AAF processing

Questions and answers on how to get the most out of FFAStrans
emcodem
Posts: 1643
Joined: Wed Sep 19, 2018 8:11 am

Re: AAF processing

Post by emcodem »

I guess there are not many tools because only Avid uses aaf and they are interested in keeping everything as propreitary as possible so they can get most money out of it and don't need to invest resources to fulfill other's standards.
nknuelle wrote: Wed Oct 09, 2019 12:12 pm HRESULT c:\dev\aaf\examples2\axlib\axinit.cpp:63 0x8007007e The specified module could not be found.
I guess that means that the aafsdk dlls are not in the same folder. Please download and extract the whole zip file that i linked, not only one single .exe from it. You need at least those 4 dlls in the same folder as aaf2dot.exe:
AAFPGAPI.dll
AAFCOAPI.dll
AAFINTP.dll
AAFPersonnelExtension.dll
nknuelle wrote: Wed Oct 09, 2019 12:12 pm I generated some AAFs with your tool. There seems to be a problem with UNC paths if only 1 file is given. If I add a second file as argument it works, but ignores the first one.. ?
Interesting, could you please run it with "-debug 1" and add 2 files, then send me the whole output?
Also i added some error handling and updated the Version on my first thread here. The source code is included in the "source" folder. Basically all this does is some additional file finding etc... but in the end it all comes down to these 3 lines:

Code: Select all

    with aaf2.open(os.path.join(args.odir,args.oname), 'w') as f:
        for _file in args.files:
            f.content.link_external_mxf(_file)
    
emcodem, wrapping since 2009 you got the rhyme?
nknuelle
Posts: 19
Joined: Mon Jul 01, 2019 4:39 pm

Re: AAF processing

Post by nknuelle »

emcodem wrote: Wed Oct 09, 2019 12:48 pm I guess that means that the aafsdk dlls are not in the same folder. Please download and extract the whole zip file that i linked, not only one single .exe from it. You need at least those 4 dlls in the same folder as aaf2dot.exe:
AAFPGAPI.dll
AAFCOAPI.dll
AAFINTP.dll
AAFPersonnelExtension.dll
I already downloaded the whole zip.. I use it on a Windows 10 64Bit installation..

I am a bit busy now, but I will send you the output of your tool in debug mode.
emcodem
Posts: 1643
Joined: Wed Sep 19, 2018 8:11 am

Re: AAF processing

Post by emcodem »

Oh sorry, i see that i uploaded a mix of debug build and release build, i'll probably correct that and add the link to the first post when i find the time.
meanwhile i added the needed dlls from vcredist 2015, i hope this package works for you now:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Or0PT ... QM-k-vokkt

If that don't work, try to download and install VC Redist 2015 x86 installer from microsoft:-)
emcodem, wrapping since 2009 you got the rhyme?
nknuelle
Posts: 19
Joined: Mon Jul 01, 2019 4:39 pm

Re: AAF processing

Post by nknuelle »

emcodem wrote: Wed Oct 09, 2019 1:07 pm Oh sorry, i see that i uploaded a mix of debug build and release build, i'll probably correct that and add the link to the first post when i find the time.
meanwhile i added the needed dlls from vcredist 2015, i hope this package works for you now:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Or0PT ... QM-k-vokkt

If that don't work, try to download and install VC Redist 2015 x86 installer from microsoft:-)
The new package is not working. Installing VC Redist 2015 x86 doesn't help. I think the problem is the library (axlib) which is mentioned as missing:
HRESULT c:\dev\aaf\examples2\axlib\axinit.cpp:63 0x8007007e The specified module could not be found.

I am a bit confused whhere this path comes from: c:\dev... ,because that is no path from my machine...
emcodem
Posts: 1643
Joined: Wed Sep 19, 2018 8:11 am

Re: AAF processing

Post by emcodem »

Sorry for that inconvenience, i uploaded a new build that should include everything thats needed and only consists of release builds, tested on a totally new windows that does not already have all developer depenencies :-) You can use the same link as before and download the new zip file. Also i removed all the junk .exe files that are unuseable anyway... only aafdump and aaf2dot is really interesting from my perspective.

c:\dev\aaf\examples2\axlib\axinit.cpp:63
This was the location of axinit.cpp on the PC of the developer who built axlib.lib file which was used(linked) by aaf2dot.exe
emcodem, wrapping since 2009 you got the rhyme?
nknuelle
Posts: 19
Joined: Mon Jul 01, 2019 4:39 pm

Re: AAF processing

Post by nknuelle »

Thank you that's working now! This will make the process of analyzing and compare the AAF's more comfortable.

I think there is something wrong with pyaaf and the generated AAF. I will generate some samples now and look if there is a working example which includes network locators. This is definetely the problem, because this must be the reason that interplay does not recognize the file locations..
nknuelle
Posts: 19
Joined: Mon Jul 01, 2019 4:39 pm

Re: AAF processing

Post by nknuelle »

@emcodem

I generated some new AAF's and it seems like pyaaf2 is failing to add descriptors for the source files. I added this information to the GitHub issues. This is the link. So I don't need to duplicate everything in here :)

https://github.com/markreidvfx/pyaaf2/issues/64
emcodem
Posts: 1643
Joined: Wed Sep 19, 2018 8:11 am

Re: AAF processing

Post by emcodem »

Maybe @taner can help here, as the createaaf stuff worked for him on interplay viewtopic.php?f=5&t=892&start=50#p3952
@taner, maybe you could upload one of the aaf files that you created with the createaaf 0.0.0.1 tool? :-) Did you ever update to the recent version of the createaaf stuff and does it work for you?
emcodem, wrapping since 2009 you got the rhyme?
emcodem
Posts: 1643
Joined: Wed Sep 19, 2018 8:11 am

Re: AAF processing

Post by emcodem »

Just for info to all who is interested on the AAF decoding part, as i said i believe it is something that can only be done in a project where there is some money in the background. Even if i came up with something that supprots the complex sequences from @ghatis, it would need constant work on the project and depending on the number of users some months to do it's basic job.

After some research i believe Avid is not able to help at all as the needed software part seems to be part of MCP software instead of any available API (like the media api) from them.

Meanwhile i'll try to push a little on the AAF decoding part of the pixar opentimelineio (OTIO) project, this one seems to be active and large enough to cope with this kind of procedure. Also if they succeed, we don''t only have support for AAF decoding but potentially for all Project formats they support (premiere, FCP...).

One more question: would it be an option to "flatten" the video timeline before exporting the aaf so there is only one video track?
emcodem, wrapping since 2009 you got the rhyme?
momocampo
Posts: 592
Joined: Thu Jun 08, 2017 12:36 pm
Location: France-Paris

Re: AAF processing

Post by momocampo »

Hello Encodem,

Well I think "flatten" the video is create a "mixdown" video in Avid so it will take a lot of time with long program. So we lost the benefit of aaf linked...
It's a shame because it would be a very good "time saver".
Anyway thanks a lot Encodem for all the work you did ;)
B.
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