Exporting AAF or XML or EDL from APP to Resolve - bad in & outs

Melden · Feb 22, 2020

I’ve tried everything I can think of or read about.

This just won’t work.

Goal:

export consolidated* sequence of footage to DaVinci Resolve for colour correct

Parameters:

timeline is 4096x2160

footage is from four different cameras (Sony F5, Panasonic GH5, GoPro4, DJI MavicPro2) all with different resolutions and frame rates.

Process:

created a new, clean project
imported sequence from original (full)project
stripped timeline of all effects (except speed changes)
deleted all audio from timeline
consolidated media (no handles)
export AAF
import AAF into Resolve and link consolidated media* - most clips’ in & out points are bad/useless
export XMF
import XMF into Resolve and link consolidated media* - most clips’ in & out points are bad/useless (exactly the same)
export XMF/AAF
import XMF into Resolve and link original media - most clips’ in & out points are bad/useless (exactly the same)
export EDL (blech!) and flattened video file (double blech!!) and the timeline would not see the original clip and it appears was useless anyway as the empty red-clips in Resolve had no relation to the cut points in the flattened video.

Note when i said “most” above. I cannot find a correlation between when they work and when they don’t

Some seem to be related to wether I edited the original timeline from a subclip vs the original clip.

Some seem to be related to speed changes I did in the timeline

(I know, I have a lot of nerve assuming an AAF or XML in 2020 can handle the math of a speed change!!!)

- but a lot of the clips have no speed change and are not sub-clips and yet they are messed up.

Then I thought it might be the proxies messing things up (because when I consolidate it insists on consolidating the proxies). No difference…although when I deleted ALL the proxies the consolidation* just created new proxies(!)

I’m leaning the “blame" it on the Sony F5 footage

(shot at 60fps but playing back at 24)

But I’ve done this process before with other footage that was shot the same way

and with similar complexities with absolutely no problems.

(* note that I have had a lot of problems getting Premiere to play nice with consolidating. I had create a brand new project and import the sequence just to get Premiere to consolidate ONLY the media related to the sequence because "exclude media"’s checkbox had no affect on PP’s desire to make a copy of every, single, teeny, tiny file related to the project. I went through and deleted ALL my proxies but it still made new ones during the consolidate. Then I went and deleted all my media cache files and still PP kept making new proxies during consolidation. Arrrrghhhh! Anyway, back to AAF/XML nightmares… )

When I reimport the same AAF back into Premiere, everything works perfectly.

Premiere's likes Premiere’s AAF files. Go figure.

So…I’m blaming Resolve.

Resolve user groups tend to just blame Premiere.

But I’m here in this user group hoping someone thinks of something I haven’t.

Anyone?

Thank you

><({(º>

Melden · Jun 22, 2020

Just glad it's working for you.

Neil

Melden · Mar 31, 2021

I am running into the exact same issue. I am so surprised more people are not complaining about this. I managed to fix it by using Avid MC.

Bring Original media into MC.

Bring AAF into MC.

Use many tricks in MC to relink all the footage. I'll elaborate if anyone wants to know.

Once all the media is relinked in Avid export AAF.

Comes into Resolve as solid as it needs to be.

Done!

This proves my main belief regarding PP, it's NOT a professional tool if you need to collaborate with anything outside of the Adobe eco system.

Melden · Feb 25, 2022

Curious how this is going for you? As a long time PPro user, I've been digging into Resolve lately and am having some similiar issues, though not experiencing it globally as you are. I've noticed if I have "ignore file extensions" unchecked, and if I can I'll check "link to source camera files" things usually work at least a little better. Also Red files are a bit of a pain to use, but I've noticed if you import RED files via the media browser vs drag and drop from finder/explorer into PPro things work a tad better.

Melden · Feb 25, 2022

I hear from a number of colorists daily. Most Resolve based, but a couple out of Baselight. This entire XML/EDL/AAF thing is a pain in the tushie it seems for about anyone.

My understanding is that if you have experience going from X program to Y program via Z, you're able to work fine. But getting figured out what are the bumps and hiccup producing settings or practices is not easy. And can rear their very ugly mutt going from anything to anything.

Clearly, none of the app's developers puts a great deal of effort into the inter-app processes so many users need. Sad.

Neil

Melden · Feb 25, 2022

So this is my “simplest” process now:

I have to first turn off ALL my source clip effects (a.k.a Lumetri) on all my master and sub-clips.

turning on GlobalFX mute does not affect exports
you may want to create a unique project for this exercise as there is no undo for disabling the source effects

Strip out all audio

Strip out all graphics

(Optional: move all clips onto different tracks depending on the camera source to help your colourist)

Export each track one at a time as Quicktime ProRes-422HQ (or better); you’ll have to turn off the other tracks for each export if you have more than one.

Reimport all the tracks

Place tracks, stacked, into into a timeline.

Select all the tracks and choose “Scene edit detection”

When complete, expand all the tracks, make sure “video thumbnails is turned on" and delete the black-only clips

Export FinalCut XML.

Copy XML and exported tracks to 3rd party application (e.g. Resolve)

(Then take a break, have a beer. You've earned it)

This method has proven to be the fastest and most reliable way for our shop to get stuff to Resolve.

Melden · Feb 25, 2022

So you do your "auto edit detection" in ppro vs Resolve? Is there a reason for that? I haven't used PPro's, curious how it compares.

Melden · Feb 25, 2022

I do it in Premiere -it is fast and reliable. But mostly I prefer to give the preparred files to the colourist so they're ready to go with no guesswork.

Melden · Feb 25, 2022

If Adobe Premiere did a few “simple” things it would make life a lot easier:

global FX mute affects exports option
ability to solo a video track
ability to turn source clip effects back on
ability to clear source clip effects
ability to mixdown clips (flatten them) and automatically replace the selection in the timeline
or ... just have a reliable xml export

All these things would be of benefit to more than just people exporting to Resolve.

Melden · Feb 25, 2022

not sure whether premiere needs a reliable xml export or resolve needs a reliable xml import... probably both...

I've done the "output each track, and then get rid of the black" dance in Premiere as soon as I have an issue in resolve... and gotta say, it does make working in resolve easier if each camera has it's own track...

Melden · Feb 25, 2022

Brownfish,

Great list of things in Premiere that would make the export-XML/EDL process better.

Neil

Melden · Mar 01, 2022

The project is long over. The whole thing was a disaster trying to bring things over from PP to Resolve.

In the end, what we had to do was export a ProRes 4444 file for each track with EDLs for each and combine things in Resolve.

Once in Resolve, it worked fine. Metadata for cameras was obviously lost.

Like I mentioned I am not a PP person at all but it seemed no one in my circles of Network TV shows here in LA is either. We had to go thru 3 different AEs till we found one who knew what he was doing.

The whole experience was extremely disappointing.

Unless some major things changed in PP do what I did above.

Good luck.