Smart Render / Use Previews bug and fix

On one of my long, effect intensive sequences, I was surprised to discover that smart render actually worked. I left the edit room early!

I had written off "use previews" because of how it would function correctly one time, then after a Premiere update, would seem to break. Sometimes it would work for one export, and then a few days later it wouldn't. Of course, I've been following the workflow that Adobe lays out.

Since I was able to get it working the other day, I've been able to figure out part of the randomness. Here's what happens:

-If I start with a properly setup, completely unrendered sequence using ProRes as the render codec, then I can simply "Render In to Out" and then immediately export the sequence using the preset: "Match sequence preview settings". Smart render works! However, if I do nothing, and just export the sequence again with the exact same settings, the export takes significantly longer this time. Smart render fails! Baffling.

-Solution 1: Select "Delete render files in to out" then re-render the entire sequence. Immediatly export using "Match sequence preview settings" and once again smart render works. But, you have to delete and re-render every time. This is not helpful.

-Solution 2: Take a fully rendered sequence, close it. Then, open another seuqnece, and close that. Then re-open the original fully rendered sequence. Now you can export again using previews. You have to do this every time, but it works! Wow!

Anyway, having sorted this out today, I figured I'd post. As an editor trying to hit deadlines and keep our post department running, this is a necessary feature. Keep in mind, I'm using Premiere 23.4.0 on an Intel iMac, running Team Projects, so your milage may vary.