then make sure you make an XML from the entire bin that contains all your sequences.  When importing this XML into Premiere, you can have numerous sequences with same media but it does not import same media multiple times.   

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New Here ,
Dec 01, 2014 Dec 01, 2014

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Nice solve for migrating a whole project.


For passing sequences from one editor to another, here's a workaround we learned today from a shop with multiple editors sharing projects on Premiere:

Set Premiere's media cache* to the same folder as the media referenced in your XML.** Then import the XML, and Premiere won't duplicate the media on your hard drive, provided the media is in the same folder structure as referenced in the XML. This will relink the media without making duplicates.***


* Preferences -> Media

** The Media Cache may reset itself when restarting Premiere, so it's important to check this every time you migrate a sequence.

*** Big up to my man Clay for figuring this out.



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Community Beginner ,
Dec 04, 2014 Dec 04, 2014

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Great workaround! that made my day!! Thank you for sharing!!

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New Here ,
Mar 09, 2015 Mar 09, 2015

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This worked, though we had to figure it out the long way before reading it on this forum. We are sharing project files rather than XMLs. ... to be clear, we stopped getting dupe media when:

1) The media cache was located with the source media

2) The incoming sequence was built inside a project file with a a bin structure that mirrored that of the project file to which it was being imported

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Community Beginner ,
May 06, 2015 May 06, 2015

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The best way I just found to do this is as follows:

I'm working on my computer and and my Asst Editor is working remotely.

She sends me a project file and I open it up. This links everything she did to the media on my drives instead of her drives off-site.

I export an XML out of her project file.

I re-open my project file and import the XML.

Only a sequence comes in, no duplicate footage.

Just opening the project file on my computer takes care of both steps 1 and 2 from sirinfilms' post. If I were to import an XML that she edited, or import a sequence from her project file directly, this would bring in duplicate footage. Exporting the XML on my end and then opening the my project back up takes two minutes, and it's super simple.

Hope this helps anyone who still finds this post.

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LEGEND ,
May 06, 2015 May 06, 2015

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Always good to have work-arounds that work posted ...

Neil

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