Moving timelines between editors with Video by Zaweba

Few projects live in one program from start to finish. An edit might begin on a laptop, go to a colourist on another system, then come back for sound. Video by Zaweba reads and writes the common interchange formats so a timeline can travel without being rebuilt by hand.

Knowing which format to use, and what to expect after the move, makes those handoffs far less painful.

The formats it handles

Video by Zaweba can export and import OpenTimelineIO (.otio), Final Cut Pro 7 XML, FCPXML, CMX 3600 EDL and AAF. Between them those cover most of the routes editors use to swap timelines. OMF is not built, so if a sound facility asks for OMF, ask whether AAF will do instead; many accept it.

Choosing a format

Ask the person on the other end what their system prefers. That answer beats any general rule. Without one, a few broad points help. FCPXML suits Final Cut Pro. Final Cut Pro 7 XML is an older format that many tools still read. AAF is common for handing work to sound and to larger editing systems. CMX 3600 EDL is the oldest and simplest, a plain list of cuts that almost everything understands but that carries little beyond the cuts themselves. OpenTimelineIO is a newer open format designed for this exact job.

The simpler the format, the less of your edit survives the trip. Cuts and clip positions travel well almost everywhere. Effects, titles, grades and complex sound work rarely translate fully between different programs, whatever the format. Plan for the receiving editor to rebuild some of that.

What happens on import

An imported timeline opens as a new tab, leaving your current timeline alone. That makes it safe to bring in a timeline just to look at it, or to compare it with your own version side by side.

If the files the timeline refers to are not where it expects, the clips come in offline rather than failing. You can then relink them to the media on your machine, using the relink tool to search a folder. This is normal when a timeline comes from another computer, since drive letters and folder names rarely match.

Making a handoff go smoothly

Before you export, tidy the timeline. Remove clips you have disabled, collapse unused tracks and make sure clip names are sensible, because they are what the other person will see. Send the media too, or agree where it lives, so relinking is a short job.

Export a quick reference video of the edit with burned-in timecode alongside the timeline file. The receiving editor can then check their rebuilt version against yours frame by frame and spot anything that did not survive.

Common snags

Frame rates that do not match between the two projects cause cuts to land in slightly the wrong place, so agree the rate first. Speed changes and nested edits are often where translations go wrong; flatten or note them. And if a format drops something important, try another before rebuilding by hand.

Interchange sits alongside the Avid media log and Project manager among Video by Zaweba's handoff tools. Together they let you work offline on your own machine and still slot into a team that uses something else.