Time effects in FCPX

cseeman
New Member

Posts: 6

Time effects in FCPX Nov 28, 2012 18:08:09 GMT -5

Quote

Post by cseeman on Nov 28, 2012 18:08:09 GMT -5

bcc8finalcutprox.boards.net/index.cgi?action=display&board=posts&thread=6&page=1#11

Starting a new thread specific to this as I suspect it will help tracking.

Sluggish Performance

MacPro 3.1 2008 8 Core 2.8GHz, ATI 5770, 8GB RAM.
Granted this is an aging Mac and the RAM is on the low side so that may be at issue.
FCP 10.0.6 preference set to Better Performance.
Source 1080p29.97 Apple ProRes422
BCC Temporal Blur, settings at default you posted and I expect settings would impact performance relative to the frames needed to be decoded and available in RAM. I mention "at default" so you'd know I'm just testing settings unchanged.

The frame rate is so low and playback so erratic that it is impossible to judge the impact of changing such settings until rendering. Rendered playback is good as expected but it's impossible to make adjustments without having to render each time. Not very practical in most cases.

I haven't tested in Motion yet on the same machine but I do wonder what would be a practical hardware threshold.

I have a 2011 15" MBP with 10GB RAM whose Quad i7 and GPU might outperform the MacPro but I wonder if it would only be marginally better.

Your thoughts?

Dirk de Jong (BorisFX)
Administrator

Posts: 20

Time effects in FCPX Nov 28, 2012 21:00:24 GMT -5

Quote

Post by Dirk de Jong (BorisFX) on Nov 28, 2012 21:00:24 GMT -5

Nov 28, 2012 18:08:09 GMT -5 cseeman said:

BCC Temporal Blur, settings at default you posted ...The frame rate is so low and playback so erratic that it is impossible to judge the impact of changing such settings until rendering. Rendered playback is good as expected but it's impossible to make adjustments without having to render each time.

Temporal Blur is not an especially fast effect since it's taking frames from different points in time and then compositing them etc. And since it's basically a motion effect, as you wrote you need to see it playback smoothly to judge how it looks. So, I guess I'm not surprised you'd need to render some of the effect to get a useful preview. That said, it will definitely do better on faster machines. I recently did some performance testing of these effects in FCP X by taking the same effect applied to the same source and comparing the time it took to be exported from After Effects with the time it took to be rendered in FCP X (on the same machine) - and what I found was that (for the effects I've tested so far) the FCP X render was as fast or faster (when FCP X was faster than AE I think it was because it was faster at creating ProRes codec video rather than having anything to do with plugin processing). In any case, it was good to see that the same BCC effect was not slower in FCP X.

In Motion 5 and FCP X it's always a float 32bit color depth render so that's what I set AE to do when comparing.

cseeman New Member Posts: 6	Time effects in FCPX Nov 29, 2012 20:14:15 GMT -5 Quote Select Post Deselect Post Link to Post Member Give Gift Back to Top Post by cseeman on Nov 29, 2012 20:14:15 GMT -5 I'm wondering if a low resolution preview might be possible then.

Dirk de Jong (BorisFX)
Administrator

Posts: 20

Time effects in FCPX Nov 30, 2012 12:01:23 GMT -5

Quote

Post by Dirk de Jong (BorisFX) on Nov 30, 2012 12:01:23 GMT -5

Nov 29, 2012 20:14:15 GMT -5 cseeman said:

I'm wondering if a low resolution preview might be possible then.

The FCP X Help file says

"Use proxy media: Click this button to use medium-quality proxy media (converted to one-half resolution) rather than full-resolution media for playback."

I think if you have it generate proxy media, and you have FCP X set to "Use proxy media" the proxy media is Apple ProRes 422 (Proxy) codec @ half rez so that's the low resolution option. I do wish that the "Use proxy" and the Playback Quality controls were right near the play button below the preview window and could be toggled by keyboard shortcut... I can't be the first to make this request though, can I ?...

One thing (perhaps obvious to those more experienced with FCP X than I am) is that "Use proxy" really means it's using the proxy media for everything while this option is enabled - so an effect rendered in this state will render at the proxy quality (and would need to be rendered again when no longer using proxy media) - As opposed to the Playback Quality setting (where you can choose between "High Quality" or "Better Performance") which indeed only affects playback (and not the quality of effect render)

Last Edit: Nov 30, 2012 12:05:00 GMT -5 by Dirk de Jong (BorisFX)

Post by cseeman on Nov 28, 2012 18:08:09 GMT -5

Post by Dirk de Jong (BorisFX) on Nov 28, 2012 21:00:24 GMT -5

Post by cseeman on Nov 29, 2012 20:14:15 GMT -5

Post by Dirk de Jong (BorisFX) on Nov 30, 2012 12:01:23 GMT -5

Quick Reply