What is MXF file and how to convert mxf file to mov for editing

Posted by eimaliyu on January 4th, 2013

What is MXF file?

MXF is short for Material Exchange Format, it is one of the highly-compressed file format, Files in this format are a type of media file (either audio or video, depending on the specifics of a file) designed to be played on a computer. MXF file is designed to streamline workflows between different platforms, such as cameras, digital editing equipment, and servers. The file format adopts a subset of the Advanced Authoring Format (AAF), which was designed to help standardize the interchange of video between multiple vendors and platforms.

"Here is a question for the professionals?

How can I import MXF files to Final Cut Pro? I have 3 hard drives of footages for a film I am editing and while some of the files are .mov files, it appears to me most of them are .mxf files, which I cannot open. Is there a way I can import .mxf files into Final Cut Pro for editing without downloading special software?" From Apple Discussion

As we know, most of video editing applications, video uploading websites and video player can not support the MXF file, if you want to share your video or edit them you should convert mxf file to other common video format like avi, mov, mp4, etc.

Doremisoft MXF Converter for Mac, especially designed for dealing all kinds of video incompatibility, which can help you to convert MXF from

Panasonic P2: Panasonic AJ-HPX 300, AJ-HPX3700, AG-HPX250, AG-HVX200, Panasonic AG-HPX370, Canon XF: Canon XF305, XF300, XF100, XF105, C300, Sony XDCAM: Sony PMW-EX1, PMW-EX3, PMWEX1R, PMW200, PMW100, PDWF800, etc. to Mac friendly file format like ProRes MOV, MPEG-4, for easily playback on Mac or editing programs like iMovie, Final Cut Pro, FCP X, etc.

Otherwise, after you converted the MXF file, you can enjoy them at

Apple devices: iPad, iPad 2, iPhone, iPhone 4S, iPod touch 4, iPod nano, Apple TV, etc.

Mobile phones: Android, Blackberry, Nokia, HTC, Motorola Xoom, Samsung Galaxy S2, Sony Ericsson, Sony Tablet S, LG, etc.

Game hardware: PSP, PS3, Xbox, Xbox 360, Wii, NDS, etc.

General MP4 players: Zune, Archos, Creative Zen, iRiver, Walkman, etc.

Applications: iMovie, QuickTime, iTunes, FCE, FCP, iDVD, Adobe Premiere, etc.

So you can import canon xf300 mxf to fcp x for editing, and you also can edit canon xf105 mxf in adobe permiere pro.

The conversion also is easy, you just need to download the mac video converter, then install it to your Mac, then run the application to load your .mxf file into the converter, then seleted the output format, you can choose Apple ProRes 422(*mov), this software also give a way to edit your video, you can clip or trim videos to get the wanted segments, merge and join multiple videos together into one file, crop and remove the black bars or commercial markings, capture snapshot from video, set effects like Brightness, Contrast and Saturation, etc.