FCPX XML & FCP XML audio bugs

I make a translator tool that converts FCPX XML (.fcpxml) and FCP XML (.xml) into some other formats.

I have recently been getting audio related bug reports from Resolve users.

These bugs appear to be long standing but I assume nobody noticed before because Resolve was mainly used by Colorists where audio wasn't relevant. Now more people are using it for editing this is becoming more of an issue.

FCPX XML (.fcpxml) problems:

Problem 1: Assets that have multiple audio streams are not being encoded correctly.

The two assets are a MOV with 6 streams of 1 channel each, and another MOV with 1 streams of 6channels.

The first asset definition is incorrect. It should have audioSources="6", not ="1". In FCPX XML the audioSources count is number of streams the files contains, and the audioChannels count is number of channels per stream.

Code: Select all

<asset name="embeded-mc-audio-test-6x1.mov" hasVideo="1" id="r1" audioChannels="1" format="r0" hasAudio="1" src="file:///Volumes/System/Users/john/Development/bugs/Resolve/Glenn/vordio-test.dra/MediaFiles/DATA_CACHE/RENDERS/embeded-mc-audio-test-6x1.mov" audioSources="1" start="3600/1s" duration="486/25s"/>

<asset name="embeded-mc-audio-test-1x6.mov" hasVideo="1" id="r2" audioChannels="6" format="r0" hasAudio="1" src="file:///Volumes/System/Users/john/Development/bugs/Resolve/Glenn/vordio-test.dra/MediaFiles/DATA_CACHE/RENDERS/embeded-mc-audio-test-1x6.mov" audioSources="1" start="3600/1s" duration="486/25s"/>


Problem 2: Also in the timeline itself, these audio elements should refer sequentially to streams 1-6 but they are missing the srcID attribute which indicates this. They only mention the source channel but without the stream that information is insufficient. When a srcID is missing, it defaults to 1. So all these clips are coming out as stream 1, channel 1. They should have srcID="1" then srcID="2" etc.

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                           <clip lane="2" name="embeded-mc-audio-test-6x1.mov" enabled="1" offset="90268/25s" start="90268/25s" duration="16/5s">
                                <audio offset="3600/1s" ref="r1" srcCh="1" start="3600/1s" duration="486/25s"/>
                            </clip>
                            <clip lane="3" name="embeded-mc-audio-test-6x1.mov" enabled="1" offset="90268/25s" start="90268/25s" duration="131/25s">
                                <audio offset="3600/1s" ref="r1" srcCh="1" start="3600/1s" duration="486/25s"/>
                            </clip>
                            <clip lane="4" name="embeded-mc-audio-test-6x1.mov" enabled="1" offset="90238/25s" start="90238/25s" duration="161/25s">
                                <audio offset="3600/1s" ref="r1" srcCh="1" start="3600/1s" duration="486/25s"/>
                            </clip>
                            <clip lane="5" name="embeded-mc-audio-test-6x1.mov" enabled="1" offset="90349/25s" start="90349/25s" duration="136/25s">
                                <audio offset="3600/1s" ref="r1" srcCh="1" start="3600/1s" duration="486/25s"/>
                            </clip>
                            <clip lane="6" name="embeded-mc-audio-test-6x1.mov" enabled="1" offset="90238/25s" start="90238/25s" duration="197/25s">
                                <audio offset="3600/1s" ref="r1" srcCh="1" start="3600/1s" duration="486/25s"/>
                            </clip>
                            <clip lane="7" name="embeded-mc-audio-test-6x1.mov" enabled="1" offset="3616/1s" start="3616/1s" duration="17/5s">
                                <audio offset="3600/1s" ref="r1" srcCh="1" start="3600/1s" duration="486/25s"/>
                            </clip>


In FCP XML (XMEML / .xml) the export has the following problems:

Problem 1: Missing source channel information on audio clipitems. This is critical because it means that from a multichannel or even dual mono file, you don't know which mic is actually being used in the edit.

The clipitem tag should have a sourcetrack tag when mono channel from a multichannel file is being used.

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<sourcetrack>
   <mediatype>audio</mediatype>
   <trackindex>2</trackindex>
</sourcetrack>


Problem 2: (Not as critical as source channel information) but tracks can also have extra format and output channel routing information. This one doesn't affect me but you may like to address it anyway for sake of completeness.

