re: Dealing with audio recorded on a Zaxcom Deva

I'm about to start work on a project where the audio was recorded to Zaxcom's Deva hard-disk recorder. I was told by the producer I will receive DVD-RAMs containing Broadcast WAVE audio files and I'm trying to do some homework on what I'll have to deal with. Are the files going to be separated by takes, or is it going to be one big media file? What's the best way to parcel out this audio for syncing to individual takes? And will Broadcast WAVE files play back in the timeline without rendering?

You are going to have to convert the Wave files to AIF and just find your sync points. I can't remember if QT converts Wave to AIF. If it deosn't just google for a Wave to AIF converter. There are a number of converters out there.



Michael Horton
-------------------

i havent dealt with BWF, but Sebsky tools has a good reputation for converting them:

[www.dharmafilm.com]

best to ask the sound recordist about the slate and take situation.
i'm pretty sure you can get it that way, if you request it

cheers,
nick

Hi,

You also may use my BWF2XML tool, there is some info and a free trial at:
[www.spherico.com]

It will convert the BWFs to .mov files with timecode and create one ore more XMLs - dependent on your settings - which contain all metadata you selected.
There are also options to do some settings in advance like individual level pan settings.
Even though it's still a (stable) beta, it was good enough to handle all the BWF conversion for audio/video preproduction of the HBO "Rome" (with altered settings to work with the Avids)

Regards
Andreas

Hey Andreas & Nick,

I've downloaded the trial version of BWF2XML and figured out how to use it, but there's a catch I haven't been able to figure out. The WAVE files on the DVD-RAMs are in 24-bit, so I changed all my Sequence Settings and Presets to 48kHz, Stereo, 24-bit under Audio Format. The problem is, all the QT movies require rendering or they play with our favourite "beep, beep" noise. To add to the confusion, I was able to import the WAVE files directly into FCP, the exact same Sequence, and play those back without rendering. Of course, the problem is that the WAVE files don't contain the metadata and require much more prep before I can sync them. Do you see what's wrong here?

Also, I've been capturing the video in 29.97fps drop-frame, but I just found out that the sound recordist's WAVE files are in 29.97fps non-drop-frame and the QuickTime movie files are being converted as such. Will this be a problem? I suspect this might result in discrepancies in the timecode slates and the timecode on the QT movies, but then again, I'm not using those timecodes for syncing purposes, at least not now. I synced the dailies and aside from some major camera problems (bad TC, and possible inability to stay at speed), sync has generally been OK. Do you see pitfalls ahead?

Hi Derek,

>The WAVE files on the DVD-RAMs are in 24-bit, so I
> changed all my Sequence Settings and Presets to 48kHz, Stereo,
> 24-bit under Audio Format. The problem is, all the QT movies
> require rendering or they play with our favourite "beep, beep"
> noise.
Those 24 bit Deva files I got here, do work without rendering and I got some costumers with Deva which do not have this kind of problem - or maybe they didn't tell me.
Maybe you got a small clip you can send me to have look at it.

>To add to the confusion, I was able to import the WAVE
> files directly into FCP, the exact same Sequence, and play
> those back without rendering. Of course, the problem is that
> the WAVE files don't contain the metadata and require much more
> prep before I can sync them. Do you see what's wrong here?
No, not really. But as said above, an example could be helpful. But there is also a FCP problem handling "raw" audio and "mov" audio (see below). I just try to figure out what's going on there.

> Also, I've been capturing the video in 29.97fps drop-frame, but
> I just found out that the sound recordist's WAVE files are in
> 29.97fps non-drop-frame and the QuickTime movie files are being
> converted as such. Will this be a problem? I suspect this
> might result in discrepancies in the timecode slates and the
> timecode on the QT movies, but then again, I'm not using those
> timecodes for syncing purposes, at least not now.
The TC popup allows to set up the "incoming" timecode stamp of the first sample. It doesn't change anything in the file itself. So the file could be recorded at whatever framerate, DF or NDF. But this could be an issue, though normally everything works fine, as long you save the files as self contained (if you are on the "slow second" side of the video world, where one second is 1.001 second of real world time). There are some issues with FCP on NTSC and drop frame. I emailed with the FCP people and they will have a look at it, I will try to find a solution too.
>I synced the
> dailies and aside from some major camera problems (bad TC, and
> possible inability to stay at speed), sync has generally been
> OK. Do you see pitfalls ahead?
As said above, there shouldn't be any issues with self contained files.

Any sample files could help me to solve the first issue.

I know, this was not a really helpful answer in a way like "you have to do this and that". But the stuff works with some fine tune.

Regards
Andreas

Hi Derek,

Here something I forgot to ask; how many channels the files do have?

Regards
Andreas

Hey Andreas,

Thanks for responding so soon.

> The TC popup allows to set up the "incoming" timecode stamp of the first
> sample.

Yes, and the sound recordist insisted that I should import the sound using 30 non-drop. How much does it matter? Because I don't see a sync problem...at least not yet...by using 30 fps non-drop-frame audio with 29.97fps drop-frame video, though I suffer from not having a broadcast monitor here, and the footage originated on 24fps, whose "flicker" makes it harder to spot soft sync.

> everything works fine, as long you save the files as self contained

I would've loved to do that because I've always hated "dependent" files, except that the "self-contained" option crashes the BWF2XML application every time. Probably because it's a trial version. I'm going to try to convince the post supervisor to spend the 25 euros to get the full version.

> Any sample files could help me to solve the first issue.

I'll try to send you a file on Monday -- I'm not at the station right now.

> I know, this was not a really helpful answer in a way like "you have to do this
> and that". But the stuff works with some fine tune.

Hey, this is exactly what the sound recordist told me. He couldn't tell me what I was doing wrong either. Limitations of long-distance troubleshooting. I appreciate your feedback and I'll try to get you a sample to look at/listen to, maybe screen-capture my settings so you can see what exact steps I'm doing.

All the best,

Derek Mok.

I also forgot to mention: So far the maximum number of channels I've had to import is six channels. All the channels appear fine in both WAVE and .mov formats. Again, my only issue right now is that the .mov versions need to be rendered. Now I wonder if that has something to do with the fact that these .mov files aren't self-contained.

Hi Derek,

Please reload the app from the link you got, there is an updated version which addresses this crash issue with self contained files which happen on some machines.

Regards
Andreas

Thanks for the tip, Andreas. Also, is there a preference that might allow me to make one XML out of a group of BWF files? Up to now I've had to double-click on one XML to import a single sound take.

Hi Derek,

> Also, is there a preference that
> might allow me to make one XML out of a group of BWF files? Up
> to now I've had to double-click on one XML to import a single
> sound take.
Not yet, you can select files or folders. Folders with BWFs and the files within the folders will be saved to a single XML/bin.
I haven't found the time to make a good internal structure out of "x files and y folders selected".

Regards
Andreas