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nablet Sony RAW X-OCN AMA Plug-in

nablet Support Team
  • Updated

Features

The nablet Sony RAW Plug-in allows you to link, play and edit the Sony X-OCN formats as well as F65, F55, F5, and NEX-FS700 Raw MXF files via AMA in Avid editing products. It supports the latest imager modes of CineAlta VENICE and BURANO cameras.

The plug-in supports viewing and editing capability with the gamma curve(S-Log3) and color space(S-Gamut3.Cine). The plug-in will translate the image into S-Log2/S-Gamut when the metadata shows that the clip was shot in this monitoring environment. Otherwise, the image will be translated into S-Log3/S-Gamut3.Cine. Please select the LUT in the Source Settings window accordingly.

The nablet Sony RAW Plug-in is the successor of the former Sony PLAV-RW1 plug-in. Note that the nablet plug-in and the Sony plug-in cannot coexist on the same system. The installation of the nablet plug-in guarantees a seamless transition* in your Sony RAW editing workflow after the Sony plug-in has been uninstalled.

*Note that clips in an editing project which have previously been linked by the legacy Sony plug-in will show the same plug-in name in the bins clip info although the nablet plug-in now handles them. This is because the initial information is stored persistently in the AAF file during linking.

Note: The nablet plug-ins and the legacy Sony plug-ins cannot coexist on the same system. Having them both installed will result in unpredictable behaviors of the editing application.

Supported Avid Products

  • Avid Media Composer v8.6 to latest releases

Supported Operating Systems

Windows

  • Windows 11
  • Windows 10 64-bit

Mac

  • macOS 14 (Sonoma) (Intel, Apple Silicon via Rosetta 2)
  • macOS 13 (Ventura) (Intel, Apple Silicon via Rosetta 2)
  • macOS 12 (Monterey) (Intel, Apple Silicon via Rosetta 2)
  • macOS 11 (Big Sur) (Intel only)
  • macOS 10.15 (Catalina)
  • macOS 10.14 (Mojave)

System Requirements

  • Media storage must be able to sustain a data rate of 600 MB/s per stream.
  • Windows OS minimum system requirement: Dual 6-core Intel Xeon Core i7 (Nehalem or later) with multithreading enabled at a speed of 2.66GHz or higher with at least 8 GB of memory installed.
  • MAC OS minimum system requirements: Dual 6-core Intel Xeon at a speed of 2.66GHz or higher with at least 8 GB of memory installed.
  • OpenCL 1.2 or higher supported high-end graphic cards are required.
  • It is recommended the Video Quality Playback option be set to Best Performance.

Change Log

  • v5.1.0
    • Improved hardware accelerated color space processing, OpenCL on Windows, Metal on Mac.
  • v5.0.0
    • Support for CineAlta BURANO 1 imager modes.
    • Support for VENICE/CineAltaV 2 v3 In-camera VFX features.
    • Extended ISO range for EI processing.
  • v4.9.0
    • Support for VENICE/CineAltaV 2 v2 8K imager modes.
    • Support for embedded LUTs.
  • v4.8.0
    • Support for VENICE/CineAltaV 2 and 8K imager modes.
  • v4.7.1
    • Approved for Windows 11 and macOS 12 (Monterey) (Intel, Apple Silicon via Rosetta 2).
    • Fixed failure to read and decode frame data from a drive with a huge sector size.
  • v4.7.0
    • Mac version refactored and approved for macOS 11 (Big Sur, Intel CPU only).
    • Added a control to the Source Settings dialog to modify a clip's sharpness.
  • v4.6.3
    • Added control to modify a clip's exposure value in the Source Settings dialog.
  • v4.6.2
    • Fix: Plugin failed to load under Media Composer version 2018.11 or earlier on Mac systems.
  • v4.6.1
    • Fix volume linking for X-OCN XT.
    • Mac version approved for macOS 10.15 (Catalina).
  • v4.6.0
    • Support for the new VENICE/CineAltaV v4.0 imager mode 4K 2.39:1.
    • Adjusted black level in color conversion.
    • The Mac version is now notarized by Apple.
  • v4.5.8
    • Fix detection of supported Nvidia OpenCL GPU on certain system configurations with the latest Nvidia drivers.
  • v4.5.7
    • Support for the new VENICE/CineAltaV v3.0 imager modes 5.7K 16:9 and 6K 2.39:1
    • Support for X-OCN XT recording format.
    • Added controls to do White Balance adjustments in the Source Settings dialog.
    • Use dual GPUs for RAW/X-OCN development and color conversion.

