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Features

Imagine what you could be doing instead of having to spend time copying and converting media to edit it. That’s the beauty of AMA, a powerful timesaving feature only available from Avid.

The Waitless Workflow

With AMA, a tapeless workflow becomes a waitless one, giving you the fastest project turnarounds and playout*. Spend more time crafting a compelling story and polishing your work instead of transcoding, rewrapping, importing, or moving media.

For post production, AMA lets you focus more on being creative instead of dealing with file format bottlenecks. With direct and immediate access to a variety of tapeless media formats—not to mention you can mix and match formats—you can start editing right away and deliver final projects back in the same media. And if you’re working on effects- or processing-heavy projects, use Avid DNxHD to maintain the highest quality throughout the entire editing process.

In the broadcast world, news can’t wait, and AMA offers the fastest route from shoot to edit to output, so you can make it to airtime in practically no time. With end-to-end XDCAM HD support, and full native RED, QuickTime (including ProRes), HD CAM SR Lite, P2, XDCAM HD/EX, Canon, and GFCAM media support, you can focus on delivering the best story for playout, without worrying about how to get footage and data in and out of the system.

Under the Hood

AMA is a plug-in-based feature in Media Composer, Symphony, and NewsCutter software that enables you to directly edit* tapeless media without having to copy or import the footage. It works behind the scenes, automatically linking clips from the device to a bin in your software. You get immediate and direct access to all AMA media just as you would when working with clips stored in the Avid Media Files folder.

What’s more, AMA Virtual Volumes work with any hard drive full of supported files too; just connect the drive, choose File > Link to AMA Volume, select the desired content, and the media pops up in a bin, ready to view and edit. AMA media functions like other video clips too. Need to consolidate all of your media? Just use the Consolidate** command to offload footage and put that camera or card/disc back in use.

Supported Formats

Arri MXF/DNxHD—Get direct access to and full native support of DNxHD files recorded on the Arri ALEXA and ALEXA Plus cameras. This plug-in opens up new Arri ALEXA workflows, and allows users to link to Arri OP1a MXF files as if they were stored in the Avid MediaFiles folder. Since the files are MXF, consolidating the files to into the MediaFiles folder is simply a copy, and no transcoding is involved. It also provides full metadata support for better clip and project management, and allows you to link to any DNx files that the Arri ALEXA can record, including DNxHD 115/120/145 (8 bit 4:2:2) and DNxHD 175x/185x/220x (10 bit 4:2:2).

AVCHD—Get direct access to and full native support for the Advanced Video Coding High Definition format with the AVCHD AMA plug-in, enabling you to instantly access and edit material for the fastest turnarounds, or quickly screen material and choose selects before transcoding. You’ll need to perform a one-time-only free activation of the Dolby AC-3 codec to use the plug-in.

Canon—Get direct access to and full native support for Canon’s new XF codec. This Canon-developed plug-in enables you to instantly start working on footage shot on upcoming Canon HD camcorders that will employ this new codec, while natively retaining the format’s high-quality 4:2:2 YUV color resolution and 50 Mbps data rate. Plus, edit footage from Canon DSLR cameras with the Canon HD-DSLR (QuickTime) plug-in.

GFCAM—Get direct access to Ikegami GFPAK media and full native support of the GFCAM format with the AMA GFCAM plug-in. This plug-in opens up new GFCAM workflows, eliminates having to transcode or copy GFCAM media before editing on an Avid system, provides full metadata support for better clip and project management, and allows you to deliver final masters in GFCAM format.

HDCAM SR Lite—Get direct access to and full native support of Sony HDCAM SR Lite media and metadata. This plug-in eliminates having to transcode media, enabling you to start editing footage right away

P2—Get direct access to and full native support of P2, DVCPRO HD, and AVC-Intra media and metadata with the AMA P2 plug-in. Experience the fastest, most flexible P2 workflows as you edit footage directly from a P2 card or drive, mix and match media, work directly with P2 Store Drives, and deliver finished programs to P2 media (Windows only).

ProRes—Get full native support to capture and output ProRes material without transcoding or re-compressing to another resolution. With the ProRes AMA plug-in, you can ingest media through Fast Import, get better AMA performance when linking to ProRes files, and even encode in ProRes (Mac only) during tape-based capture.

QuickTime—Work natively with any movie file that can be played+ in Apple’s QuickTime Player, including ProRes and H.264, plus get access to all clip metadata. With the AMA QuickTime plug-in, you can even instantly access and edit .mov footage without having to transcode, rewrap, or log and transfer media.

RED/RED EPIC—Get direct access to and full native support of RED (.R3D) files with the RED plug-in. In addition to preparing files through MetaFuze, ROCKETCINE, or REDCINE, you can shoot on any RED camera and then instantly access footage right from the RED-FLASH card or RED-DRIVE, enabling you to get right to work, with access to the full metadata and color management data. Choose between preserving RGB color space or downconverting to YUV color. Images are scaled to HD image size. See all RED workflows with Avid video editing systems.

XDCAM—Get direct access to and full native support of Sony XDCAM, XDCAM HD, and XDCAM EX formats (including low-res proxies and JVC MP4 files) with the AMA XDCAM plug-in. With fast and flexible XDCAM workflows, you can edit your way, right away. Edit SD and HD footage directly, get better clip and project management with full metadata support, import footage over FireWire, and deliver final projects in XDCAM formats.

* Playback speed and the complexity of edits and effects possible may be limited by the inherent bandwidth restrictions of the disc/card. Moving material to higher speed storage as an AMA Virtual Volume will resolve this issue and free up the original media for further recordings.

** Certain file formats may require transcoding as part of the consolidation process.

 

+ Certain file types or codecs may not open or perform optimally depending on factors such as age of codec, QuickTime engine behavior, OS version, system configuration, and installed system components.


AMA Plug-ins and Media Composer Version Compatibility

Media Composer and Symphony / NewsCutter3.5/7.54.0/8.04.0.5/8.0.55.0/9.05.5/9.56.0/10.0
XDCAM/XDCAM EX
P2
GFCAM 50
GFCAM 100  
RED One      
RED Epic          
RED Scarlet          
Quicktime      
HDCAM SR Lite        
Canon XF    
MXF    
ProRes        
AVCHD