Importing DJI Phantom 4 Pro Footage into Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2017.1.2(22) v11.0 Oasis

[jesselch]

Hi,

I've shot a number of footages on my P4P a week ago and currently trying to compile them using Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2017.

Some of the footage gets imported without issues, some have the File Import Failure : The File has no audio or video streams - (A low level exception occured in ImporterMPEG (Importer:39)) Please refer to the screenshot.

It seems to happen to certain files only, i have no idea why... All the videos are shot on the Phantom 4 Pro using h.264

Can anyone please advice?

I have tried using ffmpeg and handbrake to convert the MOV file to MP4 and then import into Premiere Pro again and it works... but the conversion process have degraded the video quality tremendously... from the 800++MB MOV file the converted MP4 file is less than 30MB...

I would prefer to import the original MOV file straight from the SD card into Premiere in order to retain the quality...

Please help!!!

Jesse

[Ann Bens]

Looking at your sceenshot i seen a clip with an odd framerate (47.95)

Check the framerate mode with Mediainfo.

If its variable convert with Handbrake to constant.

[jesselch]

Yea, the framerate is quite odd, but it was successfully imported into Premiere Pro without any issues...the ones that failed the import process are 29fps

[R Neil Haugen]

If you're getting that sort of compression in Handbrake, it's because that app often chooses a HORRID preset to apply. It would take my 4k from my Samsung S7 phone and always convert it to 1920x1080 if I let it!

So I had to create my own preset there, to keep original media frame-size, change to CFR and you need to BOTH click the CFR "radio button" and select a specific frame-rate number, don't use the "Auto" or "same as source" settings, you'll still get VFR.

Plus I had to kick the compression settings in two places into the "placebo" range to maintain the original Mbps and image quality.

After creating a good preset, and learning to use the ... intriguing ... batch operations of Handbrake, I can set many gigs of phone media to convert overnight and be ready to work the next day.

Neil

[jesselch]

I actually went to buy a new notebook to try to solve this, freshly installed Premiere Pro CC, and same issue... same error messages... have also tried renaming .mov to mp4 but it doesn't work... can i post the video here and you guys try importing it? I'm out of ideas how to resolve this now... Here's the link (the shortest clip i have is this 485MB file.. https://1drv.ms/v/s!ArpdZcNh23nSkBX9MUqPcNmkm1ns

[Ann Bens]

Tested your clip and plays fine in 2017.1.2.22

I would prefer to import the original MOV file straight from the SD card into Premiere in order to retain the quality...

Copy to hdd first then import via Media Browser. (this does not reduce quality).

[jesselch]

Yup, it's already copied to my HDD first before i import them under Media Browser... ..

still have the same error on 2 notebooks now... running the same version 2017.1.2.22

What other factors could have contributed to this? What am I doing wrong? Both my computers are Windows 10, i tried both with CUDA (Mercury Playback Engine GPU Acceleration) on and off... same thing...

[Ann Bens]

Any codec pack installed?

Quicktime installed?

Post a screenshot of your sequence settings.

[jesselch]

One computer has klitecodec pack installed a while ago. Have also tried installing Quicktime on this same computer

The other computer has no codec pack installed (new computer). Quicktime also not installed.

By sequence setting do you mean this?

[Ann Bens]

Klite can mess up your system.

Sequence settings: the one that says Sequence 01.

Select and go up to Sequence / Sequence Setting.

[jesselch]

ok, here's the sequence setting..

but my other computer is a fresh out of the oven windows 10 without any codec whatsoever installed...also gave me the same error...

[kulpreet singh]

Hi Jesselch,

I am sorry that you are experiencing trouble importing DJI Phantom 4 Pro clips into Premiere Pro

There seems to be an issue/limitation with the codec, the way DJI P4P is creating it is not familiar to Premiere Pro.

This file type is not currently supported by Premiere Pro.

Please submit a feature request through the following link to Premiere Pro Engineering team requesting support for this file type.

Feature Request Form

Thanks,

Kulpreet Singh

[Ann Bens]

Read post 5.

[aarontassin]

I'm having a similar issue. However, video files under 2 GB import without problems, but video files over 2 GB with the same resolution and frame rate display a corrupted error code. It appears adobe isn't capable of handling large files

[R Neil Haugen]

Yet, from RED's and Arri's, PrPro imports comparatively massive files ... even my ol' GH3, PrPro will import a larger-than-2Gb file without trouble.

Neil

[Owl311]

Please submit su ticket.... you can’t make this stuff up, especially when it comes right from the horses mouth...   I am sure you are the only person in the world with a DJI Phantom that uses (or use to) Adobe.  

[R Neil Haugen]

I'm puzzled by the fps in your screen grab ... some of the clips show at 47.95, some at 59.94 ... I'm familiar with the latter, but not the former fps.

