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Final Cut Pro → Media Composer

Final Cut Pro to Avid Media Composer

AAF is Avid's own interchange format, and it is the most at-home target there is. fcp2aaf writes it from a Final Cut FCPXML, conforming the audio from your original recordings.

macOS 14 or later · Apple Silicon

Avid built AAF. Media Composer reads it natively, and so does every Avid-oriented finishing and sound pipeline. Final Cut Pro, on the other hand, exports FCPXML and nothing else.

fcp2aaf reads that FCPXML, conforms the audio, and writes the AAF. What reaches the Avid side is a clean audio session: roles as tracks, clips placed to the sample, levels and fades in place.

AAF is the native format

Because AAF is Avid's own, there is no lossy interchange step on the Avid side — the AAF imports as a sequence with its tracks, clips and metadata intact. fcp2aaf writes to the standard, so the Audio Channel Combiner setting stays off and every channel arrives on its own track.

Embedded or linked

An embedded AAF holds the audio inside a single file, which is the simplest thing to bring in. A referenced delivery is a folder with the AAF and the conformed WAVs beside it, under readable names, for a pipeline that would rather link than import media.

Roles as tracks, timecode for relinking

Each Final Cut role and subrole becomes its own track. The session start timecode is written in, and each recording carries the source timecode the machine stamped, so material can be matched back to the rushes.

You set the track order, the names and which tracks travel before converting, with the whole session drawn in front of you.

The audio edit, not the picture

fcp2aaf's AAF is an audio session. It carries the sound of the edit and where every piece of it falls. It does not carry the video — Media Composer's picture comes across by other routes, and that is not what this application does.

fcp2aaf does not pass audio through. It reads the paths Final Cut wrote into the FCPXML, opens your original recordings, and cuts from them exactly the regions the edit uses, with as much or as little handle around each clip as you ask for. WAV, BWF, RF64, AIFF, CAF, FLAC, MP3, MP4, MOV and MXF are read straight from the drive, at any size.

What imports on the Avid side

A native sequence
Roles as tracks, clips to the sample, fades and crossfades, in AAF's own format.
Levels and markers
Clip gain, volume automation, pan, and markers with the kind written into the name.
Timecode that lines up
Session start timecode, and per-recording source timecode for matching back to the rushes.

Questions about Media Composer

Is AAF really Avid's format?

Yes. Avid created AAF and Media Composer reads it natively, which makes it the least lossy target of the lot.

Embedded or linked media?

Either. Embedded is one file. A referenced delivery is a folder with the AAF and its WAVs, which suits a pipeline that links rather than imports.

Does the video come across?

No. fcp2aaf writes an audio AAF. The picture reaches Media Composer by other means — that is outside what this application does.

Will source timecode be right?

Yes. The session start timecode is written into the AAF, and each recording carries the timecode the recorder stamped, quoted on its own clock.

Other destinations

The AAF is standard, so it opens in Pro Tools, Nuendo, Fairlight and Premiere Pro too.

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