Original file
Also known as: camera original, source file
The file as the camera wrote it, before any proxy, export, chat application re-encode or platform copy has been made from it.
Updated
What it means
A clip collects versions on its way to being watched. A proxy for editing, an export for delivery, a re-encode from a messaging application, a platform copy, and only one of them is the original.
Every version after the first has lost something. Each encode discards detail the previous one kept, which is why the generation a file belongs to matters more than the resolution written on it.
It differs from Raw footage in emphasis rather than in substance. One describes material that has not been edited; this describes a file that has not been re-encoded by anything.
How it works in practice
Keeping them is the whole point. Originals on a drive mean an edit can be remade at full quality years later, and a session that exists only as an export cannot be revisited properly.
Working from them is what proxies make possible. Proxy editing edits a light copy and renders from the originals, so the convenience takes nothing away from the finished picture.
Identifying them matters when several versions exist. A File naming convention that marks exports and proxies distinctly is what stops somebody archiving the wrong one and deleting the right one.
What to watch out for
A chat application copy is not a usable source. Sending a clip through a messaging service re-encodes it heavily, and a file received that way is a generation down before anything else happens.
Downloading from a platform is worse again. The upload was already recompressed once, so the download is a copy of a copy, which is what Re-upload quality loss describes exactly.
Phone libraries hide the question. A device holding a reduced local version and the full file in the cloud will hand over whichever one is present, usually without saying which one it handed over.
How RawClip handles it
Uploading originals rather than exports or shared copies is what the analysis is built for, since every generation lost is detail it cannot recover. A clip that arrived through a messaging application is used and scores lower than the same moment from the card.