Neil

[leod35217563]

I'm having the same problem. Most of the video files from the P4P will import properly, but there's sometimes one or two that fail in the same way you describe. I'm suspecting that shooting a still while recording video on the Phantom may do something to the video file that causes Premiere to not accept that video clip (while other editors don't have a problem with it). But I have to do more testing to find out. For now I'm importing problem clips into another editor and rendering them. Premiere accepts the re-rendered files but I'm not happy because they are reduced quality from the originals.

[R Neil Haugen]

Interesting idea, that taking a still while video is running may cause an issue ... would be nice if you could test that out.

And what other program are you transcoding in, to what format/codec & settings?

Neil

[leod35217563]

Before Premiere I used Corel Video Studio. I've been using that to transcode the P4P video files that Premiere won't accept. I'm rendering from VS in MP4 AVC 4K (3840 X 2160, 30p, 40Mbps). This is the best quality I can get out of VS unless I go to 60p, which gets me nothing since I usually shoot at 30.

[leod35217563]

I just did several tests of shooting stills & video at the same time and all the video files and the stills imported into Premiere without problem. I also started taking video on the P4 and turned off the power on the drone at the battery before stopping the recording. Surprisingly, even this video file closed properly and I was able to import it into Premiere. -- So far I am unable to duplicate the problem at will, though it has happened to me on at least 4 different video files on 3 separate flights and days... including a flight 2 days ago. In the problem cases I was still able to play the problem files and import them successfully with different software.

[R Neil Haugen]

These situations where we can't replicate by design what happens occasionally are maddening. And frustrating!

Neil

[johnhollands]

From my previous life as a 32-bit editor, I needed to transcode some 4K files from a Sony F-55 (I think).

I used MOVAVI encoder to good effect. Mpegstreamclip sometimes worked, not always and for troublesome files MOVAVI was very useful and fast.

Be careful of your settings, as it is not fully for broadcast but it's smart at knowing which files can be converted quickly because they are container files.

disclaimer: I have no connection to MOVAVI other than as a customer/user

john

sydney

[tp-doku]

Same problem with DJI-Phantom-4-mov-Files, but only with PremiereCC2018. 

Can´t import the files. And older files (already imported without problems in Premiere CC2017) are gone.

Strange!

FCPX, Resolve and so on can read it without any problems.

[Owl311]

I returned my DJI phantom 4 pro and cancelled my Premiere Pro subscription because of all of the incompatibility.  You think the average person buys a drone to fly, but most importantly to record and show off what they have done...  for personal or commercial purposes.  The video looks fine on the SD card...   it actually looks amazin....    so off we go to pre pro to import it and combine all of our clips...  the end result is a video that looks like hell.   After several (more than 4) hours of trying to figure out what was going on...  I trouble shooted my drone.... thinking therein must be the issue....   no issue found.   I sent requests off to both Adobe and DJI...  no reply...  no response.  Remember this is a new 1500 drone with a 4k camera, and premiere pro is a well established "Industry Leader" with video editing and mixing... most would rate them #1 in their field.  Sooo as I dig deeper into the great mystery and "secret" I call DJI on the phone and spend about a lovely hour with them.  Reset all the settings... etc...  and they say it looks fine on our end.  They asked if the video looked on on the card when played thru their app and I said yes....   the laughed and said well its perfect then...  and we don't deal with 3rd party vendors like Adobe....   of which I would never call or rate them as so.  Soooo  then back to Adobe...   the secret stays alive...  and then finally after digging and researching...  I find by accident, that Premiere Pro does not have the correct codec to handle dji phantom 4 pro drones...   it seems this has been an issue for sometime with what appears after reading the group messages.. has zero sense of urgency of getting fixed.  One reply from Adobe said we should send in a request ticket to have it addressed...  wow.... just wow.  The very sad and unfortunate part of this entire store is this....   DJI knows they put something in their codec which makes it hell for any other video editor to work with unless it is their own...  they know this....   do you think they could have just mentioned this during my 1 hour call with their tech?  Nooo,......    Adobe knows this to be a know issue...  it's no secret to them....  do you think they could have just sent me a reply and let me know....  nope...  it's a secret...  I'm on my own.  Are there ways around this if you are a computer and techno type of a person?  I am sure there is...  but for the 90% of us who purchase a drone and intend to edit the clips to be somewhat creative, they don't know all this crap and shouldn't have to.   It's a very sad day when 2 industry leaders in their own respective fields...  Video editing and Drone use and drone video capture...  not only won't talk to each other to help fix this and address this issue...  but also won't even talk to or communicate to their customers other than to say they are not responsible for "3rd" party software.  I have neither the time or patience to put up with such arrogant behavior and corporate bull....   I wish you all the best... esp. all of you non- techs that have beautiful footage you now find useless and unable to process without it looking like crap.