NOTE: In FCP XML (XMEML / .xml) there is no distinction between streams vs channels like there is in .fcpxml, so 3rd stream is same as 3rd channel because multiple streams are always assumed to be mono.

Thanks John for you very clear explanation of this long standing issue.
This level of detail is needed to get stuff like this fixed.

Will this be "fixed" in DR15?

I've been having problems with resolve and audio in xml as well. Wether I export an edit from fcp or premiere and clips have multichannel audio (usually 8 or 10 channels) they are not correctly imported in resolve via xml. Resolve imports audio from the first channel only, replicating it into the other channels or drawing a flat waveform from channel 2 onwards. I tried different settings and I noticed some other users in the forum had the same problem but it has never been fixed.

Yep, problem has been there since DR12. Multichannel audio in XML (import ad export ) and Resolve do not have a good relationship. I have seen zero development on that front over all these years.
Maybe too few people screamed about it.
Seems that its something BM could fix in a second, but its snowed under by all the other developments.

Worth mentioning in the R15 beta forum?

I assume that R14 is pretty much locked now.

Also what’s the link to your translator?

Thanks

Johns tool is called Vordio.
http://vordio.net/

Next to his tool also a great tool for different target group is AATranslator
http://www.aatranslator.com.au/


Both amazing livesavers, when needed ( i use both) and great guys with great support.

Seems that its something BM could fix in a second, but its snowed under by all the other developments.

I hope they will fix it because Resolve is increasingly becoming a complete finishing tool. In my opinion, they did a terrific job with the first beta of resolve 15 but development should also look at a better integration with other editing tools rather than simply becoming a closed ecosystem.

I hope they will fix it because Resolve is increasingly becoming a complete finishing tool. In my opinion, they did a terrific job with the first beta of resolve 15 but development should also look at a better integration with other editing tools rather than simply becoming a closed ecosystem.

[/quote]

Yes it's essential for finishing at least with FCPX projects.

I've seen FCPX users complaining that media won't relink after grading in Resolve. Because the audio is incorrectly specified in the XML, so FCPX thinks it's no longer a compatible clip. FCPX has no way to force relinking if specs don't match. Currently you have to edit the XML manually to workaround this which is a massive waste of time.

development should also look at a better integration with other editing tools rather than simply becoming a closed ecosystem.

That's a bit harsh - the roundtripping to/from Avid and PPro is second to none already - to the extent that Resolve is often used as a cleaning process when going between those two!

But, IMO, they need plenty of decent feedback from editors really cranking on it as an NLE with lots of different workflows - this is how Avid / PP etc grew up. Fixing little XML gremlins will happen as part of that I'm sure.

development should also look at a better integration with other editing tools rather than simply becoming a closed ecosystem.

That's a bit harsh - the roundtripping to/from Avid and PPro is second to none already - to the extent that Resolve is often used as a cleaning process when going between those two!

But, IMO, they need plenty of decent feedback from editors really cranking on it as an NLE with lots of different workflows - this is how Avid / PP etc grew up. Fixing little XML gremlins will happen as part of that I'm sure.

That's not really true with PP at least via XML. My bug report includes audio bugs from Premiere XMLs (XMEML) as well as FCPX XMLs (FCPXXML). Those have been there a long time too. Again they don't matter so much if you are only interested in the image, because in PP you can override incorrect channel configs in the XML. But if the audio was important to you, then overriding it won't work. You'll lose information instead.

That's a bit harsh - the roundtripping to/from Avid and PPro is second to none already - to the extent that Resolve is often used as a cleaning process when going between those two!

I didn't mean to be harsh. Just saying a simple fix to the XML workflow would be a big step forward for Resolve to become an even more powerful finishing tool and potentially attract more editors to the software.

Seems those bugs never got fixed yet in over a year.

I've managed to replicate a different XML audio bug now after client complaints.

The 'auto sync audio' feature is completely broken for XML audio exports.

In this simple test the wave files do not appear in the XML, only the video file does.



Notice how there is only one asset in the XML - the video file. Where did the WAV go?

Unfortunately this bug applies to both FCP7 XML & FCPX XML varieties so there is no easy workaround. Sync clip feature is just dangerous.

