This article covers advanced use of Avid MetaFuze as a render farm processing node. For basics on MetaFuze visit the official site.

MetaFuze can be described as a front end media importer for Avid Media Composer. It is a standalone application used for transcoding various digital formats to Media Composer’s native MXF format.

In cases of certain file formats such as DPX or R3D MetaFuze must be used because Media Composer lacks the ability to import these file types directly.

MetaFuze is also capable of faster file imports of certain file types that are supported by Media Composer. It can be more economical because multiple instances of free MetaFuze software can be deployed on general purpose computers thus relieving the editing workstation of file import duties.

MetaFuze runs in Windows but can also be executed from command line using this syntax:

METAFUZE [-DEBUG] FILE

where “file” is the file name of the MetaFuze XML transcode job.

This functionality allows users to develop rendering networks using MetaFuze on any number of render nodes.

The batch script below is a simple render manager that illustrates this concept using only one node. Save the Mfmanager batch file in C:Program Files (x86)AvidMetaFuze as MFMANAGER.BAT. Execute it as follows:

MFMANAGER PATH

where “path” is the full Windows path to the folder with MetaFuze XML files.

The batch file will submit all the files to MetaFuze for processing and place them in “processed” directory when they are finished.

Mfmanager is very simple and may not be appropriate for actual post-production processing but can be used as a basic building block for building a more robust render manager for MetaFuze.

REM Simple MetaFuze XML Render Manager
 REM Igor Ridanovic 2009 www.HDhead.com

ECHO OFF
 CLS
 IF "%1"=="" GOTO Instructions

REM Verify path and files
 IF NOT EXIST "%1" GOTO Error
 IF NOT EXIST "%1".xml GOTO Empty

REM Create "processed" Directory if none exist
 IF NOT EXIST "%1"processed MKDIR "%1"processed

REM Call MetaFuze for each XML file
 FOR /f %%f IN ('DIR /b "%1"*.xml') DO (
 METAFUZE -debug "%1"%%f
 COPY "%1"%%f "%1"processed
 DEL "%1"%%f
 )
 GOTO :Done

:Error
 CLS
 ECHO The XML path you entered doesn't exist.
 GOTO Done

:Empty
 CLS
 ECHO There are no XML files in the directory.
 GOTO Done

:Instructions
 CLS
 ECHO Usage: MFMANAGER PATH
 ECHO where PATH is the path to your XML files.

:Done