Media Composer 2021.12 – Released Today

Great News!!!  Avid is pleased to announce the release of Media Composer 2021.12 today, December 16, 2021 at 12:00 noon ET.

Location at Launch:  The ability to launch this Media Composer 2021.12 software is dependent on the status of your Upgrade and Support Plan on the date this software version is released.  The software can be obtained through MyAvid, Avid Link or the Download Center.

What's New: https://resources.avid.com/SupportFiles/attach/WhatsNew_MediaComposer_v21.12.pdf

Read Me:  https://resources.avid.com/SupportFiles/attach/README_Avid_Editor_v21.12.pdf

What's New

Avid has qualified the following for this release.

• Windows 11

(Windows 10 is still also supported.)

Rendering AudioSuite Effects

With this release, when performing an AAF export that requires rendering of AudioSuite effects, the rendering is performed on the existing sequence prior to making the .copy that is used for the actual export. The reason for this is that after more edits are made to the original sequence, subsequent exports will only create new renders for effects that have changed since the previous export, reducing the volume of new media that needs to be included in the turnover.

SubCap Font Support

(Windows) With this release, the SubCap effect supports Extensis Universal Type Client/Server Fonts.

Change to Dual Monitor Systems

With two or more monitors connected to the system, when you launch with a new user setting, Media Composer will display a main host panel on Display 1 (the primary display), and a Floating panel containing the Timeline and Composer on Display2. The second host panel will be disabled by default. To enable the second host panel, go to Windows > Host Panels > Display 2.

Dockable Tool Palette

You can now dock or tab one or more Tool Palettes and include them in Workspaces. Simply click in the vertical title bar of the Tool Palette and drag to the location where you want to dock the window. Locations where you can dock the window will appear as green drop zones.

You can also access your named Tool Palettes from the Tools menu. To create and name multiple Tool Palette Settings see “Duplicating Settings” in the Help. Once you have multiple settings you can choose them from the Tools menu.

Increased Track Limit

Previously, Media Composer allowed you to create up to 64 video and 64 audio tracks. With this release, you can create up to 99 video and 99 audio tracks. If you create a sequence with up to 99 video and 99 audio tracks and bring that sequence to an earlier version of Media Composer, you will be able to see the additional tracks, but they will be locked.

Snap to Grid in Bin Frame View

When you are in Bin Frame View, you can select grid settings to allow you to easily organize your clips in the bin with the aid of a grid. The grid is used only when you are dragging clips. The grid can be hidden or visible and allows you to easily arrange your clips.

To work with the grid in Frame View:

1. Click the Frame View button in the bin.

2. Select the Bin Fast Menu and select Snap to Grid, or right click in the Bin and select Snap to Grid.

3. Choose from the following:

Disable - choose to disable the grid in the bin.

Temporary - choose to temporarily display the grid. Click and hold a clip to temporarily display the grid until you move the clip to the desired location.

Enable - choose to always display a grid in the bin allowing you to easily arrange items in the bin.

Invisible - choose to enable the grid without displaying the grid.

If you have enabled the grid, arrange the items in your bin by dragging the clips. Once you drop the clip, it will align to the nearest intersection of the grid.

HW/SW Context Menu Update

With this release, you can call up control panels for each hardware interface or streaming plug-in individually from the HW/SW open I/O context menu. Places where the hardware control panel is accessed, outside of the context menu on the HW/SW switch, will call up control panels for the attached interfaces and streaming plug-ins.

Insert Track Menu Option

An Insert Track menu option has been added to the Timeline menu. This allows you to easily access the Insert Track dialog box. Select Timeline > New > Insert Track or right-click the Timeline context menu and select New > Insert Track to access the dialog.

In previous releases, you could access this dialog with Ctrl+Alt+U or Ctrl+Alt+Y.

When you choose to insert a track, Media Composer labels the new track with the number you selected and renumbers the existing tracks in consecutive order.

Updated Bin Settings

The text in the Bin Settings has been updated to clarify the settings when creating a new Bin or opening a closed Bin.

This allows you to choose:

• Tabs the Bin into the active pane in a Bin Container - select if you want double-clicking a closed bin, script, or volume in a Bin Container sidebar to open and tab it to the currently active bin in the right side of the Bin Container.

• Floats the bin - select if you want double-clicking a closed bin, script, or volume in a Bin Container sidebar to open in a new floating Bin Container window.

Pressing Ctrl (Cmd) + double clicking inverts the active setting.