Code: Select all

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE fcpxml>
<fcpxml version="1.8">
    <resources>
        <format width="1920" name="FFVideoFormat1080p25" frameDuration="1/25s" height="1080" id="r0"/>
        <asset src="file:///Users/john/Movies/XMLSyncTestMedia/SonyEX1R/BPAV/CLPR/001_3972_01/001_3972_01.MP4" duration="364/25s" format="r0" start="1514592/25s" audioSources="1" name="001_3972_01.MP4" hasVideo="1" hasAudio="1" audioChannels="2" id="r1"/>
    </resources>
    <library>
        <event name="Timeline 1 (Resolve)">
            <project name="Timeline 1 (Resolve)">
                <sequence duration="728/25s" format="r0" tcStart="3600/1s" tcFormat="NDF">
                    <spine>
                        <clip duration="364/25s" offset="3600/1s" format="r0" start="1514592/25s" enabled="1" name="001_3972_01.MP4" tcFormat="NDF">
                            <adjust-transform position="0 0" anchor="0 0" scale="1 1"/>
                            <video ref="r1" duration="364/25s" offset="1514592/25s" start="1514592/25s">
                                <audio ref="r1" duration="364/25s" offset="1514592/25s" srcCh="1, 2" start="1514592/25s" lane="-1"/>
                            </video>
                        </clip>
                        <clip duration="364/25s" offset="90364/25s" format="r0" start="1514592/25s" enabled="1" name="001_3972_01.MP4" tcFormat="NDF">
                            <adjust-transform position="0 0" anchor="0 0" scale="1 1"/>
                            <video ref="r1" duration="364/25s" offset="1514592/25s" start="1514592/25s"/>
                            <clip duration="364/25s" offset="1514592/25s" start="1514592/25s" enabled="1" lane="1" name="001_3972_01.MP4">
                                <audio ref="r1" duration="364/25s" offset="1514592/25s" srcCh="1, 2" start="1514592/25s"/>
                            </clip>
                            <clip duration="364/25s" offset="1514592/25s" start="1514592/25s" enabled="1" lane="2" name="001_3972_01.MP4">
                                <audio ref="r1" duration="364/25s" offset="1514592/25s" srcCh="1, 2" start="1514592/25s"/>
                            </clip>
                        </clip>
                    </spine>
                </sequence>
            </project>
        </event>
    </library>
</fcpxml>


Bump for this.

We are moving a handful of scenes from Premiere with heavy audio editing into Resolve to finish editing our film. The XML brings the scenes in fine, with the normal video instances. But audio is a completely different story. The multitrack audio is completely out of sync, having me send an OMF to Adobe Audition to rebuild just my dialogue. Then I XML to Resolve from there and copy it into my timeline. The issue with this is Audition rebuilds the multitrack audio correctly from the OMF, but it creates new files and I don't have the complete handles from the original source audio. Surprising with all that Fairlight has to offer, you can't import an OMF.

I'm at a loss and don't know what to do when adding these scenes in to be complete reproductions of the original source media. I've tried sending my XMLs from Premiere through SendToX but I lose a lot of the audio regions due to its Secondary Timeline compounding. Here's an image of what happens when I send an AAF from Premiere to Resolve:

Screen Shot 2019-02-04 at 7.17.31 AM.png (1019.01 KiB) Viewed 3820 times

As you can see, the first 8 tracks are my multitrack dialogue audio, and some are red. They are complete duds, I can't do anything with them, or even relink them to anything - even when those files are imported into the project and play fine. I can't match frame and the inspector is empty. Also, look at that transition on the audio clip in the bottom right corner... it's just floating. I've been replacing the XML'd cross dissolves with Resolve's cross dissolves, but ultimately pulling anything with audio into Resolve is an absolute nightmare. We want to finish cutting in Resolve - just wish I could get some help...

I also posted this last month - another audio bug I found with audio regions hiding behind others:
viewtopic.php?f=21&t=85319

Thanks in advance.

I tried duplicating clips in my test and unlinking every other clip to see if it made a difference.

Is there a way to properly 'explode' clips to become all normal clips again? I could only find link/unlink.

Anyway you can see in a translated XML that audio clips go completely missing when linked but don't when unlinked. (However still incorrect as refer to wrong source media file)



FCPX XML 1.8 translated. You can see unlinked clips are back but refer to wrong source media file.

