Native Format Editing in Adobe Premiere Pro

PVC Editing & Post by Volin Brougham

The promise; the reality; how to do it.

In the past few years, a barrage of new video acquisition formats and recording methodologies have sprouted like mushrooms after the rain. The major shift has come in the form of tapeless, file-based acquisition that uses equipment that has its roots in the information technology industry.

As video post-production has scrambled to keep up, editors have been left with little choice than to become ersatz compression specialists and computer technologists. We all wear a few extra hats these days, but there are times when you just want to do what you do without a lot of additional work.

Adobe Systems has heard the cries of editors everywhere, and kicked open the door on a completely different way of working with tapeless, file-based media. Adobe Premiere Pro CS5.5, which is available standalone or as the anchor application of the Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 Production Premium bundle for both PC and Mac, is the company’s latest gambit in the evolution of non-linear editing and post-production. If you tried and dismissed Premiere sometime in the past before the software received a ground-up rewrite and gained the “Pro” suffix, it’s time for a second look. In this article, I will review both the general theory of the tapeless native file format workflow, and also give specific instructions (including video demonstrations) on how to get up and running quickly.

Disclaimer: Yes, I am an unabashed fan of this workflow, and can’t help sounding like a kid in a candy store about some of it - but read on and you’ll soon understand why.

Native, tapeless workflows: Why?

In 2007 with the release of Premiere Pro CS3, Adobe introduced and has since refined and expanded what has become the cornerstone of the software and is arguably its strongest feature: native format support for tapeless, file-based post-production workflows. Right out of the box, Premiere Pro is ready to edit virtually any tapeless format available today, immediately and without limitations. read more...