Adobe After Effects CS3 User Manual
Page 79
AFTER EFFECTS CS3
User Guide
74
The root of the P2 folder structure is a CONTENTS folder. Each essence item (an item of video or audio) is contained
in a separate MXF wrapper file; the video MXF files are in the VIDEO subfolder, and the audio MXF files are in the
AUDIO subfolder. The relationships between essence files and the metadata associated with them are tracked by
XML files in the CLIP subfolder.
Note: Adobe Premiere Pro and After Effects do not support proxies recorded by Panasonic P2 camcorders in P2 card
PROXY folders.
The video and audio on a P2 card are already in a digital form, as if the P2 card were a hard disk, so there is no capture
step involved in importing media from a P2 card. The process of reading the data from the card and converting it to
a format that can be used in a project is sometimes referred to as ingest.
For your computer to read P2 cards, you must install the appropriate driver, which you can download from the
Panasonic website. Panasonic also provides the P2 Viewer application, with which you can browse and play media
stored on a P2 card. See the Panasonic website for details:
Because Panasonic P2 cards use the FAT32 file system, each file is limited to a size of 4 GB. When a shot is recorded
that requires more than the 4 GB, a P2 camera creates another file and continues recording the shot to the new file
without interruption. This is referred to as clip spanning, because the shot spans more than one file or clip. Similarly,
a camera may span a shot across files on different P2 cards: if the camera has more than one P2 card loaded, it will
record the shot until it runs out of room on the first P2 card, create a new file on the next P2 card with available space,
and continue recording the shot to it. Although a single shot can be recorded to a group of multiple spanned clips,
the multiple-file shot is designed to be treated as a single clip or footage item in a video editing application. For After
Effects to automatically import a group of spanned clips simultaneously and assemble them into a single footage
item, they must all have been recorded to the same P2 card and none of the files can be missing, including the
associated XML metadata file.
1
(Optional) Copy the entire contents of the P2 card to a hard disk.
Though it is possible to import assets into Adobe Premiere Pro or After Effects directly from a P2 card, it is usually
more efficient to copy the contents of the P2 card to a hard disk before importing.
2
Choose File > Import.
3
Navigate to the CONTENTS folder.
4
Select one or more MXF files:
•
To import a video essence item and its associated audio essence items, select the MXF files from the VIDEO folder.
•
To import only the audio essence items, select the MXF files from the AUDIO folder.
•
To import a group of spanned clips for a shot that were recorded onto the same P2 card, select only one of the MXF
files in the group from the VIDEO folder. The group will be imported as a single footage item with a duration
equal to the total duration of all the spanned clips it includes. If you select more than one of these spanned clips,
you will import duplicates of the whole group of spanned clips, as duplicate footage items in the Project panel.
You cannot import spanned clips from a shot that spans two different cards as a single footage item. Rather, you must
select a single MXF file belonging to the shot from each card to create a separate footage item for the part of the shot
recorded on each card. For example, if a group of spanned clips for a single shot itself spans two cards, you must select
a spanned clip from the group on card 1 and another from the group on card 2. This will import the contents of the
shot into two footage items in the Project panel.
The Date column in the Project panel shows when each source clip was acquired. After you import spanned clips,
you can use the Date value to determine their correct chronological order within the shot.