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matii_
matii_
Inspiring
August 18, 2023
Answered

Premiere Pro Productions - The project containing this media is missing

  • August 18, 2023
  • 2 replies
  • 2423 views

I have been using Premiere Productions on a long-form documentary project and it is a bit of an ongoing process of finding the best way to lay out the project to best suit the workflow. 

I originally had the rushes for Day 1-7 in one project. But I have since found that separating them into individual projects (Day1, Day 2 etc) is better. 

I have split up all the rushes into individual projects now, but it seems that when I open a project with my edit sequences in it - it can no longer link to the original media. 

It still sees it, because it plays back absolutely fine and doesn't appear offline, but if I right click a clip in the sequence and 'reveal in project' I get the error: 'The project containing this media is missing. Would you like to open it manually?' 

I could go and relink each clip manually and re-route it to the new individual project days but this is a very slow and tedious process to do for every single clip. Is there a faster way to relink all of these clips to the new project the media is stored in? I find it strange that it can still see the clips and playback fine, but can't seem to find it within the actual project. 

Premiere Pro Version 23.6.0
Mac OS Big Sur

Thanks in advance! 

    Correct answer mattchristensen

    @matii_ It sounds like what you're seeing is working as I would expect, but, there are ways to do what you are trying to do a little more smoothly. Fundamentally though, Productions will work best if you don't re-organize your clips across projects once you start editing with them.

     

    Of course sometimes you'll need to, so in those cases there are two approaches you can take:

    1. Keep the edit sequences open while you rearrange your source clips, which will update the cross-project associations as you go
    2. Rearrange the source clips and clean up the associations afterwards

     

    For the first method, you're taking advantage of the fact that if the project containing your editing sequence(s) is open at the time you re-arrange your source clips, Premiere Pro can update the association in the timeline. Imagine three projects that are all open at the same time: Media 1, Media 2, and Timeline. If you cut a clip from Media 1 into a sequence in Timeline, that clip "remembers" that it came from Media 1 project. If you then move the clip from Media 1 to Media 2, Premiere Pro will update the Timeline project as well so now that clip in the sequence "remembers" it came from Media 2. This works seamlessly if your editing sequence is open when you do the reorganizing. If it isn't (like in your case), then the Timeline project never gets the memo that the clip moved. So if you're going to do a big, one-time reorganization of your source clips I would do this approach. Open all the projects in your production (or at least all the projects that contain editing sequences) and then do the moving of source clips. When you're done, File > Save All and everything will be perfect.

     

    For the second method, you can clean up cases where clips have already moved but the Timeline project wasn't open at the time. To do this, select one or many clips in your sequence and then choose Edit > Reassociate Source Clips. This gives you a file picker where you can choose which .prproj the source clip(s) now live in. Premiere Pro will then open that project, and re-associate any clips it finds in the project that match the timeline. It's sort of like relinking media, but for this cross-project association instead. You can be course with this. Select every clip in your timeline and only the ones actually in the project will be matched, so there's no need to tediously track down each one. Then repeat for any other projects that had source clips moved into them.

     

    I hope that helps! 

    2 replies

    mattchristensen
    mattchristensenCorrect answer
    Legend
    August 25, 2023

    @matii_ It sounds like what you're seeing is working as I would expect, but, there are ways to do what you are trying to do a little more smoothly. Fundamentally though, Productions will work best if you don't re-organize your clips across projects once you start editing with them.

     

    Of course sometimes you'll need to, so in those cases there are two approaches you can take:

    1. Keep the edit sequences open while you rearrange your source clips, which will update the cross-project associations as you go
    2. Rearrange the source clips and clean up the associations afterwards

     

    For the first method, you're taking advantage of the fact that if the project containing your editing sequence(s) is open at the time you re-arrange your source clips, Premiere Pro can update the association in the timeline. Imagine three projects that are all open at the same time: Media 1, Media 2, and Timeline. If you cut a clip from Media 1 into a sequence in Timeline, that clip "remembers" that it came from Media 1 project. If you then move the clip from Media 1 to Media 2, Premiere Pro will update the Timeline project as well so now that clip in the sequence "remembers" it came from Media 2. This works seamlessly if your editing sequence is open when you do the reorganizing. If it isn't (like in your case), then the Timeline project never gets the memo that the clip moved. So if you're going to do a big, one-time reorganization of your source clips I would do this approach. Open all the projects in your production (or at least all the projects that contain editing sequences) and then do the moving of source clips. When you're done, File > Save All and everything will be perfect.

     

    For the second method, you can clean up cases where clips have already moved but the Timeline project wasn't open at the time. To do this, select one or many clips in your sequence and then choose Edit > Reassociate Source Clips. This gives you a file picker where you can choose which .prproj the source clip(s) now live in. Premiere Pro will then open that project, and re-associate any clips it finds in the project that match the timeline. It's sort of like relinking media, but for this cross-project association instead. You can be course with this. Select every clip in your timeline and only the ones actually in the project will be matched, so there's no need to tediously track down each one. Then repeat for any other projects that had source clips moved into them.

     

    I hope that helps! 

      M
      Mary31437702tyko
      Participating Frequently
      October 17, 2025

      Hi, I'm having this same issue. I tried what you've outline in method two, but it's still telling me the media can't be found even after I've told it to reassociate with the project where the source media now lives. I also tried the workaround of moving the sequence into the source media project and back, but that isn't working either. 

      M
      Mary31437702tyko
      Participating Frequently
      October 17, 2025

      I was trying to reassociate the media while the clip was offline, but once I onlined the clip it finally reassociated properly 

        Kevin-Monahan
        Community Manager
        Kevin-MonahanCommunity Manager
        Community Manager
        August 18, 2023

        Hi @matii_,

        I got your message. See if this workaround might help: https://community.adobe.com/t5/premiere-pro-discussions/premiere-productions-the-project-containing-this-media-is-not-found-on-the-disk/m-p/12001775#M343971. Let us know.

         

        Thanks,
        Kevin

        Kevin Monahan - Sr. Community and Engagement Strategist – Adobe Pro Video and Audio
          matii_
          matii_Author
          Inspiring
          August 25, 2023

          Hi Kevin, 

          Thanks for your reply. Unfortunately this workaround didn't work for me on this occasion. But I thankfully found a workaround (similar) that worked for me. 

          To make things easy to understand 'Project 1' will refer to the project with my sequence with unlinked clips in it, and 'Project 2' is my project with the original clips in it.

          I was trying to relink rushes sequences (project 1), so they are all thankfully pointing towards the same day project (project 2). Instead of clicking on each clip 1 by 1 and relinking manually to project 2, I found that dragging the entire sequence out of project 1 and into project 2 automatically relinked every single clip that was in the sequence. Then all I did was drag the sequence back into project 1 and everything was still linked. 

          This was slightly annoying to do, but easier than doing each clip 1 by 1. Would be much different in a sequence with clips from multiple projects - so still needs a better solution. 

          Thanks!

            Kevin-Monahan
            Community Manager
            Kevin-MonahanCommunity Manager
            Community Manager
            August 25, 2023

            Thanks for the note, @matii_. Good to hear back from you. I see that Matt from the team has responded to you. I hope the response helps. Take care and have a great weekend.

             

            Thanks,
            Kevin

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