Extremely frustrating that I'm finding in 2022 a bug that's been reported since 2017 at least.
The audio import / export is becoming a big hurdle in Resolve for me.

Same issue for me -- for years now. I've had to occasionally resubscribe to PP for a month or borrow a friend's workstation in the past, but as Resolve now tends to represent my complete workflow (minus heavy audio work), this is quite a hassle.

I've spoken to a developer a couple of years ago and they are not very interested in improving audio in XML. They seem to consider XML as a colourist workflow where audio doesn't matter. Colourists usually just strip the audio off anyway so don't care and never report audio as an issue.

It is possible to work around some XML audio issues but only if you also avoid certain resolve features when editing. i.e. sync clips just don't work. If you sync camera video to location wavs then you either get the camera audio (instead of the desired wav) or the audio goes missing completely (depending on which flavour of XML - .xml or .fcpxml). So you'd need to be careful to sync the clips on the timeline itself instead for the correct audio media to appear in the XML.

i.e. although Resolve .xml always incorrectly references only channel 1 of the audio file (even if it was a different channel used in the edit) it is possible to correct this in reaper DAW later because reaper supports channel modes for individual clips. You can use this to rescue all channels or switch to a different channel. Obviously more work but it is possible in some cases at least. In this gif there is a 4 channel audio clip and I switch between which channel(s) is used.



In .fcpxml Resolve does not include some important data that determines which "track" a clip is on. .fcpxml is a trackless format. Instead it uses "roles" metadata to determine how to layout clips. Resolve misses out roles completely so everything is considered one super track! They could at least put the track name as the role. That would be better than nothing. You can't use track names from .fcpxml because there are no tracks - it is a nested hierarchy of clips each with roles like "dialogue.boom" "dialogue.pete" "music" or "effects" etc. So converting .fcpxml can be very messy in terms of final layout because everything has no specific role to use.

At least they have fixed some AAF issues in terms of audio workflow in v17. But there are still gotcha bugs. i.e. if your audio edits are not on exact video frame boundaries then they will play out of sync in the AAF.

However it is not possible to generate an AAF that references original media (which I was hoping would work around the XML issues). I asked a developer why and the answer was "because we assume everything is always rendered by resolve." This actually makes sense for colourists but not audio.

Wow. Thanks for this John. Perhaps my attempts to edit a dual-system originated piece in Resolve – especially a feature - are still premature. Dang.

Wow. Thanks for this John. Perhaps my attempts to edit a dual-system originated piece in Resolve – especially a feature - are still premature. Dang.

If you want to know how badly an app supports a particular format, just export stuff, then re-import it back in. See what goes wrong or missing.

I upset a few audio people recently by pointing out that protools exports terrible AAFs (showed people by round tripping them back in). Considering AAF is pretty much avid's baby - that should work right? Gets annoying that many of these big companies don't actually care that much about getting material out. Protools is better at getting AAFs in than out.

I make a format translation app (mostly focussed on sound editors who want to avoid protools which is where XML is most useful for audio) and in terms of XML only Premiere & Final Cut are reasonably reliable for audio.

I have to deal with customers reporting bugs that are not mine all the time. Many people refuse to even believe me when I point out the real problem is Resolve. Often blackmagic bugs are not even simple mistakes like most bugs, they sometimes have completely misunderstood the spec itself when it comes to audio clips (like audio can reference more than 1 channel - lol!) or just not implemented a crucial major part of it (like fcpx audio channel sources which contain both the channel & role metadata).

Oh one more thing to avoid in Resolve AAFs.. audio clip fades... you need to turn them into transitions so they are an exact number of frames. Otherwise the audio will be out of sync too!

Have you tried more recently to post this on the software developer forum?
If so did you get any response?

Have you tried more recently to post this on the software developer forum?
If so did you get any response?

I spoke via direct messages with a senior developer who was also aware of the problems in this thread.

I had an official beta tester also reporting the exact same bugs mentioned in this thread.

The only XML audio bug I found that actually got fixed later was one that also affected video so prevented importing colour graded clips back into FCPX. I imagine because it affected colour grading workflows it got priority.

My guess is Resolve's very long history as great colour grading app has lead to a management culture where image is all important. Even if a developer really wanted to to improve audio exports and fix known bugs, they would not be allowed to prioritise it. At least that's the impression I got - we would really like to but unlikely to happen in practice.