Transcoding XDcam footage of premiere project for DaVinci Resolve import...

I've tried posting this message in the Premiere forum, unfortunatly with no response, so I though maybe I'd have more luck in the davinci forum.

Here's goes:

I've recently finished editing a short videoclip in premiere. it is a simple two camera 5min edit of a section of a live concert event, one clip is from a DSLR the other a sony EX3.

Now that I've completed the edit I want to take my sequence to Resolve to finish, but resolve doesn't support XDCAM file (native or quicktime codec I believe), so I have to transcode the one XDCAM clip (which is a long clip chopped up and used several times in the edit) to prores 422 or 444. Now I tried to manually export the clip in premiere (file>export>media) to a proress quicktime with all the proper frame rate/size/etc. to match the clip, but the resulting clip has lost the timecode of the original, and so when I replace the clip in my edit by this converted clip, it no longer matches and my edit goes to hell!

Because the clip is a long take (1h), it's been broken up by the camera into multiple mp4 clips with smi files (which premiere reads as one single clip), so the watch folder method doesn't work because it results in it transcoding each sub clip into its own quicktime file and still no timecode.

So this is where I'm stuck... because it's a small edit and for the web, I can always just grade inside premiere this one time... but Resolve has become my new platform of choice for grading (specially since the death of Color and the new 8.1.1 update to the free version), and so finding a solution to this is essential to me, because the XDCAM format is one I use frequently...

thanks for any help.
for reference I'm on a Mac Pro dual quad-core, 8gb ram, OSX Lion 10.7.2, CS5.5, Resolve lite 8.1.1

Pierre P. Blais
Multimedia performance and VFX artist
Pierre P. Blais Productions
Perception Films
http://www.vimeo.com/user1771129

That's not crazy, I'll give it a try, thanks.

I think I read something similar on Walter Biscardi's forum, but he didn't use an edl I think, just Resolve's built-in edit detection tool. Although I fail to understand how dissolves would show up properly, wouldn't those get baked in when you export the master file?

Pierre P. Blais
Multimedia performance and VFX artist
Pierre P. Blais Productions
Perception Films
http://www.vimeo.com/user1771129

that's good to know. Thanks!

Pierre P. Blais
Multimedia performance and VFX artist
Pierre P. Blais Productions
Perception Films
http://www.vimeo.com/user1771129

I've done the Avid to Resolve workflow a couple of times now, based on what your saying I am assuming your files are brought into Symphony with Avid AMA system right? in other words, avid is looking at the original mp4 files to avoid having to transcode. However, in order for the AAF to work properly in resolve, you need to either transcode the media or consolidate the project to DNxHD, ideally the 10-bit flavor that corresponds to your project (220 for 30fps, and 175 for 24fps projects). Resolves does not support native XDcam footage, it only supports the quicktime rapper (which you get when transcoding in Final Cut pro). Once you've gone through the transcoding process, you make the aaf with the "reference media files" option and not "copy media", you then bring in the AAF into Resolve and point resolve to the media drive that contains the mxf media for your project. Everything should link up just fine, so long as there are no timecode conflict. I've done quite a few time but coming from Media Composer 6 and it always works fine for me, although at first I had to fiddle around quite a few time to finally get the right kind of AAF for resolve.

Pierre P. Blais
Multimedia performance and VFX artist
Pierre P. Blais Productions
Perception Films
http://www.vimeo.com/user1771129