AVID – How To Relink to your Original Camera Footage And Re-Transcode for Online Conform to HD or UHD or 4K

  1. Duplicate the sequence and put in a new bin.  Call that bin ONLINE - XXX your project name

  2. Next attempt to modify the video tracks down to 1 or 2 tracks if possible.

Go to the hard drive that all your AVID Media is on and hide the media

Hide the AVID media files so that AVID doesn't relink to the old transcoded media. Change the name to the AVID MediaFiles folder.

Change from this

To This

Back in AVID Project OPEN all the bins in AVID that have your linked files that you used to transcode the camera originals

to make the media in your avid project for offline



Skip this step if you already have your footage linked 

If you need to RE-Link you camera originals do the next steps

  • Relink to the Storage Hard Drive or volume that the Original Camera footage is on. (where you stored the backup of all the cards you recorded on the camera)

Go to >Tools>Source Browser

  • Choose to Link not Import
  • Navigate to the Original Footage folder for each card
  • Or each day of cards and the folder


  • Locate the original Native Pro Res .movs QuickTimes or 
  • XAVCHD or .r3D etc.
  • Click on Link

  • The clips will load into the Bin shown here from each card you linked to. Do this till all the cards are linked and the files appear in the bin.

All the Linked files will load up in the bin when you choose the default settings.



When all the cards are re-linked and loaded up in the bins

Go to each of the bins and select all the footage in each bin by using the keyboard shortcut "command a" on a mac

Do this in all the bins that contain your camera masters that are linked in AVID


Once all that is done then>

Open the Bin that contains your final duplicated sequence that you want to link the newly linked files to

Right click the sequence to relink and choose Relink

>Managed Media


Choose Selected Items in All open bins

Choose to relink by Tape Name or Source file Name

If that doesn't work choose





Choose to relink by Tape Name or Source file ID

Change the timeline Clip Color to show AMA clips as a different color so you can make sure you are linked to the "Native" ProRes .mov QuickTimes




Go to the Timeline "fast menu"

Choose Clip Color






Choose a color for the Linked Online clips and make sure the "checkbox" is checked for Linked Clips


Offline will by default be RED so that is how we'll check if we have any offline media

Notice in this timeline only part of the clips turned purple. You should have the entire timeline show purple clips so that you know all the clips are relinked.

On AVID timeline, you can -Match Frame Track by placing your timeline indicator on the timeline

Right clicking on the V1 or V2 or V3 depending on what track you are match framing and choose

>Match Frame Track

The clip containing the match frame will load in the source monitor with the inpoint marked at the match frame. Then choose the Find Bin Icon to identify the clip in the bin location

Right click the clip that is highlighted in the bin and choose Revel File

The location of the file will load and you can verify as in this example that yes this is the camera original that we wanted to link to

Next you need to put the space back into your AVID MediaFiles folder

Back in AVID


Next change your project settings to Avid Media Composer > Preferences > Choose the Format Tab

Choose the Format Tab > Change the project to Ultra HD> UHD 23.98 if it is not already set to that


NOTE most of you shot in UHD or 1080 but check the raw footage files to make sure you know what format you

shot and make sure that the AVID project is set to that.