It was created by the Advanced Media Workflow Association (AMWA), and is now being standardized through the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE).
Technical work of the AMWA is through projects that aim to improve compatibility between AAF, Broadcast Exchange Format (BXF), MXF and XML.
AAF was created to help address the problem of multi-vendor, cross-platform interoperability for computer-based digital video production.
AAF's rich data model combining metadata and various types of essence has led to its use in non-broadcast applications as well.
The core elements of the AAF specification include: AAF is designed to be a data representation of works in progress, as compared to Material Exchange Format (MXF), which is for exchanging finished media products.