How to make sequential .mts files on different cards?

andres

I really complicates makes workflow having shots with the same name, does anyone know a way around this problem,
is it possible to make the gh remember its last filename?

dkitsov

nope - reason - GH2/GH1 being consumer camera by Panasonic design has to have compatibility with bluray-like file/folder structure

andres

too bad.
then does anyone know about a software that can batch rename?

dkitsov

Adobe Bridge?

OSGondar

@andres you wont be renaming the files in camera, here are your options:

How To batch rename files for windows

Its easy to rename a series of videos and you don't need special software. Just highlight all of the files say its 30 of them, highlight them all. Then simply right click + RENAME on the FIRST file of the series (while they are all still highlighted) specify a series name and hit enter. They will ALL rename with that name but with an automatically added (1), (2), (3) etc after the file name you specified. So imagine Series name (1), Series name (2) and so on for all 30 files... as the new files names, I do this all the time. I don't know of a program to do this but its a standard feature in windows so you don't need one anyway. It is pretty crucial to appropriately name a series of files for a given shoot, simply putting each project in it's own folder will not cut it and if you insist on putting all of your video files in the same folder (bad practice) now you have a fix.

BTW You can batch rename them while still on the CARD this way, so do that before you drag them over if you prefer.

How To batch rename files for MAC

i don't use mac myself to know if the above works similarly in the mac "finder" or explorer without a special program BUT if it doesn't, i found this http://www.mrrsoftware.com/MRRSoftware/NameChanger.html Does exactly what you are asking for except it's for mac and that is all the program is designed to do..

crunchy

Making (number) after the name of the file is not so nice. Better solution is to use IrfanView.
Select: File-Batch conversion/rename
Select the files which should be renamed and click "Add" (or "Add all" if you want to rename all the files in selected directory)
Select "Batch rename"
Name pattern: "SomeFileName_###" (### stands for digits). With options you can even select starting number if you wish
Select Output directory (if renaming, you should click "Use current")
Then click "Start Batch". Voila!

Fool4UAnyway

Phil Seastrand has written an importer file to replace PhotoFunStudio, which does just this: rename the .mts files on importing. The filenames will make more sense than the anonymous numbers they originally contain. There are also more (dedicated) file renaming tools that allow you to add almost anything to your wishes to a file's name or completely construct it.

Shield

This is a freeware GUI renaming tool for Windows. Been using it for years, and it works great!

http://www.1-4a.com/rename/download.htm

fatpig

i use antrenamer. its very nice and has a lot of ways to rename.

Oedipax

I use Name Mangler for OSX - the sequential rename feature.

Note that renaming MTS files will break compatibility with FCPX, if that's important to you. I think it messes up the Log & Transfer tool in FCP7 as well. Strangely, Adobe doesn't have this problem and you are free to rename your files whatever the hell you want :)

Ptchaw

@andres Why can't you just put the files from each camera in a subfolder?

andres

@Ptchaw
In my workflow I tend to transcode everything to prores first so I really don´t care about the avchd structure. Then I edit, send it to AE with Premiere if I must do an effect (denoice). Then I send back to Final Cut 7. Here I must relink the files and if they have the same name I must know which one is each. If they have unique names I trust in the automatic process of relinking. Then I send to color and back to final cut.

Now I will do the same thing but in Avid using Prores so I can later grade in color.
There is no timecode in the AVCHD so AVID or FINAL CUT don´t know which clip is which.
This AVCHD is a love hate relationship for me. I would prefer recording to .mp4 or .mov secuentially.

I used to do the folder thing but I feel I loose control of my media.
For me the name of the file should have everything
d21-07-11card1-####.mts
d21-07-11card2-####.mts
d22-07-11card3-####.mts

and so on.
For small projects is no problems but I plan to start a probably 50 hours material documentary and is not nice to have 50 files with the same name in your avid.

sankarz

@Andres
The best workflow I can suggest for your situation using FCP7 is :
Create a new project for each card and log and transfer them. Now you will get ProRes files in scratch disk for two cards in two different project folders. Rename them using any program as mentioned above or simply go to terminal, change to the scratch folder and run a script some thing like
# for a in `seq 01 10`; do mv clip0$a Prefix$a; done #
The above script (with out the hashes #s) will change file names of clips clip001 to clip010 to Prefix01 to Prefix10.
Then you can put all these ProRes files in one folder and import them to FCP7 and have fun.

Edit: Actually there is new feature in FCP 7 that can add prefixes by default. I just figured it out. When you log and transferring under the preview window there is an option to add customized prefixes. Its very straight forward. I used to follow above procedure for FCP 6 and was continuing with FCP 7 in same way. But no more hassle. Its very simple :)

Note: Don't rename the AVCHD files, they need to have the same filenames and file structure since some metadata related to each clip is stored in different places. But the self contained Proress clips can be renamed as described above. Hope this helps.

@Oedipax
FCPX is using a different file naming scheme for transcoded clips and it is also adding a prefix depending on the parent event. I don't think this is an issue now.

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