How to deal with image sequence that has a new range?

Hi,

One issue that I regularly face is that my image sequences regularly need to be updated/replaced inside the timeline. The reason is that I render large image sequences and I import them as they are rendered to check things or use them as placements, because waiting until they are done is not feasible.

The way I am doing is that I delete the clip and reimport it, but this is a pretty dumb way to do it if you will. What I would like is some kind of reload function which forces the clip to not just get the updated renders but also have their time ranges adjusted to the range.

Any solutions?

Thanks

[Peter Chamberlain]

Have a look in the manual for Reconform for bins' or 'Reconform from media pool"

Have a look in the manual for Reconform for bins' or 'Reconform from media pool"

Hi Peter, neither one of the methods you suggest is the feature being asked for. Reconforming expects the updated image sequence to already be present in the Media Pool, when the issue is exactly that we want the Media Pool to be have the ability to update an image sequence from disk (without having to re-link or re-import or restart Resolve).

This has been a long-standing pain point. Kindly consider adding a simple function that needs no UI, that will explicitly refresh an already imported image sequence to use the updated frame range from disk. Thanks.

Resolve links to your sequential files all the time. As long as you don't have caching enabled you will see the most current render in Resolve. There is a disclaimer though. Even with caching turned off, Resolve will cache some of the frames you played back. I'm not 100% certain this happens with sequential files but it happens with MOVs. In case you don't see your latest render on the timeline just reload the project.

Resolve links to your sequential files all the time. As long as you don't have caching enabled you will see the most current render in Resolve. There is a disclaimer though. Even with caching turned off, Resolve will cache some of the frames you played back. I'm not 100% certain this happens with sequential files but it happens with MOVs. In case you don't see your latest render on the timeline just reload the project.

This works great in theory, but in practice it is unreliable at best, and flat out does nothing at worst.

I get the intent to want to take this out of the user's hands and make it "just work", but unfortunately it doesn't work at all most of the time. Sometimes even restarting Resolve doesn't sort it.

What you end up with is having zero confidence in whether you have the latest sequence, and need to manually replace the clip in order to be sure. When you have many image sequences in one project, this turns into a major annoyance.

Manually refreshing a clip or an image sequence is such a basic feature that I'm not sure why Blackmagic doesn't relent and just put it in there.

Kindly consider adding...

There is a separate forum for Feature Requests.

viewforum.php?f=33

Best practice is to search first, to see if someone already asked. If not, post one idea per thread with a very brief description of the idea in the thread's title.

Kindly consider adding...

There is a separate forum for Feature Requests.

viewforum.php?f=33

Best practice is to search first, to see if someone already asked. If not, post one idea per thread with a very brief description of the idea in the thread's title.

Jim, I mean this quite respectfully — try not to do the mods' jobs here, it makes you come across as condescending. Maybe ask Blackmagic to promote you to a moderator, and you can edit these forums to your pedantic heart's delight. Until then, either contribute to the discussion or, if you cannot contribute to it, say nothing.

Furthermore, if you had taken your own unsolicited advice and searched the feature request subforum, you'd have found that this request already exists there. Multiple times.

Meanwhile, please leave me (and others) be to continue posting relevant material to existing threads as I/they see fit. Many thanks.

[Peter Chamberlain]

can you describe again what you want as i now read this as a different request.

Try, make a 10 second clip of dpx frames.. put it in the timeline.. then change the images on your disk to 10 seconds of different images with the same dpx names.. what does the timeline play?

can you describe again what you want as i now read this as a different request.

Try, make a 10 second clip of dpx frames.. put it in the timeline.. then change the images on your disk to 10 seconds of different images with the same dpx names.. what does the timeline play?

Hi Peter. The image sequence is something that is likely being rendered out of a 3D application, so is subject to frequent change. The initial versions tend to be at lower resolutions and the frame ranges will almost always update, depending on how they fit the edit.

The scenario that you described usually occurs when the image resolution changes. I'll do a quick, low-res preview and import that into Resolve, and when I'm ready for the final version, I'll render it out as a high-res version, overwriting the previous frames. Resolve will not update the images until they are deleted and re-imported. Even re-linking the same sequence will not update its resolution.

In the other instance, with changing frame ranges, I'll render out frames 1-100, and then import that into Resolve. Then, say, I see that I actually need 200 frames, so I'll render out the remaining 101-200. There is no way to update this frame range to include the new frames.

Alternatively, if I end up removing frames, and have only 1-50, Resolve will correctly show Media Offline for frames 51-100, but offer no way to update the image sequence to match what is currently on disk.

In pretty much every other app I've used that deals with image sequences or changing source, a dedicated single-click, no-UI "Refresh/Reload Source" button has all that has been needed to sort this.

Almost one year later to the last reply, is there any update on this issue? As I am in the exactly same scenario, looking for answers on manuals and forums for this request, I can only find "workarounds" so far.

Came here to add my request for this feature.

I mostly render out EXR sequences, which Resolve handles incredibly well (thank you for that). I often add an image sequence to the timeline as it's still rendering so that I can see how things are looking, scrub back and forth etc. Once the render is done, I need to "replace" the footage with the now complete image sequence, which loses the LUT. This is at least a 6 click process:

- Right click clip and select "replace selected clip"
- Find the image sequence in the file browser, click "open"
- Right click the clip in the bin, go down to LUTs>VFX>sRGB, select.

This should really be two clicks (right click, select "refresh selected clip") at most, nothing at all at best (Premiere Pro automatically picks up new frames of an image sequence).

It may not sound like a lot of work the way it currently works, and it's not much work for just one clip, but if you have a load of image sequences that need updating, it's a lot of time spent clicking the same buttons over and over and over again to update each clip individually. Please with a cherry on top consider looking at this Black Magic, a lot of your customers would be incredibly grateful.

Manually refreshing a clip or an image sequence is such a basic feature that I'm not sure why Blackmagic doesn't relent and just put it in there.

We do this by completely deleting the original sequence from the Media Page, which leaves a big "Media Missing" hole in the timeline. Then, we import the NEW image sequence with the same embedded timecode numbers, and it relinks automatically. It takes seconds to do.

There is also an unlink command on the Media Page which I suspect will work, but I don't use it often.

The lack of an Automatic Footage updating system is a real pain if you work in a 3D Rendering Environment...it is actually for me a knockout criteria for Davinci in my pipeline.
I need to update many files many times in a 3D production. I can not do that manually...its just too much. Also there is many instances where you need to render additional frames from the 3D Software and Davinci should always update the ranges of EXR Sequences. Also it should automaticlly ReRender Caches if needed.

For now I will need to go back to After Effects and Premiere for many Projects.