Installation Procedure

You cannot install the AMA Plug-ins while the editing application background services are running. Make sure you stop the services before installing the AMA Plug-Ins. The stop/start background services icon is on the Media Composer menu bar (Macintosh) or taskbar (Windows). Once you installed the new AMA plug-in, restart the services. See “Starting and Stopping Avid Background Services” in the Media Composer Help.

Install Instructions

Windows

  1. Uninstall any previous version of the nablet Sony Raw Plug-in and the Sony PLAV-RW1 plug-in (See “Uninstalling concurrent legacy Sony plug-ins” chapter later if unsure).
  2. Download the archive with an installer of the plug-in and extract it to some folder.
  3. Run the EXE file in the extracted folder to run the installation.
  4. Follow the instructions provided by the installer.

Mac

  1. Download the installer DMG file with an image of the plug-in.
  2. Double-click the DMG file to mount the image. A folder with the plug-in package should be open.
  3. Launch a PKG file to run the installation.
  4. Follow the instructions provided by the Installer application. Read and accept the End User License.
  5. During the installation, any previous versions of the nablet Sony Raw Plug-in are updated. If the Sony PLAV-RW1 plug-in exists, the installer will try to remove it. Confirm that it is no longer present by the instructions given in the “Uninstalling concurrent legacy Sony plug-ins” chapter later.

Uninstall Instructions

Windows

  1. Open Windows Control Panel and launch “Programs and Features”.
  2. Select “nablet SONY-RAW AMA Plug-In” and then select Uninstall.
  3. Next, select Yes to confirm the removal.

Mac

  1. Locate the directory “Library/Application Support/Avid/AVX2_Plug-ins/AMA/nablet”.
  2. Delete the .avx file.
  3. Empty the Trash to completely erase the file from the system.

Note:  After uninstalling/removing the nablet Sony Raw plug-in from the system, Avid Media Composer will no longer be able to access the Sony RAW and X-OCN media imported via the (AMA) Link function.

Verifying the nablet Plug-in Version

After installation, the “nablet SONY RAW Plug-in” will be available to Avid Editing products. To verify the version follow the steps below:

  1. In Avid open the Console window by selecting Tools->Console
  2. In the Console, type 
    Ama_ListPlugins
    and press Enter.
  3. Confirm the version number listed for the “nablet SONY RAW Plug-in” matches the version you installed.

Uninstalling a concurrent legacy Sony plug-in

Note that nablet plug-ins and the legacy Sony plug-ins cannot coexist on the same system. Having them both installed will result in unpredictable behaviors of the editing application.

  1. List available plug-ins as described above (Ama_ListPlugins command).
  2. If “MVP_MSP_SonyRaw_64-bit” is listed close the Avid application and uninstall the Sony plugin.

Make sure you stop the Avid Background Services before uninstalling the Sony Plug-Ins. The stop/start background services icon is on the Media Composer menu bar (Macintosh) or taskbar (Windows). Once you uninstalled the plug-in, restart the services.

  • On Windows enter the Control Panel and launch “Programs and Features”. Uninstall “Sony PLAV-RW1”. If you cannot uninstall from “Programs and Features” locate C:\Program Files\Avid\AVX2_Plug-ins\AMA\ and manually delete the folder named SonyRaw.
  • On Mac OS X locate the directory “Library/Application Support/Avid/AVX2_Plug-ins/AMA" and remove the Sony PLAV-RW plug-in by deleting MVP_MSP_SonyRaw.avx. Empty the Trash to completely erase the file from the system.

