final cut pro 11 - Playback is choppy with masks and effects activated

Question

final cut pro 11 - Playback is choppy with masks and effects activated

Hello everyone, I’m kinda disappointed by the new fcp update…

Working on macbook pro m3 max (the strongest one)

Everything on my actual comp was butter smooth before the update… now it’s all laggy when pushing play…. At first i noticed the problem only with shots denoised with Neat video plug in, and transitions..

So am i the only one experiencing (new) laggy playback with effects and transitions?

Could you Try this steps to help me out?

Take a large file video (prores if possible)
Drop It to your comp (any color profile)
apply neat video to the shot
wait for render, then play: everything is smooth
now add a color wheel to this shot with a simple mask, play with the mask a bit
wait for render and play
its all laggy…

Lets try backwards:

deactivate only neat video: render and play: all smooth
deactivate only masked color wheel : render and play: all smooth
activate both: render and play: laggy

They did something wrong with masks….

Now , deactivate the color wheel mask, (keep only neat video activated)
duplicate the shot
add any transition between the 2 shots (native or third party)
render and play: smooth
do the opposite (deactivate neat video and activate the masks) -render and play: transition is laggy

My 2 cents, their new algorithm for masks is not compatible with any effects/transition added playback wise.

And That makes me very sad. What do you think? Can you reproduce?

Here is a video I did to show the results (macbook air M2 fcp10.8 vs Macbook apro M3 Max fcp11

https://youtu.be/Xg0Er6qVH0w?si=e18aJ44aHQFAo0SG

Posted on Nov 18, 2024 9:29 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

joema

Level 2

381 points

Nov 18, 2024 7:10 PM in response to thomas_destugues

Thomas, I confirm this happens on my M1 Ultra Mac Studio running Sequoia 15.1, FCP 11.0 and Neat Video 5.6.6. It does not happen on the same machine if using FCP 10.8.1. You did a great job documenting it. Your Youtube video made it easy to reproduce.

The problem is not unique to Neat Video; it also happens on FCP 11.0 with the built-in video noise reduction effect and if a simple color wheels effect with a static shape mask is used above or below the NR effect -- despite the clip being fully rendered to cache.

Edit/add: I just saw your scenario of three stacked clips, each using only a color wheel and shape mask. I tried that on my M1 Ultra Mac Studio and did not see it. However, I'm confident the overall problem is as you described.

I will examine this more tomorrow.

Reply

Answer 2

Nov 18, 2024 6:21 PM in response to BenB

Well it is not.

i’m doing reverse engineering to find out the issue, and clearly there are big performance issues relates to masks

have a look at the video i just made

https://youtu.be/MM2M0iF-ixM

macbook air m2 fcp 10.8 vs macbook pro m3 max fcp 11 : same shot , same conditions. No third parties involved.

Apple, please fix this out, or at least let us rollback easily to the previous version. I bought a 6000$ machine especially to experience smooth playback while working, i can’t anymore because you fail at testing your updates. I an’t happy.

Reply

Answer 3

timc007

Level 1

14 points

Nov 20, 2024 8:43 PM in response to thomas_destugues

How did this clear Apple's quality control ? Did they not do internal testing ?? My mac mini m2 pro with 32 GB used to run FCP X flawlessly. Butter smooth playback. Now with the halting and jerky playback after the upgrade it's unusable ! And no, I don't want to use proxy files as the popup asks me to do. FCP-X used to work just fine before with original 4k clips.

Reply

Answer 4

joema

Level 2

381 points

Nov 21, 2024 10:20 AM in response to thomas_destugues

I tried it with 10-bit 4k/23.98 HEVC transcoded from ProRes 422 via FCP and I didn't see it. Then I tried it with 4k/23.98 10-bit 4:2:0 HEVC from a DJI Mavic 3, and I see the slowdown if using the simple directional mask on a fully-rendered timeline. This is unique to FCP 11 and does not happen on FCP 10.8.1. This was on M1 Ultra.

The key point is not whether a particular codec itself is smooth, minus any Fx. The point is if the timeline is fully rendered, it should be completely smooth, as it is with 10.8.1.

This can also be reproduced with ProRes 422 but using built-in FCP video noise reduction and a simple color wheels shape mask effect. Again, the main issue is it shouldn't be slow if fully rendered to cache. FCP 10.8.1 is not slow and FCP 11 is slow.

I will now examine the code paths used for each case using XCode Instruments.

Reply

Answer 5

Nov 19, 2024 3:52 PM in response to thomas_destugues

i’ m still trying to isolate the problem, it feels related to performance issues

note: all test are ran locally on my mac’s drive. Played in best quality mode. Cache is located on the library at the same location.

New diagnostic i just run: speed!

i just found out that all laggy shots where slowed or accelerated (80% to 800% in some cases) again, everything on my comp was running smooth before the update to 11:

altered speed + simple masks: super laggy
Altered speed + no masks: smooth
100% speed + masks: smooth

so yep after neat video and masks, looks like speed is another factor of choppiness

it makes sense right, the more you add, the more the calculations you ask the machine… but man we’re talking about last year most powerfull macbook pro…they must have somehow play with perf settings….

Reply