Slow working Premiere Pro

[Andrew Devis]

Hi Carl
The problem is almost certainly the speed of the hard drive on your system. The bit rate needed to run multiple HD layers is more than a standard drive can provide. The only real way to deal with this is to have a good RAID system so that the rate you can draw info from your discs is at a usable rate when running multiple HD layers at one time.

Hope this helps
Andrew

… because it’s all about stories …

[Carl Graham]

I see. Is there a way I can mod my RAID system to make it better then?

[Andrew Devis]

Hi Carl
I’m not an expert on RAID, it may be worth starting a new thread for that.
Andrew

… because it’s all about stories …

[Tim Kolb]

You have a 50 Mbit stream from a DSLR…your drives aren’t the issue. If you can run ProRes HQ (220 Mbit) without an issue, your drives can do three (note) streams of DSLR from a read standpoint.

(note: the extra allowed is because it’s reading three different streams with your DSLR footage as opposed to one stream for ProRes, so even though 50 goes into 200 4X, in the real world 4 streams x50 Mbits is more work than 1 stream x 220 Mbits)

The problem is that your processor is simply not up to the task of decoding multiple H264 HD streams simultaneously. It takes some serious processing power to decode one stream of H264, relative to its data rate (it’s far more processor intense than 50 Mbit XDcamHD 422 for instance, which is MPEG2).

It will not matter what sort of hard drive system you put on a MacBook Pro (or any laptop…this isn’t an anti-Mac thing), you’ll be running out of real time decode capability long before you get four streams…your drives may be capable of that now…your processor is the bottleneck.

Lowering the playback resolution will help somewhat, but H264 formats (DSLR, AVCHD, etc.) don’t drop to partial decode with the visual grace of most other formats.

Premiere Pro CS5 has a lot of capabilities, and being able to edit so many formats natively is definitely a significant feature, but the software doesn’t deliver the power to do the work…like all software, it brings the know-how. The computer still has to deliver the heavy lifting…and H264 is heavy.

The conundrum for Adobe is trying to set some coherent, graduated minimum system requirements in an industry where source material ranges from 4K RAW to uncompressed HD, to MPEG2 and MPEG4…to standard definition DV and even cel phone video in some cases.

It’s not that your MacBook Pro is underpowered to run PPro CS5, it’s that it simply doesn’t have the speed or processing threads to decode four streams of H264. If Adobe publishes a minimum system requirement that says your computer can’t edit H264, then someone who wants to edit something like a narrative with a single stream will think they can’t do that…but of course, you said that one stream runs fine…

Many users will talk about matching the software to the workflow. PPro CS5 does just about every workflow (I’m buzzing through a ProRes source project right now…on my Windows machine), so really the issue for PPro CS5 users is matching the hardware to the workflow…

Bottom line: If stacking 3,4,5 or more streams of H264 DSLR footage is your everyday gig and you need good response…it’s time to go fire-breathing workstation.

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

[Carl Graham]

Thanks Tim!

Haha, that was probably the most informative forum response I’ve ever read. And informative at that!

Well, I guess I’ll lay off the 4 streams of H264 footage then. But is there a way I can convert my footage to a more workable (HD, if possible) format that I can edit easier?

[Eric Monroe]

Carl, if you want to convert to a more edit-friendly format use Prores LT. It has way smaller file sizes while still maintaining image quality.

I have a 13″ macbook pro and ran into the same issues. I got 2 Hitachi G-Raid drives (1 for media, 1 for scratches) ran the media drive off of the FW800 port and the scratches off of a usb port. In FCP I could multicam edit 4 cameras of Prores LT footage each approx 1 hour in duration with no problems. Premiere was jumpy using the same footage on the same drives.

I was always a PC/Adobe editor. I wanted to learn the MAC/FCP side of things, so I switched for a while. Although now I love Macs, I am not pleased with FCP’s lack of integration with AE & Photoshop. So I looked into a “fire-breathing” (as Tim Kolb called it) :o) Mac Pro that would run Premiere Pro and the rest of the creative suite. I looked at a 6-core Mac Pro with 16 gb ram etc. Roughly $5700. I decided that was too much money and built a new PC with a 3.2ghz AMD Phenom 2 6-core, 16gb ram, etc. I cut long form multicamera shoots everyday that range from 1.5-2 hours in duration….3-4 cameras of native AVCHD 1920×1080 60p footage with zero issues. No lag whatsoever. Life is grand. :o) glad to be back in the creative suite.

Cheers!

[Carl Graham]

Hey Eric!

Thanks! Sounds like a solution! Two questions:

So those are external drives that you used, are those the best you can get for a regular budget?

And how do I convert to Prores LT?

[Tim Kolb]

[Carl Graham] “And how do I convert to Prores LT?”

With a Mac and Final cut Pro.

…or in real time using an AJA KiPro recorder and an SDI I/O card.

Apple has attached the ability to encode ProRes to FCP itself.

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

[Mike Taylor]

Hi!

I am having a similar problem. I usually use fcp but I am trying out Premiere CS5 because of it’s ability to link to after effects.

I am editing and doing fx (compositing, filters, 2.5d cameras, lens flare etc) in Premiere on footage shot 1080 24p on a Cannon 5d.

I am on a brand new Mac Pro 2.8 Quad Xeon with 8 gigs of Ram.

It was great in the rough cut but as I have proceeded with the FX Premiere has gotten slower and slower, with the rainbow wheel appearing for minutes just when I move in the timeline and it now can take up to 30 minutes just to open or save the project.

The linking to AE CS5 was working great but I was worried that it was slowing things down so I rendered out all of the AE files as video clips. I replaced most of the linked clips in the time line with my renders and it was still sloooow.

What am I doing wrong? This machine and this software should be able to handle this project yeah? I have Premiere’s memory usage set at 6.5g.

This is for a 1min and 30second trailer cut down from about 2 hours of footage.

[Reginald Emvula]

Hi Tim,

Amazing reply, informative responses like these really make conversing through forums worthwhile.

I have near the exact same problem though.

– Exact same camera
– on After Effects CS4
but
– i7 2.80GHz
– 4 Gig Ram
– ATI HD 5700
– Windows 7 64-bit
– WD Caviar Blue 7200RPM

I don’t know if this is enough information to go by, but occasionally when I’m even not using HD footage and just simple text motion graphics, After Effects just seems to slow down whilst I’m manipulating objects in 3D space.

It generally does this after 15 minutes or so, as if there’s a build up of information that it can’t handle.

Looking forward to a response,

Reg.