Operation Procedure

Linking to Sony RAW and X-OCN files on Media Composer 8.6 and later

  1. Select the desired destination bin in the project.
  2. From the menu bar, select File->Input->Source Browser.
  3. Make sure 'Link' is selected in the Source Browser Settings, not 'Import'.
  4. In the Source Browser navigate to the Sony RAW file(s) to be linked.
  5. Right-click the file and select Link with -> Sony RAW.
  6. Hit the Link button on the bottom right.

Linking to Sony RAW and X-OCN files on Media Composer 8.5 and earlier

  1. Select the desired destination bin in the project.
  2. From the menu bar, select File->AMA Link… (Link to Media… if using Avid MC 8.4/8.5).
  3. From the Files of type drop-down menu select Sony RAW (*.mxf).
  4. Select the Sony RAW file(s) to be linked.
  5. Select Open.

Volumes and root folders

The root directory of a RAW or X-OCN volume will either be named “CINEROOT” or will carry a name that consists of Camera-ID+RealNumber+CameraPosition+3 Random alphanumeric characters, for example, “A003CTLZ”.

mceclip0.png

Linking to a Sony RAW and X-OCN Volume on Media Composer 8.6 and later

  1. Select the desired destination bin in the project.
  2. From the menu bar, select File->Input->Source Browser.
  3. Make sure 'Link' is selected in the Source Browser Settings, not 'Import'.
  4. Inside the Source Browser navigate to the desired volume.
  5. When linking to the SR-D1, AXS-CR1, AXS-AR1, or AXS-AR3 devices select the root directory of
    the mounted volume. When linking to a virtual volume, such as when the contents of a media
    drive have been copied to another storage device while maintaining the folder structure, select
    the copied root directory.
  6. Hit the Link button on the bottom right.

Linking  to Sony RAW and X-OCN Volume on Media Composer 8.5 and earlier

  1. Select the desired destination bin in the project.
  2. From the menu bar, select File->AMA Link… (Link to Media… if using Avid MC 8.4).
  3. From the Files of Type drop-down menu select Sony RAW (Folder).
  4. When linking to the SR-D1, AXS-CR1, AXS-AR1, or AXS-AR3 devices select the root directory of
    the mounted volume. When linking to a virtual volume, such as when the contents of a media
    drive have been copied to another storage device while maintaining the folder structure, select
    the copied root directory
  5. Select Open.

Relink proxy to high-resolution

The relink operation will replace the XAVC or MPEG2 proxy files on a timeline with their corresponding Raw files. For the relink to be successful, the raw files must be online and in an open bin. It is important to note the clips in the bin will not be modified by the relink, only the timeline clips in the sequence will be modified. To prevent any changes to the original timeline enable the “Create new sequence” option in the Relink tool. Use the instructions below as a guide for relinking XAVC/MPEG2 clips to raw clips in a timeline.

  1. Open all bins that contain proxy clips to be relinked.
  2. In each bin, highlight the proxy clips to be relinked.
  3. Highlight the sequence.
  4. Right-click the sequence to reveal the context menu and then select Relink.
  5. Enable the following options:
    Selected items in ALL open bins,
    Relink by Timecode: Start,
    Source Name: Tape Name or Source File ID,
    match case when comparing tape and source file names,
    Create new sequence (this prevents modification of the original timeline).
  6. Select OK to start the relink.

Source Settings, Color Transformations and Embedded LUTs

In order to view the Source Settings window, you must right-click a clip in a bin and select Source
settings… Three tabs in this window affect the image appearance:

  • Linked Plug-in,
  • Color Encoding,
  • FrameFlex

The Color Encoding tab allows you to add and remove LUT tables, which will change the visual look of
the image which can transform the clips' color space to the project color space.

The Frameflex tab allows you to change the dimension and framing of the image.

