V9 and EX1 | Page 2

megabit wrote on 5/16/2009, 2:15 PM

Sorry Bob, but you're wrong (if I get you right) - for the first time since I first started using this great forum :))

I'm not talking about the Explorer within Vegas (same as in all previous versions), but Device Explorer under the View menu (aa new addition in V9).

When it doesn't find a "compliant" device (like an SxS card in the laptop's hot-swappable ExpressCard slot), it simply says:

"Device Explorer initialization failed".

You can still use the "regular" Explorer tab, which of course will see any disk device - but you need to open each CLPR subfolder to access its mp4 clip... What's even worse, you can only add such clip to the Project Media bin or timeline; cannot copy to your local HDD from within Vegas.

farss wrote on 5/16/2009, 2:23 PM

I too am talking about Device Explorer.

Last night several times I used it to import from card images on my hard drives.

It also found my $18 USB card reader.
Possibly you are having a problem because you have an almost compliant device.

Bob.

megabit wrote on 5/16/2009, 2:34 PM

Oops...in this case, I'm lost!

While I agree the Syncrotec reader in my PC is only "almost compliant", I also tried it to access complete BPAV structures (on USB drives, as well as what you refer to as "card images on my hard drives" - to no avail...

The only scenario it does work (and displays thumbnails of all clips, without a need of digging manually through the BPAV structure), is with an SxS card in the ExpressCard reader of my Vaio laptop.

Could it be some configuration problem then?

farss wrote on 5/16/2009, 3:11 PM

"Oops...in this case, I'm lost!"

Do I get my gold star back then?

I just tried this again, sorry about the delay, I had to cold start my reactor to get enough power to run the hyperdrive.

In Device Explorer, RClick the left pane to get Browse.
This will open a Windows like file navigator. Navigate to the folder that CONTAINS the BPAV folder, e.g. E:\ClientX\Cards, do NOT select the BPAV folder. Note as you do this the "OK" button will become highlighted. Then when I click OK all thumbnails will appear ready for me to import.

I'll admit it took me a couple of goes to work this out as detailed above.

I am doing this in V9.0 running under XP SP2. The files reside on a SATA drive, I doubt this has anything to do with it though.

Bob.

megabit wrote on 5/16/2009, 3:19 PM

Yes, you definitely are getting your gold star back, Bob.

What I'm suspecting now is Vista vs XP - I cannot RClick anything, because (in V9 under Vista x64) the Device Explorer fails to initialize.

Will try under XP tomorrow; if it works as you describe, it's definitely a bug (it should recognize any media with the BPAV structure on it).

To make sure and avoid further misunderstandings - could you elaborate what exactly you mean by "card images on your hard drives"?

farss wrote on 5/16/2009, 3:44 PM

"could you elaborate what exactly you mean by "card images on your hard drives"? "

I created these sometime ago by simply copying the BPAV folder (and its contents) from the card to a folder on one of my internal SATA drives. I think I just dragged and dropped them.

If your Right Clicker is broken then you do have a very fundamental problem. I can't imagine how you can even attempt to use Vegas. I suspect there is some way in Windows to use a key + left click to emulate a right button click.

Bob.

megabit wrote on 5/16/2009, 3:50 PM

Bob, my RClick is OK - I said I cannot use it in Device Explorer, because it is inactive (it says "failed to initialize"). So, either it's a Vista problem (will check under XP tomorrow), or my V9 installation went wrong and I'm having a similar problem to the Capture window that failed to appear in the very first release of V8, if you remember.

farss wrote on 5/16/2009, 3:56 PM

OK, understand.
What if you disconnect the device that's failing to initialize?

I do agree, based on the problems you and Jay seem to be having there could be a bug in there. Perhaps they need an option to prevent it trying to initialise a device.

Bob.

megabit wrote on 5/17/2009, 3:19 AM

I can now confirm proper behaviour of Device Explorer under XP and Vista x86; there must be a bug preventing it from initializing under Vista x64!

Alternatively, something has gone wrong during my installation under Vista x64; the probability not being very high IMO, as:

- both 32 and 64 bit versions are affected
- both installations are fine otherwise

Before I file the bug report - can any one confirm Device Explorer actually working with any (32 or 64 bit) VP 9 version under Vista x64?

