Weird timeline from my own 3D Motion Generator

I try to get a quite complex animated 3D scene (camera 360 deg 10 s rotation) saved as a Motion Generator. The idea is of course to re-use the scene in FCP.

I face occasionally (every second update or so) a very strange behaviour from FCP:

After I update the Generator from Motion:

  • Motion saves a mov clip file which looks almost ok (some3D detail strangely missing but that is likely not relevant to this question)

After I start FCP, I get either situation:

  • I drag the generator title on a new project timeline, retime it (or not) and everything ok
  • I drag the generator title again and I get a completely *unexpected* *fix* clip, without camera move and on a totally different camera angle. This clip is out of the blue as I didn’t plan it…


I am totally puzzled by FCP behaviour. I kept Motion cameras to a strict minimum (one!) assuming that it may bring trouble to FCP. But it seems I was wrong.


I also suspected slow rendering from FCP of the motn clip could trigger this. During rendering both timeline clip AND the browser icon look sometimes both wrong…


The trouble is that once in the timeline the wrong clip sticks, and even rendering does not help…


Option/cmd/restart didn’t help…


I got short of ideas and I have no idea what could trigger this behaviour from FCP.

Am I doing something wrong here? Br

Mac mini

Posted on May 16, 2025 7:39 AM

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May 16, 2025 8:04 AM in response to claude_210

It is hard to guess what the problem is without more information.

Would you be willing to share the Motion project so we can test?


It is a bit confusing as you say that Motion saves a clip, but then you also say "generator title" in FCP. Which is it?


If you export a Quicktime movie out of Motion, you can import and use that directly in FCP; on the other hand, generators and titles are two separate kinds of templates, which you use and can dynamically adjust inside FCP.


Can you clarify?

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May 16, 2025 9:19 AM in response to Luis Sequeira1

When you create a Generator, Motion gives you the choice to create a low quality mov file, saved in Motion Templates subdirectories. Here, these are called "Main room 1" and "Main room 2". Ie. 2 different generators unfortunately having the same problem that I described above. I assume that FCP uses this mov file as an animated clip shown as a browser icon. But my problem is not the icon clip. My problem is the Timeline which does not correspond to the clip shown in the viewer, as you see in the screenshot below. I hope the picture is clear enough...


BTW, exporting a mov file from Movie is something I believe I know and have used successfully so far. But re-using clips and scenes from Motion generator interface seems interesting. Timeline retiming, rendering, and most of these, goodies like publishing of Motion parameters, as you can see on the shot below. I am still experimenting and this was promising until today...

BR


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May 19, 2025 3:56 AM in response to claude_210

The only thing I can see right away is that the opacity slider for chandelier is at 0%.

I'd imagine this would make it so you cannot see the chandelier in the image.

Is it possible that somehow in the Motion project this slider is mistakenly affecting other items in the image?


It would be easy, at least if it were me, to erroneously select a different control from what I had in mind, and not noticing it. In this case, have the chandelier slider affect the opacity of several items in the generator.


I understand if you are not willing to, but if you decide to share the Motion project I'll be glad to test it.

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May 19, 2025 4:20 AM in response to claude_210

I got an explanation for the "weirdnest" of the camera angle I get in the timeline.

As I wrote, I am using a single camera, that I select before creating the generator. But it looks like FCP ignores that camera selection and acts as if no camera was selected, hence the weird angle. FYI, I get the same weird angle in Motion if I deselect the camera, switching by default to some default "Active Camera" selection.


Of course, it could have been that I forgot to switch the camera before updating the Generator, but it is not the case. It is an accidental behaviour from FCP that I cannot explain. Sometimes FCP fixes, it sometimes not. It looks to me that rendering gets lost in the way.


So, I have an explanation but not a solution. I may write a bug report.

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May 19, 2025 5:05 AM in response to Luis Sequeira1

Luis Sequeira1 wrote:

The only thing I can see right away is that the opacity slider for chandelier is at 0%.
I'd imagine this would make it so you cannot see the chandelier in the image.
Is it possible that somehow in the Motion project this slider is mistakenly affecting other items in the image?

I thought so as well. Changing the opacity of 3D objects does bring sometimes unexpected results, in particular affecting other objects in the space rendering. Then I replaced all sliders with the Property/Timing parameter which turns into an on/off switch in FCP. That does the job ok, but sadly the problem remains unchanged.

It would be easy, at least if it were me, to erroneously select a different control from what I had in mind, and not noticing it. In this case, have the chandelier slider affect the opacity of several items in the generator.

The switch does a better job IMO. Although of course, I could forget any one of them... But I did test that this does not affect the faulty rendering.

I understand if you are not willing to, but if you decide to share the Motion project I'll be glad to test it.

I certainly keep it in mind still, Luis, and thanks a lot for asking me. I just wait until the right moment to pack up a demo project not overwhelming you with a million objects. Tx for reminding me...

--

Claude

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Weird timeline from my own 3D Motion Generator

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