On the Linked Plug-in tab, you find controls to adjust the White Balance, Exposure and Sharpness of
the clip. Application of an embedded LUT, which is explained later, can be enabled here as well.
Initially, the values for Color Temperature, Tint and Exposure were found in the clips metadata
are used.

For technical reasons some parameter names needed to be truncated on the user interface. When you
hover with the mouse over a parameter, it's full name is shown.

The Color Temperature can be adjusted on the appropriate slider in a range of 2000 to 15000 Kelvin,
and Tint in a Range of -1.0 to 1.0.

The Exposure can be adjusted in the range from ISO 80 to ISO 10000 in steps of 1/3 of a stop.

Sharpness can be adjusted in a range from -300 to + 500. The default is a value of 0. Note that the Sharpness setting takes effect only when full-resolution frames are requested. So make sure the Avid Video Quality menu is set to Full Quality (see below) when you monitor the settings adjustment. How the sharpness changes can best be viewed at the full-screen display on a secondary monitor after you hit the Apply button.

X-OCN footage shot with a camera with VENICE 2 v3 firmware or later can have two additional parameters which then appear in the In-camera VFX settings group. When the footage was shot in an environment with mixed conventional light and light from an LED wall and the In-camera VFX checkbox is checked, you may fine tune the color fidelity by correcting the LED Wall Color Temperature in a range of 2000 to 15000 Kelvin, and by specifying the percentage contribution of conventional light to the color in the mixed environment by means of the Light Blend slider in a range of 0 to 100 percent

Note: On some versions of Media Composer the first attempt to change a value does not take effect. To overcome this, toggle a setting one time, e.g. switch between Clip Meta Data and Default and back. After that, any further changes will take effect.

To reset the custom settings to the values at recording time choose Clip Meta Data settings above. To reset them to generic defaults choose the Default settings above.

The image preview on the Linked Plug-in tab shows the image in the format before any Color Transformation LUTs and Look LUTs have been applied on the Color Encoding tab. Switch to the Color Encoding tab to view the final effect of your custom settings after the LUTs have been applied and thus how the image will appear in further processing, or, if the clip is opened in the Source Monitor, use the full-screen display on a secondary monitor to view the final image while you change settings.

Managing Color Adapters

When you link footage whose Capture-Gamma or Transfer-Characteristic does not match the project color space, for example, a clip with Sony S-Log3.Cine into a BT.709 project, a color transformation is needed to correctly display the pictures.

Media Composer ships with a variety of LUTs for color transformations, including those for Sony S-Log color spaces. Automatic insertion of a matching color transformation upon linking can be enabled in the Color Management Settings. They can be reached either via File->Settings->User tab or at the Color Encoding tab in the Source Settings dialog.

Open the Source Settings dialog of the linked clip to see the current color transformation.

If automatic insertion of a color transformation is disabled in the Color Management Settings, or if the clip color space matches the project color space, the Color transformations list will be empty. If color spaces don't match, you can now insert a color transformation manually in two ways:

  1. Under Color Adapters hit the Auto button which will cause Media Composer to insert the required
    transformation automatically now
  2. Or select the desired Color Adapter from either the Generic or User installed LUTs type:

Look LUTs and custom Color Transformation LUTs

If you have a Look LUT, a LUT that gives the recorded video a creative look, or a custom color space transformation LUT that you want to insert, first you need to install that LUT via the Color Management Settings dialog.

For details please see the Media Composer user manual. A user-installed LUT can be inserted in the same way as manually inserting a color adapter. Select it from the User Installed LUTs Color Adapter type.

Make sure to position a Look LUT before any color transformation. If you added a Look LUT after a color transformation was added automatically or manually, you can easily drag the Look LUT upwards to the top position.

Embedded LUTs

Some clips may carry an embedded LUT. This can be a creative LUT to apply a specific look to the recorded footage or a color transformation LUT for example for conversion from Slog3.Cine to BT.709 or it can even be a combination of both. When an embedded LUT is available you will find the additional checkbox on the Linked Plug-in tab.

