Proxy workflow on 2 computers

[krummij]

Hi,

I'm about to start editing a documentary which will include working with and ingesting 10s of hours of footage that's over 8TB of media.

Ideally I want to be able to work on the project on two separate computers, a desktop and a laptop which I could edit on, on the go. The way I imagined doing this was creating Cineform proxies on a separate drive from the original media. The original media would be on the desktop and the proxies on a separate drive which I could connect to the laptop and edit on the go. While doing research on the forums I ran into some users saying that you should ideally keep your proxies in the same folder structure as your original media.

What I'm wondering if users here have any experience working with proxies in this sort of manner? One computer which has both online and offline media and another where there are just the proxies? Is this just a crazy fever dream that will only incur workflow nightmares?

[Jim_Simon]

Whatever you decide, test it first.  Don't blindly accept any advice.

[krummij]

Thanks and of course! I'm just looking at this as an option and don't want to waste too much time of it if it's already dead in the water.

[Trevor_Asq · Accepted solution]

Been using this workflow lately and it works, for the most part. Sometimes have to relink a few files and run into problems occasionally where original files have only 1 or 0 audio channels (proxy ‘not matching’ errors).

I renamed all the A7/Osmo etc files to be unique to avoid relinking issues.

I used DNX LB presets that I rolled myself - with 4096/3840/1920 presets with 8/1/0 audio channels. Idea being that we could resize in offline & have a clue how image would hold up - in retrospect would have just gone for 1920. DNX was to enable encoding on PC to same format.

I had them create ‘next to original’ - so I’d have a clue as to high res location  when it came to online.

To copy just the proxies for the offline station I used Free File Sync and used the filter */*Proxy* - which copies only files with Proxy in name and retains folder structure. Thus you link one proxy file on offline machine & rest relink.

Test first!