Avid Behaving Badly #23: Exporting 4k 23.97 files that have been converted to 1080p 23.976 fails after about 6 minutes

"What the fuck does that title even mean," you're probably wondering.

Well, I'll tell you: It means Avid is fucking stupid. Not that this fact should surprise any of my long-time readers.

Let me lay out the scenario. I'm on Avid 8.6.somthing. My production team shot on a brand new Sony Fancycam 9000. They shot in 4k. The "24P" setting on this camera is actually, apparently "23.97." Where did the 0.006 go? No one fucking knows. Maybe they though that because 29.97 was a thing, 23.xx should be rounded to 23.97 as well. I couldn't tell you.

What I can tell you is that when I AMA linked the source footage, transcoded it into an XDCam 35 codec (which is standard fare for my particular project needs right now), and then tried to export it, the export fucking failed. Not in a nice, polite, "here's an error message for your troubles and also so you can screenshot it and use it in your blog posts because we appreciate the value you add to the Avid community" sort of way, either. Nope, Avid just fucking sat there. For hours. Slowly ticking up the time elapsed and the time remaining.

So I had to force quit.

I'll save you the awful details of the next two full working days that I spent troubleshooting this particular bugaboo. The important take away is that I kept my cool and they'll never find the body.

Here's what I learned: Transcoding is stupid. Avid is stupid. I am stupid for using Avid. But mostly transcoding is stupid.

IF I transcode the footage and "convert to project framerate" (still 23.976, which is ostensibly identical to the source footage), then the resulting files will not export.

If I transcode the footage and "keep original framerate" (23.97, per the sony codec, but since that's a weird thing avid doesn't support, also 23.976 per avid's framerate column when viewing the final clips), then the resulting files export just fine.

Fuck You, Avid. May the STDs of a thousand murderers find solace in your tainted private areas.

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