Hover with the mouse over the checkbox to get information about the name of the LUT. To use this LUT enable the application with this checkbox. Also for this, on some Media Composer versions, you may need to toggle the setting once to see the application of the LUT taking effect on the display window.

You can also check the availability of an embedded LUT in the bin's Monitoring Descriptions column.

The name prefix “EMB1” indicates that it is an embedded LUT.

If the LUT is a pure creative LUT after you enabled the application of it the color transformations on the Color Encoding tab can be kept as they are. However, if the LUT contains a color space transformation, the color transformation on the Color Encoding tab must be deleted. Otherwise, you will get a duplicate color transformation which results in a bad image with the wrong colors. Switch to the Color Encoding tab, select the items in the Color transformations list, and delete them.

If you know in advance that the footage has an embedded color transformation LUT and that you want to use it, disable the automatic insertion of color transformation in the Color Management Settings before you start linking. Use File->Settings->User->Color Management or hit the Color Management Settings button on the Source Settings Color Encoding tab to change the behavior.

Of course, the color transformation of the embedded LUT must match the color space of your editing project. For example, you must not use a LUT with a target transformation to BT.709 in a project with Slog3 or HLG color space to avoid the wrong colors.

Unlike the settings on the other Source Settings tabs, unfortunately, Media Composer does not support applying the settings on the Linked Plug-in tab to multiple selected clips. So you must enable and disable the application of an embedded LUT for each clip individually.

Avid Playback Settings

The playback quality in the Avid applications can be configured using the Video Quality menu in the Timeline window. When the Avid Video Quality menu is set to Full Quality the full 6K, 4K, or 2K image is being decoded. At a Draft Quality setting an image of 1/2 resolution is being decoded and at the Best Performance option, an image of 1/4 resolution is decoded.

mceclip5.png

For a fluent playback, it is recommended to choose Draft or Best Performance mode. To view images in the best Quality choose Full Quality mode.

Known Issues and Limitations

  • The user must uninstall any versions of the legacy Sony PLAV-RW1 plug-in from Programs and Features on Windows before installing this plug-in.
  • The Source color space parameter of the Source Settings dialog for S-Gamut3.Cine color space clips will display as “unknown gamma [90-582 (10 bits)]” on earlier versions of Avid Media Composer.
  • Real-time playback is sustainable with a single video stream of RAW or X-OCN material and 16 channels of audio using Avid’s NLE Video Quality Playback setting of Draft and Best Performance for all frame rates except 50p and 60p.
  • Real-time playback of video is sustainable with RAW or X-OCN 50p and RAW 59.94p fps, if the audio is disabled in an Avid project of 1280x720 resolution at their corresponding frame rate using Draft or Best Performance Video Quality Playback settings.
  • After transcoding a clip or after performing a video mix down, some versions of Media Composer will not set a desired lower Video Quality when playing back the source file. Toggle the Video Quality setting once when you encounter a performance loss during playback.
  • Real-time playback of RAW or X-OCN material cannot be achieved without rendering first in Draft or Best Quality mode.
  • OpenCL runtime is not recommended and will reduce performance.
  • Sony SR-D1/AXS-CR1 devices are not designed for real-time playback in Avid’s NLEs.
  • Importing RAW or X-OCN files to a 1080i/50, 1080i/60, or 720p/29.97 project may show incorrect format information.
  • If linking to multiple RAW or X-OCN files at one time and the scroll bar in the AMA Link to file window is moved, it will result in a “File Not Found” error when the clips are linked. To avoid this situation perform a select all with the Ctrl+A keys instead.
  • AMA Link sometimes cannot be performed from the SR-D1 device. 
  • Automatic import of RAW files when connecting a device to the NLE is not possible when the CINEROOT folder does not exist.
  • Intel Arc external GPUs are not supported by the debayer currently. The CPU will be utilized to
    process the images no other GPU is available.

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