Avid has Quit Unexpectedly #1: When Batch Capturing

This one was awesome, and unfortunately I do not have an actual image from the actual crash to show you, but it wasn't an Avid error, anyway.  Nope, this was a MacOS error - alert, really - just letting me know that this program which costs hundreds of dollars, running on thousands of dollars of machinery, required for producing hundreds of thousands of dollars of televised programming, crashed.

Well, thank you MacOS, for letting me know.  I had no idea up until this point that Avid was crap.

But what was I doing with this crash occurred?  Surely I was abusing the open workflow of Avid in some horrible, mean-to-programmers way?  Maybe, I guess, if you consider choosing "Batch Capture" from the Clip menu as a mean thing to do.

Workflow:  I select my clips in a bin, choose Batch Capture from the Clip menu, Avid asks me to put in Tape X, I put in Tape X, Avid stalls for 20 seconds or so and then exits to the desktop, which MacOS kindly points out to me.  Huh.  I've done this hundreds of times... what's different about this batch capture?

Well, there is one stand out issue here:  The name of the clip that is crashing Avid is fifty-billion characters long.  By way of example, it was something like this:

TAPEX_XT_NIGHT_A COUPLE OF GUYS ARE JUST WALKING ALONG AND THEN A CHICK SHOWS UP AND DOES A THING AND THEYRE LIKE DUDE AND SHES LIKE DUDE AND THEN SHE IS A DUDE AND THEY ALL DO A THING AND HOLY CRAP DUDE ITS DUDEDUDEDUDE.new.01

So yeah, that was pretty crappy logging on the part of the logger, and - as fate would have it - Avid is really opposed to logging of that poor caliber.  So opposed, in fact, that Avid literally kills itself rather than having to stoop so low as to batch capture a clip with a logged name of that length.

So I shortened the name to :

TAPEX_XT_NIGHT_DUDE

Issue solved.

God damn Avid, if you don't like long clip names, limit the freaking character length like you do with bin names and save us all the trouble!  Or maybe learn to fucking catch your errors and post a useful message like "clip name too long to uprez, because we don't know how to program good, or have proper grammar."  Ugh.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How to Reset your PRAM and Delete your Site Settings

After two years, it has occurred to me that I have been remiss in my duties.  Up until now I've failed to mention the most basic troubleshooting techniques for dealing with Avid:  Resetting your PRAM and Deleting your Site Settings.  Seriously, what's wrong with my brain? Basically whenever you're getting weird errors, or multiple bus thread error crashes in a row, or "you can't write to drive X" message when pretty fucking clearly you have write permissions, the problem isn't you; it's Avid.  That's a shocker, I know, and wholly unexpected, but the fact of the matter is that Avid is the only program I've ever used that required regular resetting of your Mac's PRAM (Parameter Random Access Memory).  Avid is also one of the rare pieces of software that corrupts it's own fucking settings.  Seriously, how is that even possible, Avid?  you generate  the settings on launch, so can't you do a goddamn checksum to make sure the existing o
Read more

Exception: SYS_ERROR, OSErr: -5000

Image
Dear ISIS:  I love you.  You're great.  None of the bullshit file count limits of Unity, I can fill your drives to 100% without issue, you have automatic redundancy built into your RAID storage, your control panel is .html based and runs in my browser, and you work over ethernet instead of requiring fiberoptic cable.  You're pretty fucking swell. But there's this one thing you do sometimes that reminds me you're made by Avid.  See, it's like this:  When I create a user that has write access to a drive, and I log in as that user, I goddamn expect to be able to write to that fucking drive. Instead, Avid gives me this: What the fuck is that supposed to mean, Avid?  You're blaming the goddamn system OS for the fact that ISIS mounted my drive with incorrect permissions?  Why the christ would you do that?  Wait, wait - hang on while I get out my goddamn dictionary of What the Fuck OSErr: -5000 means. Okay, yeah, this is a write error.  It means I can't wr
Read more

File 'Avid_MediaFiles' not found.

Image
This is a great error.  It's great for a couple of reasons.  Firstly, the problem isn't that "Avid_MediaFiles' can't be found.  That's the folder on your media drive named "Avid Media Files" and it's pretty goddamn easily found by both you and Avid.  No, the real problem is that a file *inside* Avid Media Files can't be found.  Which file?  Good question.  A database file.  What this error message should really say is: File 'msmFMID.pmr' not found. OR File 'msmMMOB.mdb' not found. Or the error message could be actually helpful and say: The File 'msmFMID.pmr' which should be in path 'MediaDriveA/Avid Media Files/MXF/Ingest1' cannot be found. You know, something actually fucking helpful.  But no.  No, this message basically just says that Avid lost something, it isn't sure what, and it sure as shit isn't going to let you save any bins until you fix the problem.  Also, opening the Med
Read more