How to Archive Projects in Avid Media Composer

Preparing the external drive
Before beginning this process, be sure your hard drive archive contains no Avid Media Files nor OMFI files at the root drive level. If these files are there and you want to keep them, you can do so by simply placing them into a folder on the archive drive. The idea here is to not have any of these files "out in the open" at the root drive level, but it's perfectly fine to have as many as you want inside folders on the drive. Create a new folder and name it the project to be archived.

In the Avid
It's easier to do this if you put all your media into one bin. It is possible to archive several separate bins, however this will create several more steps to the overall archiving process. For our purposes here, we will put all our media to be archived into one bin, combining everything from the individual bins in the project.

Once all the media is in one bin, select all the clips (Ctrl+A or Cmd+A on a Mac). Next, right click and choose "Consolidate/Transcode" or choose this option from the Clip pull down menu in the main tool bar.

The Consolidate/Transcode window
The Consolidate/Transcode window will then pop up and you want to choose Consolidate on the upper left. Just below this option, check "Video and audio on the same drive(s)". In the window beneath that, choose the drive you are archiving to. All the options to the right in this window should be turned off. Select the Consolidate button below.

Relink
Another window will then pop up titled "Copying Media Files". Select the second option here, "Relink Master clips to media on the target drive." Select OK. This begins the process of consolidating the media selected to the archive. The amount of time this takes depends upon the amount and size of your media files.

The Project File
When the consolidating process is complete, exit out of the Avid application. Next, locate your Project File. The location of this could vary on different systems depending upon how your software is set up. On the system I regularly use, the path is: C:\Docs and Settings\All Users\Shared Documents\Shared Avid Projects. This is where the all of the current Avid Project Folders reside. If you do not know where your project folders are, you can find out by right clicking the project icon in the main bin in the application and choosing "Reveal File". This will actually open the project folder window as well as show you the path in the address bar. Close out of the application if you did this to find the path, and open the Avid Projects file folder. Select the project folder of the project you are archiving and copy and paste it in your folder of the project on your archive drive.

Archiving for later use
All that's left to do is simply drag the Avid MediaFiles folder (containing MXF media files) and the OMFI MediaFiles folder from the root of your archive drive into the folder of your project archive. Your project is now archived! You then can get rid of the media files of this project on the Avid as well as trash the project folder there, and don't forget the project folder in the Avid Attic. You now have your project archived on another drive, saving you disc space on your Avid media drives, and can recall your project for later use as long as you have it on your archive drive.

Recalling projects
To recall a project, be sure the Avid application is not running. Have your archived drive plugged in and simply place the archived project folder back into the Avid's Project Folder and move the Avid MediaFiles folder and the OMFI MediaFiles folder from the archived project folder to the root drive of the archive. Launch the Avid application, and you'll see your project back on the projects list when you start Avid. When you open the project, everything you archived (which should be all your media, we hope) should be there. You are actually seeing everything from the archive drive, so to consolidate it back to the Avid Media Drive(s), you do what you did to archive in reverse by selecting all the clips in the bin (Ctrl+A or Cmd+A on a Mac with the bin selected) and Consolidate as described above, except you now would choose the bold Avid media drive as the bold drive simply has the most room on it. After this is consolidated, you can unplug your archive and your project will be restored as it was the day you archived it!