Hi.

Yesterday, I installed my upgrade to the Media Composer 3.0 software from Xpress Pro and it went flawlessly for the first time ever, so kudos to Avid for making it fairly seamless.  However, I do have a couple of issues I'm concerned with, the most important being the lack of support for the Sony PMW-EX1 format camera.  I searched the KB and discovered that you can import footage acquired on the EX1, but only if you use a PC.   So, how does one import the footage if you're using a Mac?  

Which leads me to my next question; I called Avid support using my complimentary service access code and was connected to a support technician in Romania of all places.  I explained my problem to the tech and repeated at least three times that I was using the EX1 and explained that is was similar to the P2 format.  He said he could solve the problem by sending a PDF to my email address which would answer the question I had.  He told me that the PDF explained how to import footage from XDCAM.  I told him that my camera is not an optical XDCAM, but the EX1 SxS card format (like the P2 I repeated yet again) and he insisted that the PDF would solve my problem.  I was doubtful and when the PDF arrived moments later it was as I suspected confined to the optical XDCAM formats.  So can someone at Avid please tell me that Avid has not outsourced their support to Romania and that if one calls support they will get accurate information instead of confusion and misinformation, preferably from someone in Tewksbury.  Please tell me that this is not part of Avid's "New Thinking".

The workflow to convert the EX1 files is to use Sony's clip browser. Right now that's only available for PC but, Sony is supposed to release the Mac version sometime around the first week in July.

Thanks for responding to my post about the EX1, but you didn't answer the second half of my question which was regarding the technical support I received from Avid.

Please tell me that Avid's "New Thinking" doesn't include out-sourcing technical support to Romania when so many more qualified technical support agents are there in Tewksbury.  As I stated in my original post the agent I spoke with in Romania was pleasant and polite but ultimately completely unhelpful because he either could not understand my question or did have adequate training in answering the question.  Avid's tech support for North America should reside in Tewksbury, not some formerly Eastern Bloc backwater!

Blkdog is a forum moderator (VOLUNTEER job) and not an official employee of Avid. Only Avid can answer that question and that is why he did not answer your question. I don't think he has anything to do with Avid hiring :)

Nope. Dom's right, I don't have anything o do with that. I also agree. Outsourcing tech support for this type of product is the most asinine decision Avid has made in a long line of them.

"The workflow to convert the EX1 files is to use Sony's clip browser. Right now that's only available for PC but, Sony is supposed to release the Mac version sometime around the first week in July."

This is an example of everything Avid does wrong. They insist upon building their own incompatible hardware, utilizing CPU hardware, i.e. firewire in barely supported ways  while outsourcing support and relying on 3rd parties to enable import and export of media. Do they have any clue about economics, about comparative advantage?

This is an example of everything Avid does wrong ...    ...blah

.- Right now, the workflow for ANY non linear editor in order to work with EX files depends SOLELY upon Sony.

Incompatibility with EX odd format is a Sony's issue, not anybody else's.

FCP not only needs the clip browser, it needs a special Sony plugin to convert EX to quicktime.

Yes, FCP does not work natively with any XDCAM flavor, only Quicktime.

Avid's workflow is far more efficient, at least on the PC side.

raspago:

the workflow for ANY non linear editor in order to work with EX files depends SOLELY upon Sony.

Including Sony Vegas.

Dom Q. Silverio:

raspago:

the workflow for ANY non linear editor in order to work with EX files depends SOLELY upon Sony.

Including Sony Vegas.

 

 

.- Yes, that's right.

Everybody depends on the EX Clip Browser.

Everybody is waiting for the Clip browser Version 2.0.

Brainburst, I hope that you would step back for a while and get some more time in the water before posting here for a while. You seem to have quite a few misconceptions about the Avid software and the business in general.

Either that or I'm just going to have to conclude that you are simply flame-baiting and we'll be forced to take more punitive measures. Please don't let it come to that.

raspago:

This is an example of everything Avid does wrong ...    ...blah

 

.- Right now, the workflow for ANY non linear editor in order to work with EX files depends SOLELY upon Sony.

Incompatibility with EX odd format is a Sony's issue, not anybody else's.

FCP not only needs the clip browser, it needs a special Sony plugin to convert EX to quicktime.

Yes, FCP does not work natively with any XDCAM flavor, only Quicktime.

Avid's workflow is far more efficient, at least on the PC side.

There is a plugin for it. It converts the raw media in to QT files for editing. Sony is releasing the software for the Mac (v2) in the upcoming weeks.

If there is no Mac version of the Sony Clip Browser, then how do FCP users edit EX1 footage at all? I think there has to be another way to get EX1 footage into a Mac environment.

You're right. There is a mac version and it works with FCP. I have been using it for the past couple of weeks. I would think that it is possible to export HD res Qt's from EX1 footage in FCP and import those into Avid but I don't have MC 3.0 so I can't test it out.

If there is no Mac version of the Sony Clip Browser, then how do FCP users edit EX1 footage at all?

.- Of course there is a Mac version, but only works with FCP installed in an INTEL based machine (sorry G5s) and is slow and inefficient.

It does not let FCP (or any other) ingest XDCAM EX directly but only converts to Quicktime.

That's not a real solution, not for FCP neither for Avid.

And there is the PC version, which is more eficient (converts EX to XDCAM-MXF) but still not enough.

Version 2.0 is said to fix all those things.

Version 2.0 will have a plugin especially made for for Avid, it will let Avid ingest EX files directly without any conversion.

Whether this plugin is for Windows or OSX, I don't know.

OSX does not like XDCAM very much.

BobbyMurcerFan:

raspago:

This is an example of everything Avid does wrong ...    ...blah

 

.- Right now, the workflow for ANY non linear editor in order to work with EX files depends SOLELY upon Sony.

Incompatibility with EX odd format is a Sony's issue, not anybody else's.

FCP not only needs the clip browser, it needs a special Sony plugin to convert EX to quicktime.

Yes, FCP does not work natively with any XDCAM flavor, only Quicktime.

Avid's workflow is far more efficient, at least on the PC side.

If there is no Mac version of the Sony Clip Browser, then how do FCP users edit EX1 footage at all? I think there has to be another way to get EX1 footage into a Mac environment.

 

.- BTW, where did I say there was no Sony Clip Browser for the MAC?

Not only Clip browser, there is a "plugin" for FCP.