Ros wrote on 5/17/2009, 5:49 AM

On my side, it works fine in 32 and 64 bit V9 under Vista 64 bit.

I just want to make a note that I don't have to right click or anything....

I insert my sdhc card, open V9 and then open device explorer, from there it will show up as XDCAM EX device, I click on it and then the content of the card will show up as thumbnails.

Rob

megabit wrote on 5/17/2009, 6:56 AM

OK, found the culprit: on my Vista workstation, I've had a BD disk in the burner. For a reason that beats me, this prevented Device Explorer from initializing !!!

Here is the relevant excerpt from the DeviceExp.log file:

2009-05-17 15:24:54,033 [1] FATAL Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.Controller [(null)] - Controller.Initialize() failed with an unhandled exception.
System.IO.FileNotFoundException: Could not find file 'H:\bdmv\stream\00000.mts'.
File name: 'H:\bdmv\stream\00000.mts'
at System.IO.__Error.WinIOError(Int32 errorCode, String maybeFullPath)
at System.IO.FileInfo.get_Length()
at Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.AVCHDDevice.AddDeviceClipInfo(DeviceStorage storage, String file)
at Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.AVCHDDevice.AddDeviceClipInfo(DeviceStorage storage, String baseDirectory, PlayItem playItem)
at Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.AVCHDDevice.GetClipListFromPlaylistFiles(DeviceStorage storage)
at Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.AVCHDDevice.GetMediaInformation(DeviceStorage storage)
at Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.Controller.AddDevice(String path, String captureFolder)
at Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.Controller.InitDevices()
at Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.Controller.Initialize(Int32 hostAppID, Boolean resetConfig, Int32 userLCID, Object scriptingDomainManager, IGeneralHost ghComObject, IFileIOHost fioComObject, IProgManHost progManHostObject, IPreviewHost phComObject, IPreviewAdapter& paComObject)
2009-05-17 15:40:12,414 [1] ERROR Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.Controller [(null)] - SmpteDrop
2009-05-17 15:40:12,641 [1] ERROR Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.Controller [(null)] - SmpteDrop
2009-05-17 15:44:23,267 [1] ERROR Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.Controller [(null)] - SmpteEBU
2009-05-17 15:44:23,284 [1] ERROR Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.Controller [(null)] - SmpteEBU
2009-05-17 15:50:35,531 [1] ERROR Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.Controller [(null)] - SmpteDrop
2009-05-17 15:50:35,648 [1] ERROR Sony.MediaSoftware.DeviceExp.Controller [(null)] - SmpteDrop
-----------------------------------

Indeed, no .mts file exists on the BD - only m2ts's. Why is it looking for .mts ? Could it be a licencing limitation of the trial version I'm using?

And yes - as long as a valid BPAV structure is located in the root directory of any drive in the system (local or removable), you do NOT need RClick and search - it will be visible in the left pane of Device Explorer at open.

megabit wrote on 5/18/2009, 3:16 AM

A quick question, following my last "discovery" (above):

- do you guys think it's a bug (in which case I should be notifying SCS), or

- is it possible that it's an intentional limitation (of the demo version, or against importing files from BD disks?)

Piotr

farss wrote on 5/18/2009, 4:51 AM

"do you guys think it's a bug"

Yes.

"is it possible that it's an intentional limitation (of the demo version, or against importing files from BD disks?)"

Even if so it's still a bug.

Disabling a feature should not confuse a prospective user.

Bob.

megabit wrote on 5/18/2009, 4:58 AM

"Even if so it's still a bug."

I guess you're right AGAIN :), Bob.

It was very difficult to locate the DeviceExp.log file, which is placed into an area not easily accessible - especially in Vista (hidden, system folders).

megabit wrote on 5/20/2009, 4:17 AM

Well, today for the first time I had 2 SxS cards with a clip spanning them, and tried to import their contents using Device Explorer into V9.

Unfortunately, the information that spanned clips will be merged (http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/1143149-post24.html) is not true.

Even if you feed Device Explorer with the two cards in the proper sequence, Device Explorer doesn't seem to be able to read any information from the BPAV structure except the mp4 clips themselves, the result being the chunks are NOT merged.

