Subsitue clips from m2t to cineform
 

Hi I've a big HDV project in premiere cs4. I wuold like to convert all the clips from .m2t to cineform avi. I Can convert all the clips with HDlink but the problem is that cineform doesn't maintain the clip name..do you now how to do?
For example I've all my clips like this clip-0001.m2t, clip-0002.m2t etc. If I try to convert it with cineform thay become like clip-0001-0001.avi and not clip-0001.avi as I want. Do you have any advice? I can't sobstitute manually all the clips one by one, the project is huge!

Either uncheck "Split Scenes (HDV Only)" in HDLink, or if you already converted everything to Cineform, use the rename function in Windows Explorer:

HOW TO: Rename Multiple Files in Windows XP with Windows Explorer

Hi thank you for the answer but id doesn't work in either ways.
With HDlink with the split box checked or unchecked it doesn't make any difference, it always keep renaming the files adding 0001.
If I try to rename the files in Explorer, the files are renamed in clip 0001 (1).avi clip 0002 (2).avi.. I need the exact name of the m2t files but with .avi extension..

A work around
 

Just FYI if you still have a need...
Years and years ago I downloaded this great little freeware called Rname-it. Can't tell you how many times it has saved me tons of work when I couldn't get a process to name as I wanted. It does every kind of renaming with a full preview before you commit. This software never fails, doesn't run unless you start it up...a tiny one trick pony that makes fixing this kind of annoyance really easy.

Rname-It | File Management Download | PC World

1-4A Rename
 

I've been using a utility called "1-4A Rename" (horrible name, I agree) which has many, many more options, but they take some getting used to. When I download files from my Canon 5D mk II, I use software which automatically names them in the following format:

20090424171323-MVI_2727.MOV (date+time+filename)

This ensures they all appear in the order shot, regardless of whether the asset is a video file or photograph, and I know just by looking at the file when it was shot. However, sometimes that's a little unwieldy and I'll want to rename the file to something shorter. 1-4A Rename allows me to do this easily. With just a couple of clicks, I can get rid of everything prior to the filename, for example, or rename it as a sequence number, or, if I wanted to be really weird, rename the file with the Star Date put in there somewhere! The utility can rename single files, multiple files, or all files in a folder, and there's an undo function if you mess up!

Julian

There's another similar thread to this that's presently near the top of the message board, so there appears to be some issue with various settings. There is one "Split Scenes" setting for capture and one for file conversion. Just to be safe, make sure both check boxes are unchecked.

thank you, with those utilities now i renamed all the clips. the problem is that premiere doesn't recognize the clpis because they have a different extension, so i need to do anyway one by one...

In 1-4A Rename, just select all the files, and change the extension... or add one. No need to do them one at a time (make sure you're in "Advanced Mode by pressing F2).

Julian

Sorry... I meant to add how exactly to do that in 1-4A Rename:

1) On the left side of the screen, near the top, check "Extension" instead of "Name".
2) Delete any text in the "Replace This Field" box. This means, that the whole extension (if any) will be replaced.
3) Set the text in the "Replace To" box to whatever you want the new extension to be (for example "txt", "mp3" or "avi")
4) Press the "Start" button

Make sure you're only changing the extensions of the files you really want changed. I always put my raw footage into its own separate folder, that way, if I want to mess around with file renaming, I know I'm only going to affect my raw footage (not project- or, heaven forbid, system files!).

See also the list of examples given on the 1-4A Rename web page.

Hope this helps.

Julian
P.S. Please forgive any mistakes, I'm doped up on Vicodin after just having ACL reconstruction surgery!

Hi Julian. I tried to change the extension to some files, to make them look exactly as the original m2t (clip-0001.avi, converted in cineform renamed clip-0001.m2t, exactly as the original one). But when I import those to premiere, replacing the old clip, premiere shows an error, saying that it doesn't recognize the format...If I import normally it accepts cineform clips

Matero,

Sorry, I don't know what to tell you. All the rename utilities do is change the file names. They don't convert or change the actual files in any way. I use 1-4A Rename fairly frequently and have not experienced any problem importing the renamed files into a Premier Pro CS3 project. If a file starts life as ABCD.M2T and you rename it to WXYZ, and then to 1234.M2T, using either of the utilities mentioned in this thread, Premier will import it just fine... I just tried it.

Julian

Just another thought...

If you start with an M2T file, Cineform normally converts that to an intermediate and wraps it as an AVI. Are you then renaming that AVI file as an M2T file again? If so, I expect premier would get confused. It wants to perform functions on an M2T file, but you're feeding it an AVI file (just with an M2T extension).

Here's an example...

If you have the following files:

ABCDEFG-001.M2T
PQRSTUV-001.M2T

and you convert them using Cineform, you'll end up with:

ABCDEFG-001.AVI
PQRSTUV-001.AVI

If you use 1-4A Rename (or any other utility) to remove the "-001", you'll end up with

ABCDEFG.AVI
PQRSTUV.AVI

That should be your workflow, NOT renaming them back to the M2T extension.


Here are the operations inside of 1-4A Rename to get rid of the "-001":

1) Check "Name"
2) Check "Replace"
3) Enter "-001" in the "This" box
4) Clear all text in the "By that" box
5) Make sure "1st occurrence" is selected
6) Press the Starts button.

It's really very, very simple and quick. You'll see the results of your renaming operation shown on the right side of the screen before the operation has actually been done, so you can check your work. These 6 simple steps will take care of renaming thousands of files.

Julian

Hi
Thankyou for the answer. I Just renamed as you said the clips removing the 001 part. Now I have the same file with two extensions clip-0001.m2t and clip-0001.avi.
If I move the m2t file from its folder, when I open a project premiere asks."where is clip-0001.m2t?" at this point i select my clip-0001.avi and premiere accept this. The problem is that It doesn't sobstitute automatically clip-0002, clip-0003 etc in the same folder. i have to re-select all the clip one by one..
If I'll move all the clips with m2t extension and I relink one, all the others in tha same folder will be relinked...

That's correct... Premier won't automatically switch in the AVI files where the M2T files used to be. I don't believe there's any way around this. If you simply move the original footage to another folder, it'll just ask ONCE where the first clip is, then it'll assume that all the other clips are in the same folder. But when you are substituting what are essentially DIFFERENT clips, it has to ask for each one.

I've never used proxy files, but I wonder if the same workflow can be used in this case, and the original M2T files be taken off-line and replaced with on-line versions (the AVI files)? Someone else will have to help with that one -- you may want to post it on the Attend the World Premier forum for a quicker response, as it's not a Cineform problem.

Julian