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Slow Render Times
Ok… I’m going to rehash this issue again.
We have as our main edit systems, a late 2006 quad core Mac Pro and a late 2007 Octocore Mac Pro – both running Tiger 10.5.8 and 8 gigs of RAM. We also have a logging system that is a Dual 2.7 G5 with 4 gig of RAM.
We working in ProRes422 and XDCAM HD using FCP 7.0.1 and the latest XDCAM codecs. The render times are absolutely horrible. Our systems render times have slowed down tremendously since updating to FCS3. Our G5 can render XDCAM HD twice as fast as my Octocore using FCP 6.0.6. This is ridiculous.
PreRes422 renders… WOW! It is so freaking slow now that its not even worth it at all. We still use HDV as an acquisition format so to save time we usually capture the footage using the HDV-ProRes422 capture, then I have to recapture all of the footage into something more usable in our environment such as DVCProHD which renders almost ten times faster than ProRes422.
Now, I understand fully the differences in the codecs and their sizes. But under FCP 6.0.6, ProRes422 and DVCProHD render times were pretty close with ProRes422 taking a little bit longer (About twice that of DVCProHD).
Let me challenge all of you to test this out and see for yourselves what I am describing. I have a very strong feeling that FCS3 was meant entirely for the latest Mac Pro systems only. Very very disappointing.
Our main format is XDCAM HD so it would be nice to be able to work fully in XDCAM HD, not to have to capture everything into DVCProHD so that it doesn’t add almost another week of render times for a few effects and titles.
Let me hear from the COW on this… Tell me your experiences on this.
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Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
https://web.mac.com/schazamproductions
schazamproductions@mac.com -
15 Replies
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I have the opposite experience. But I admit I haven’t worked with XDCAM or ProRes on a G5. But ProRes renders faster than HDV and XDCAM for me. Slower than DVCPRO HD, but that’s a given.
Shane
GETTING ORGANIZED WITH FINAL CUT PRO DVD…don’t miss it.
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def -
Hi Wayne,
MPEG-2 rendering will always be slow compared with any intraframe format.
People mostly don’t render back to XDCAM unless have to deliver in that format.
I work with EX and NANO files. Great acquisition format, but not for production.
I work with two years old MBP, and I haven’t had any performance issue after upgrading to FC 7.
Mac Pros (4 and 8 cores) have been having millions of issues with XDCAM, although in the last few months I don’t read many posts complaining about these issues.
Rafael -
I went from a dual 2.5 G5 to a dual quad 2.93 Nehalem MacPro. I also went straight to SL & FCS3. It absolutely blows the old G5 away rendering ProRes, HDV or Uncompressed. I haven’t had XDCam footage since the change over, but I send to Color and have it render back ProRes anyway so I can’t image a need to render XDCam here often.
Perhaps that just confirms your theory about early Vs late model MacPro’s and it might also be Leopard Vs SL.
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To be perfectly honest, we don’t render in XDCAM HD either. ProRes is the choice. But, it’s so freaking slow.
Here’s an example. Take a 10 sec clip, apply a filter or two and render in ProRes. Now take the same but in DVCProHD, apply the same filters and render in DVCProHD. Notice the times.
Naturally, ProRes should render longer but in our case, this test will take about 20 minutes for 10 sec. In DVCProHD, the render may only take about two minutes.
Before going to FCS3, the render times were much much closer.
_______________________________
Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
https://web.mac.com/schazamproductions
schazamproductions@mac.com -
I’m leaning towrds this conclusion myself th more I use this.
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Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
https://web.mac.com/schazamproductions
schazamproductions@mac.com -
I just rendered a 1 minute title sequence in ProRes 4444 (2048 x 1080) adding a Nattress gamma filter (orange lines). 3 minutes on my system.
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Wow! That’s a dream for me!
What is your system specs, Michael? I’m just trying to find a common denominator here.
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Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
https://web.mac.com/schazamproductions
schazamproductions@mac.com -
MacPro dual quad 2.93 Nehalem, 16 gigs RAM, ATI 4870 graphics card. Internal 4TB RAID made up from Seagate 1.5 TB drives. Kona3, Tangent Wave.
SL 10.6.2
FCS3 with the latest 7.0.1 updates & Color 1.5.1Most work is delivered on WD or Lacie externals running FW800. I use the internal for render files as the master clips are on the external.
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I don’t use DVCProHD, but IMHO It shouldn’t be much difference when rendering Prores vs DVCproHD. They are very similar codecs.
rafael -
Here’s what I’m talking about…
I just outputted a program to a QuickTime ref file. It took 5 minutes to create. I come back about an hour later and output another program. Same specs as the first. Now, FCP is saying it will take an hour to output. Everything is rendered, just needs to output.
This is another perfect example to the sluggishness of FCP7.
_______________________________
Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
https://web.mac.com/schazamproductions
schazamproductions@mac.com
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