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Activity Forums Apple Final Cut Pro Legacy Choppy Playback

  • Choppy Playback

    Posted by Pravin Chottera on April 21, 2010 at 4:05 pm

    Hi all,

    I know there have been posts on this issue before, but for some reason none of the proposed solutions are working for me.

    I am editing a 1080p 29.97fps footage on a sequence of the same settings. The footage is ProRes 422HQ and was shot on a Canon 7D. The footage is on my local hard drive. My RT is set to Safe, and my video quality is set to low and my frame rate to quarter. I also made my audio 38kHz and 8-bit.

    The playback gets choppy after about five or six seconds and then the image will freeze although the scrubber will continue to move, and i can hear the audio. It makes it very difficult to edit!

    My spec are:
    MacBook (10.5.8) 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo 2GB RAM

    Is my computer just too slow to handle this? I feel like I have done this before without an problems.

    Thanks so much for everyone’s help!

    Calvin Scibilia replied 15 years, 11 months ago 5 Members · 5 Replies
  • 5 Replies
  • Shane Ross

    April 21, 2010 at 4:55 pm

    [Pravin Chottera] ” am editing a 1080p 29.97fps footage on a sequence of the same settings. The footage is ProRes 422HQ and was shot on a Canon 7D. The footage is on my local hard drive.”

    BUZZZZZZZ!! That’s your issue. Trying to play back ProRes HQ from a SYSTEM DRIVE? Oh my, no no no no no. Never should the footage be on your local system drive. You need at LEAST a firewire 800 RAIDED drive (G-Raid) for ProRes HQ. Even then it might stutter. ProRes 422 (non-HQ) would work fine on that…and you don’t need HQ…that’s overkill for the DSLR video.

    But if you insist, then you need an eSATA drive (and eSATA connection on your computer….Ooooohhhh, but you lack that. You are editing with a MACBOOK…not even the pro model. Sorry, but that computer is not suited to play back ProRes HQ files. I’d be surprised if it worked with ProRes 422. Doesn’t it only have a firewire 400 connection? You need at least FW800.

    Your machine is vastly underpowered for this high end work. Mainly the connection options to external drives…that’s your bottleneck.

    Shane

    GETTING ORGANIZED WITH FINAL CUT PRO DVD…don’t miss it.
    Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def

  • Gary Adcock

    April 21, 2010 at 5:25 pm

    [Pravin Chottera] “The footage is ProRes 422HQ and was shot on a Canon 7D.”

    ProResHQ is overkill for any DSLR footage.

    you are starting with highly compressed 8 bit H.264 content.

    Standard ProRes is just fine for this workflow.

    gary adcock
    Studio37
    HD & Film Consultation
    Post and Production Workflows for the Digitally Inclined
    Chicago, IL

    https://blogs.creativecow.net/24640

  • David Roth weiss

    April 21, 2010 at 5:55 pm

    And, on top of what Shane pointed out, setting your framerate to playback at less than full is going to make it anything but smooth.

    David Roth Weiss
    Director/Editor/Colorist
    David Weiss Productions, Inc.
    Los Angeles

    POST-PRODUCTION WITHOUT THE USUAL INSANITY ™

    EPK Colorist – UP IN THE AIR – nominated for six academy awards

    A forum host of Creative COW’s Apple Final Cut Pro, Business & Marketing, Indie Film & Documentary, and Film History & Appreciations forums.

  • Pravin Chottera

    April 21, 2010 at 9:01 pm

    Alas! That’s what I was afraid of. I’ll prob compress the files to SD or something for now, but it seems that I shall finally have to upgrade to a new system. I’ll prob spring for a tower… but thats for another day.

    David – I set the frame rate so low because the playback on my timeline would freeze after a while. I thought that by lowering the frame rate and sacrificing a level of choppy playback, i could view the entire timeline at once.

    Thanks so much for all the help guys! I really appreciate it! CreativeCOW is the best!!

  • Calvin Scibilia

    May 27, 2010 at 7:56 pm

    I have this same problem but i am on a iMac intel core 2 and 2.8 GHZ. what can i do to get smooth play back in FCP i have also put my footage in proress 422

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