I came across Lightworks while looking for alternatives to an outdated version of Premiere that can't handle HD files very well. So far it looks very promising, and I'm looking forward to cutting a short film on it soon.

It would also be nice if I were able to access some of the older videos I've edited, so I have a quick question about the EDL formats Lightworks can import.

I'm trying to import some projects from Premiere (which can export CMX 3600) and one project from Reaper (which can export Samplitude and Vegas EDLs). I'm working with Canon h264 files from a 60D, so no embedded timecode or reel names.

Apart from EDLs, I see in LW's specifications that it can "Import ALE, FLX, and CSV files", although a search through the manual doesn't turn up what format the CSV file might be in. I was wondering if any of the EDLs Lightworks imported could be in the following format:

Absolute path to video file, Timeline in, Timeline out, Video in, Video out

If so, I can write a program in PERL to convert the foreign formats into something Lightworks can read.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

I can't answer your question directly but you might try creating a short edit in Lightworks and export an EDL from it. Then you could see if you would need to create a perl convertor.

Thank you for your reply.

That's a very good idea. Unfortunately I tried every option in the EDL export list and in each case the export dialog said "Skipping" to all of my media items. LW exported nothing at all, not even an empty file. Any idea why it would do that?

(On an unrelated note, thank you very much for your codec switch workaround. I can now export XviD directly from Lightworks.)

Maybe the media needs time code to be able to export and EDL.

(Your welcome)

Drag the Export tool and drop it on the edit to export it as EDL. It seems like you're trying to export e.g. a bin as an EDL.

Thank you both for your help!

SMPse, that was indeed the problem. Sorry, I feel a bit silly about that.

So, the result of exporting all the EDLs is that all of them use reel names (in this case, the LW cookie) as identifiers. Since none of the external EDLs I need to import have a reel name associated with the cuts, I still need to find a way to either:

1) import media using an absolute file path (C:\this\is\my\video.mov) instead of a reel name. This method seems to make the most sense (at least to me) with newer cameras that are not tape-based and automatically assign individual file names to each take.

or

2) find a way to relink reels/clips to an absolute file path. The funny thing is that LW will import my Premiere CMX 3600 EDL and display the audio and video tracks with cuts, just as they were in Premiere. The only difference is that because LW doesn't know where to find the associated video files, the clips are unlinked and just remain a kind of empty zombie edit. So in fact, I don't need timecode, but I do need a way to point LW back to the original video files.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!