So, the only way to properly join spanned clips is still using Clip Browser. Bummer!

Piotr

Jay Gladwell wrote on 5/20/2009, 4:51 AM

Piotr, were you using the SxS card reader or the camera? Would using the camera make a difference?

farss wrote on 5/20/2009, 4:57 AM

There's no way device explorer probably can merge the two chunks.
That's hardly an issue though. The big question is when you join them is the join perfect, no vision or audio glitches???

I believe FCP doesn't join the chunks either but when joined, no glitches. That's all I care about.

Bob.

megabit wrote on 5/20/2009, 5:30 AM

Jay, I was using card reader.

Bob, in Vegas the transition between the 2 chunks I tested today is seamless. However:
- this doesn't mean it will always be so
- with long events like music performances, it's always good to have a single clip per take. To achieve that, Clip Browser shines!

farss wrote on 5/20/2009, 5:44 AM

If you want them joined at the very least I suspect you'd have to have them in the one BPAV folder. Not saying even if you did that Device Explorer will join them but without that it'd be pretty difficult for it know for sure where to find the other half or multiple parts, consider a single clip that spanned several cards.

Bob.

megabit wrote on 5/20/2009, 6:00 AM

"If you want them joined at the very least I suspect you'd have to have them in the one BPAV folder"

Absolutely (Device Explorer can only see a single BPAV at a time).

But if I have them in a single BPAV folder, they will probably be already combined (that's what happens when I combine folders with Clip Browser; and I see no point in placing all mp4's into a single folder manually).

And if I use Clip Browser to copy/combine BPAV folders from my SxS to the HDD, I don't see a point in ingesting mp4's from within Vegas, as opposed to re-wrapping into mxf while Clip Browser is already launched...

Considering how a similar problem with the DR60 drive was never rectified by SCS, I'm afraid the EX Device Explorer will never really make Clip Browser obsolete.

farss wrote on 5/20/2009, 6:51 AM

"But if I have them in a single BPAV folder, they will probably be already combined"

I don't think so, they'll be in the one folder, they only get merged when they're exported and that is painfully slow.

As I see it Vegas now offers the same functionality as Ppro CS3 and this is a good thing.

"I'm afraid the EX Device Explorer will never really make Clip Browser obsolete. "

Good grief NO. Nothing Vegas or any NLE can do will make the Clip Browser obsolete. It is the front line tool that goes hand in hand with XDCAM EX. Maybe not for you and me but for some people it will be what sells them on XDCAM EX. All you need is a small netbook and you can log clips and add metadata to them. I know some might think this some esoteric need but for some it will be revolutionary.

Just recently we rented kit to a cameraman documenting a trip through Antartica. Staying alive was difficult, getting coverage a secondary issue at -40 in a blizzard. He didn't have an EX with him but thinking through what he faced I can see how an EX, a netbook and the Clipbrowser could have made his job ever so much easier. Even getting GPS data attached to the clips could be very useful when you travel and shoot in a hostile environment.

Bob.

megabit wrote on 5/20/2009, 8:44 AM

"I don't think so, they'll be in the one folder, they only get merged when they're exported and that is painfully slow."

Bob, in Clip Browser files do not get merged at export; the do if COPIED to the same BPAV folder (or their respective containing subfolders are merged).

megabit wrote on 5/21/2009, 12:38 AM

OK, I tested another scenario: clips not spanning 2 cards this time, but divided into <4GB chunks (FAT32 limit) and residing in the same, single card's BPAV directory.

Unfortunately, Device Explorer doesn't merge them, either!

Bummer... Sony, are you going to implement some intelligence into further releases of Device Explorer?

megabit wrote on 5/21/2009, 7:30 AM

Even more strange (and annoying) is that - after using Clip Browser to merge the chunks / spanned fragments into a complete, one mp4 file per take - when you navigate Device Explorer into the BPAV containing such file, it will still see and import its original components as separate mp4 clips !!!

This would mean that Device Explorer is, after all, able to read the TAKR directory (and has some intelligence implemented).

But, if it can see the component mp4's of which the complete clip has been built, why cannot it merge them similarly by itself, in the first place ?!!