Mike Jones Digital Basin
cinematic media rinse cycle

Back-up tips to prevent editing disaster

For all the power, flexibility and efficiency that computer technology delivers us as filmmakers in the digital age, there are certain unavoidable truths - computers sometimes stuff up. Crashes, lockups, freezes and file corruptions are sadly the obstacles we will face at some point. But whilst these issues are often unforeseeable and you can?t prevent them entirely you can prevent them from being total disasters with simple workflow and backup procedures.

So here are 4 Tips to prevent a crash/lockp/freeze/corruption from being the end of the world that I advise my students of and which should stand for any editor at any level. They are not rocket science but I'm consistentl surprised at how often they are neglected.

1. Save

Save and Save often. CTRL+S (Apple+S). You should be in the reflex habit of pressing these keys every few minutes without thinking about it. It takes a spit second an updates your NLE project file immediately. There?s no excuse not to perform these saves constantly while working.

2. Project files

The project files from FCP, Vegas and Premiere (*.fcp, *.veg and *.pproj) and any other NLE, are the road maps to how your edit is assembled. The project files themselves do not contain your footage, they simply connect to it. This means you can save multiple project files connected to the same footage and the project files themselves are tiny in file size and will not weigh down your hard drive.

This system provides a great way to manage your progress through editing and provide yourself with a safety net of backups. Save a new project file (named by date) each day. When you start editing for the day open the previous project file and then immediately SAVE AS and create a new project file with the new days date. Repeat this each day of your edit.

The benefits of this process are two-fold; first you are easily able to track back through your progress, to see the evolution of your edit day by day and return to a previous days version at any time. Secondly this process allows you to avoid file corruption. Unfortunately sometimes project files can become corrupted (very often from reasons unknown), if you only have one project file there is no recourse. But if you have multiple previous project files you can simply step back to a previous project file and rebuild fro there. This is a whole hell of a lot better than rebuilding from scratch.

3. EDL

Where the project file for an editing system is a complex file keeping track of every element of your edit, the EDL (edit decision list) is an extremely simple set of text that instructs the editing system of the basic cut-only assembly of your timeline. But whilst it is very simple and minimal the EDL is also very robust and difficult to corrupt. Saving a daily EDL as a backup takes just a few seconds and provides some disaster proof security of your project

If using FCP you also have the option of creating an XML project file. XML is a universal file format for saving all kinds of data. FCP uses XML to create a simple but detailed project file assembly. You can use FCP?s XML save in place of an EDL to create a non-corruptible backup file for your project files.

4. Secondary Backup

Apart for creating backup project files you will need to ensure you also have backups of your project files in a physically separate location to protect against loss, damage or theft of your hard drive or any other major physical disaster. This may be as simple as saving a copy of your Project file and EDL to a different hard drive, memory stick or server.

If you have shot to tape (DV, HDV) then the tapes themselves are your source master backup. Store the tapes in a cool, dry, secure place away from direct light and if worst comes to worst you can rebatch capture from the tapes using the project file or EDL.

If you have shot solid state tapeless formats such SxS or P2 (XDCAM EX or DVCProHD) then you will need to backup all your footage to a separate hard drive so that there is a physically separate copy of your entire media set.



If you follow these simple procedures and take a careful and professional approach to managing your project and workflow there should be no reason to ever be caught in a total disaster. If you?ve read these notes and don?t implement them then you?ll only have yourself to blame if the sky falls in :)

Posted at 12:00AM Apr 23, 2008 by Mike Jones in video  |  Comments[1]