Red Bar instead of waveform, vision missing.

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Level 4

1,638 points

Red Bar instead of waveform, vision missing.

Hi all,

Symptom:

So as you can see in the browser (left) the waveform has been replaced by red and the vision has disappeared, no thumbnails, likewise in a project timeline, (a multicam in this case).

Media is from two cameras, an EX3 and a 5D MKii

not all clips are affected.

clips from both cameras are affected

I have 8 libraries for the client, 8 totally separate programs, all shot within a day or two of each other, all the same two cameras, all were fine, now two libraries exhibit the same symptoms.

Googling shows that this has been around for a few years, this topic with the same question title is in the discussions back in 2011... with no responses, I found a youtube clip showing the same symptoms, however his fix did not work in this case.

What I have done, (not in order)

restart app

restart Mac

deleted preferences, with Digital Rebellions app.

relinked media, said that nothing was missing

reimported media

deleted render files, all

Ran Digital Rebellions corrupt clip finder over the files, all ok.

In the list view I get the yellow triangle, likewise in the timeline index.

What I also now have is a duplicate of the files, that is the green ones, which also are not showing any vision or thumbnails. (oh and these green clips are not selectable)

Thoughts?

I do still have the original media.

Thanks,

Tony

Mac Pro, OS X Mavericks (10.9.4), 3GHz 8 Core Intel Xeon ES, 32GB Ram

Posted on Jun 21, 2015 9:07 PM

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Answer 1

Best reply

Tony Gay Author

Level 4

1,638 points

Jun 21, 2015 9:49 PM in response to Tony Gay

Update;

I tried opening from my backup drive with the same results, I opened a backup from the autosave folder, a file from 12 months ago, and the symptoms were different but the net effect of the vision not being there was apparent.

I opened the FCPX library package (ctrl click> show package contents) and copied out the original media folder to run the Corrupt Clip finder, with this folder outside the Library I tried re-linking the clips, no joy, I then tried reimporting the clips, this seems to have worked, it reimported 74gb of files and transcoded them, again, and my browser no longer has the black and red clips!

The green clips I figure they are some type of duplication from the process of trying to fix the issue, I had to wait for the importing to complete and then as I was unable to select these files was able to right-click on them and select Move to trash.

In Summary

Symptoms

Audio waveform replaced by Red

Thumbnail replaced by Black

Vision & Audio missing

Solution

Close library

in finder go to the library, control-click the affected library file and select Show Package contents

move the "Original Media" folder out of the package and into another folder

open the library in FCPX

Using the menu Import the vision from this Original Media folder, this will copy the files back into the library and relink all the files, as this is a copy process make sure you have enough space on your drive for this.

In my case as my vision was from an EX3 (XDCAM), FCPX by default copies the media files into the original media folder and then transcodes them, having deleted all render and transcoded files earlier in the trouble shooting process, they needed to be transcoded again.

An issue that occurred during this process was that the clips used in multicam clips lost their audio, in the project inspector it was there though and the clips in the browser had audio. I resolved this by turning the audio on and off using the checkbox in the project inspector, for the clip in the project, not the clip in the browser.

I was able to duplicate these results with the other library that was exhibiting the same symptoms.

I hope this helps someone down the track.

Tony

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Answer 2

Jun 22, 2015 8:01 AM in response to Tony Gay

Congratulations, very glad you did not have a total disaster on your hands. And thanks for posting your alternative solution, hardly anyone does that around here. It really helps.

Curious, do you have a media backup drive or do you keep camera archives? Would you recommend such?

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Answer 3

Tony Gay Author

Level 4

1,638 points

Jun 22, 2015 5:47 PM in response to David Bogie Chq-1

Hi David

thanks for the feedback, appreciated.

I have media backup drives, (plural) and presently I copy the disk to each drive and then do an import to FCP, depending on time available of course.

... and I know that I really should get my head around camera archives, todays project, because yes, from what I understand of a camera archive, yes, I would recommend them.

Tony

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