This setting applies anytime a Bin is opened or created, such as when you perform a Find Bin command that causes a bin to be opened 

Fixed in Media Composer 2021.12

The following have been fixed:

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4375. The Timewarp graph did not scale when resizing the window.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4385. In some instances, with Media Composer v2021.9, XDCAM media appeared offline.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4397. When performing an import, Matte Keys were offline if Dynamic Relink was enabled.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4321. Checking out an ProRes 4444 with alpha from Interplay displayed as unsupported and would crash when you tried to play the clip.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4208. You might have received a “DISK_FILE_NOT_FOUND” error (not Media Offline) in Media Composer when media was deleted from Access.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4367. Audio levels were inconsistent after performing a render and opening and closing a Bin.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4404. In the Dynamic Relink Settings, switching the “If no match is found” option between “Use Highest Rez” and “'Offline” toggled the media offline and back to online.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4369. Audio from imported camera masters went offline after being brought in from Interplay.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4380. A sequence containing XDCAM HD 50 clips displayed yellow if Multirez was activated with Dynamic Relink Target setting set to XDCAM HD 50.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-3500. In some instances, portions of imported TIFF files might not display properly.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4331. Media Composer crashed to a white screen if you enabled MultiRez with Dynamic Relink setting set to “Linked Media.”

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4002, MCCET-4408. With Dynamic Relink enabled, performing a batch import of .wav files (AAF from Prunus) did not import properly.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4376. In some instances, the Timeline would move unexpectedly if it overlapped with another window.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4310. When in MultiCamera mode, you might have received a “MultiframeCombiner.cpp” error if you turned off video monitoring on the source track.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-3985. Sequences containing Stabilize effects were not correctly zoomed if exported as DPX..

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4199. Font type and size for Bin Containers and Bins did not update in real-time.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4287. Media Composer crashed when creating or opening a project when using Teradici Agent on macOS.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4190. Play reverse did no work with RED footage when audio was present.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4291. In some instances, the representative thumbnail frame in the bincould get corrupted after editing the sequence.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4262. Long sequences exported as UME ProRes might have been truncated.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4329. In some instances, a caption file (.scc) had a different duration in HD vs UHD..

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4193. Trimming subclips from MediaCentral | Cloud UX might have resulted in redraw issues in the Media Composer Timeline..

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4362. A restored sequence might have displayed as offline in an Interplay environment.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4384. You might have received a “CORE_CONSISTENCY_CHECK_FAILURE” error when linking some Tiff images using the UME plug-in.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4105. Bin tabs did not clearly show which bin was currently open.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4318. Subclips generated from ALE broke the masterclip metadata links if you type in the Comments column.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4145. After adjusting Color Correction and adding a Paint effect, Media Composer added multiple Color Correction effects in the Effects Editor.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4153. (macOS) In some instances, Media Composer would crash when changing to a Color workspace.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4152. Dragging multiple bins into a folder took longer then normal.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4285. When a Delete Window was positioned over a bin, if you canceled a deletion, the spinning wait cursor did not stop spinning unless you moved the mouse to another position.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4068. If the brightness in the Interface Settings was set to one of the two brighter settings, values in the Quick Transition window were cut off.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4275. Opening large sequences containing SubCap effects crashed Media Composer.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4290. Bin thumbnails did not always reflect the monitored track in a sequence.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4269. Some effects would not render if a clip with “Adaptive Deinterlace Source” enabled had been applied.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-4314. You might have seen video glitches if “prefer largest raster, then prefer highest bandwidth” was enabled in Dynamic Relink.

Limitations

• Photoshop PSD files are not supported for AMA linking if QuickTime is not installed.

• Some fonts, by their design, are available only in Bold. On the Mac system it can happen

that selecting a font does not produce any visual changes. Try selecting “Bold.”

• If you launch a project and receive an “Enable 3rd Party Emulation” warning, even if you

select Enable in the warning dialog, you should also perform the following: Select File >

Settings and click the Project tab. Click General Settings and select “Enable Bin Sharing on

3rd party storage emulating Avid NEXIS/ISIS.”

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-15829. If you perform a clean install of Windows 11, Media Composer does not see the RED plug-in. This does not occur if you perform an upgrade from Windows 10 to Windows 11.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-15674. You might not be able to successfully link XAVC-S volumes using the Nablet plug-in.

Workaround: Instead of linking to a volume, link to clips using the UME plug-in.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-15843. (Windows 11) In some instances, you cannot drag and drop from the Finder to a bin.

Workaround: Use the Media Composer Source Browser to import or link your media.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-15491. Right clicking on an empty cell in the Tool Palette results in a crash.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-14845. Media Composer | Enterprise Admin tool does not restrict NDI when Media Composer is in software only mode.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-3702. Image Quality when adding UHD progressive clips to an HD interlace sequence:

The process Media Composer uses to mix and match video formats in a sequence is to transformthe source clip's frame rate and frame layout to meet the project specifications; the motion adapters are added first, then spatial adapters are applied in order to provide expected playback dimensions.

For example, if you have a UHD 50p clip that you want to add to a 1080i Timeline, the UHD clip first gets split into 2 separate fields (UHD format), then each field gets independently resized to 1920x540 in HD. The export process puts those resized fields back together into a progressive HD frame but does not maintain the clarity of the original progressive frame.

Workaround: If you first transcode the UHD progressive clip to HD progressive and then add the HD clip to the interlace sequence, it forces the resize operation from UHD to HD to be done before the split gets into interlace mode.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-3788. You might receive a “clip name is a clip in a multi-essence file that cannot be exported using the specified Embedded in AAF setting” when exporting embedded AAFs with OP1a audio clips.

Workaround: Consolidate the OP1a clips to Avid OP-Atom prior to performing the export.

➤ Bug Number: APPSVCS-723. The Collab App in MediaCentral CloudUX window does not currently work with Media Composer.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-13604. You might have issues playing clips containing Media Composer effects in the Baselight User Interface if the Fast Image Access option is enabled in the Baselight plug-in

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-12964. For a faster performance of export audio/video sequences to .mov in 2020.4, please render the sequence prior to export, or disable the GPU fx (in the Render Settings - Current menu)

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-12735. Maestro graphics do not appear correctly in the Timeline if your system uses the Radeon video card.

➤ Bug Number: DEFI-1808. (Media Composer | Distributed Processing) Two clips or sequences will always be created when performing a consolidate or transcode with Media Composer | Distributed Processing.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-11481. Promoting a title from the Title Tool application to Avid Titler+ cannot be performed if it includes a motion adapter.

➤ Bug Number: MCCET-11796. Larger than 10 bit DPX files might fail to link correctly.

Workaround: Go to File > Settings and click the User tab. In the Link Settings, click the Link Options tab and make sure Alpha Channel is set to Ignore.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-11430. Media Tool ignores the “Current project” filtering option and lists media files that are not associated with the current project.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-11197. In some instances, the Interleave option might not appear in the Export As dialog box. If you are performing an Export using the Avid Media Processor, the Interleave option should appear when you choose Stereo, 5:1, or 7.1 Audio.

Workaround: If it does not appear, briefly toggle back to the Mono setting, then toggle to Stereo Mix once again. Doing so should reveal the Interleave option.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-8641. (AMD Graphics). Systems with AMD graphics cards might display tearing when performing Full Screen playback.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-9269. (Media Composer | Cloud) After performing a remote download operation on a sequence containing AVC-I 100 remote media, the downloaded media appears as XAVC-I 100.

Workaround: Download the entire master clips.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-9011. Intermittently, when working with the XDCAM Nablet Plug-in, you might see “Failed to get the sample position from the AMA Plug-in” errors if you have waveforms enabled in the Timeline.

➤ Bug Number: COGS-2560. While working in the Script Window, text operations (cut/copy/paste/delete/editing) can only be done in edit mode. See “Editing a Script” in the Help. 

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-5650. When working with Panasonic LongG media, you might receive an “SFPlayConsumer Timeout” error if audio waveforms are enabled.

Workaround: Turn off audio waveforms.

➤ Bug Number: MCDEV-5385. MultiCam editing with Panasonic LongG media is not supported with this release.

is this version stable? anoyone out there that is running this version in shared storage environment and is happy?

Hi,

First indications are good. But it's too early to tell as we haven't installed it on many machines in Greece yet.

Wondering about the new version as well?  Is it stable and are there any major bugs/problems?   Have not heard much about the new version.

LDV20:

Have not heard much about the new version.

Given that people mainly post when they have a complaint, that's a good thing, surely.

jwrl:

LDV20:

Have not heard much about the new version.

Given that people mainly post when they have a complaint, that's a good thing, surely.

Ha!

Philip Kapadia:

jwrl:

LDV20:

Have not heard much about the new version.

Given that people mainly post when they have a complaint, that's a good thing, surely.

Ha!

Yes good point - will upgrade

using the latest MC on windows and for some reason script sync isnt working with subclips when manually adding script markers.  I click all my makers and it takes me to the top of the clip.

cls105:

using the latest MC on windows and for some reason script sync isnt working with subclips when manually adding script markers.  I click all my makers and it takes me to the top of the clip.

Have you re-set your avid user settings?

Doesnt seem to be many complaints here - is it time to make teh miove from 2018!?

DIESELE:

Doesnt seem to be many complaints here - is it time to make teh miove from 2018!?

In most cases, I would say yes :)

but in some cases: if you're in the middle of a project, have EOL equipment like a nitris that doesn't work well with 2021/22, or have a facility with systems you don't want to mess up... no - stay where you are. 

The general feedback I get is that there are many performance related issues. Sluggish behavior on existing projects for no obvious reason, The usual new user settings, delete mcstate, new project etc... sometimes help but not consistent.

I'm not able to get a grip on it at the moment.

Thanks guys - will hold off again until a long running project is delivered i think.  So hard to find a gap to switch!