AE 23.1.0 Poor Performance. Timeline/Keyframe lag.

[Nick2049]

I recently updated to 23.1.0 and just thought that the awful performance was because my project was getting pretty heavy with a few hundred layers (which AE has always suffered from, because pre-comping everything is not the solution and we still don't have layer groups/folders..)

But.. I've just cleared my cache, created a new project and already I can see there is an issue, I don't even have any layers in this new comp and the timeline indicator lags behind my mouse pointer when I move it.

If I create a simple new layer (white solid) and set a couple of keyframes, when I drag one of the keyframes left or right it massively lags behind my pointer, and is very steppy.

Moving a layers position along the timeline or adjusting its start/end position is also the same, in fact it's so delayed that things get 'stuck' to my pointer and behave as though I have not released left mouse button, and thus end up where I dont want them.

I have cleared my cache, updated windows, tried the latest NVIDIA drivers (standard and studio), tried switching between CUDA and software.. all to no avail.

OS: Windows 10 Pro 22H2

BOARD: ASUS X299-E
CPU: i9-7940X
RAM: Corsair 64GB (4x16) DDR4

OS DISK: Samsung 970 PRO 1TB

SCRATCH DISK: Samsung 970 PRO 2TB

GPU: ASUS GTX 1080Ti (Driver: 528.02)

DISPLAYS: 2 x 27" 4K @ 150% Scaling

[JBrown321]

@davids19273365 oh man that sucks, so sorry to hear that. Hopefully this will only get tuned even better in time. Curious if you're on Nvidia as well and up to date on drivers? Not sure that it's related now but doesn't hurt to ask I guess. 

[davids19273365]

I am on Nvidea as well.  I have not checked for updated drivers lately.  Thanks for the reminder.  I'll post back if I find a driver update that helps.  Here are my specs in case it is helpfull to anyone else.

Windows 10 Pro 

Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-10980XE CPU @ 3.00GHz, 3000 Mhz, 18 Core(s), 36 Logical

Installed RAM    64.0 GB (63.7 GB usable)

System type       64-bit operating system, x64-based processor

Adapter Description        NVIDIA Quadro RTX 4000

Adapter RAM     (1,048,576) bytes

Driver Version   31.0.15.2727

[davids19273365]

After updating to the latest Nvidea drivers I was able to get a smoother response when moving layers and key frames but only when the on screen layer controlls are hidden. (shift + ctrl + H  will be my new favorite key stroke till this all gets sorted out)

[thebigwick]

This has fixed the issue for me.

Much better.

Thanks.

[JohnColombo]

@ivan.markelov You are not imagining it; the interaction performance on Mac is better than on Windows in most cases, especially if Layer Controls are enabled. I'm not aware of the engineering reasons why, but this is something that we are looking at improving and bringing to parity.

@Nick2049 The cache rebuilding when dragging a keyframe in that case is simply After Effects checking if there has been a change to the render and then reloading the frames it has already cached in the case of no change.

Regarding layer groups: we are acutely aware of this need. Adding groups is not a trivial task and I can't make any promises, but please add your thoughts on how groups would be utilized in your workflow to either of these Ideas (depending on which one you support, because they are different):

• Open pre-comps as Folders / Groups in the timeline
• Folders in After Effects timeline

@davids19273365 It sounds like you are experiencing the known lag when Layer Controls/overlays are enabled. We are actively looking into improving this for future versions. This latest fix was specifically to restore interaction performance to the levels in 22.6 after it slipped drastically in 23.1, but it has highlighted these previously-existing performance problems to the team. We will continue to focus on improving interaction performance moving forward.

- John, After Effects Engineering Team 

[Nick2049]

Thanks @JohnColombo this sounds really promising. I have just added to those threads (and I must have commented on countless ones before them!)

Personally I don't think adding that functionality to pre-comps is the solution, I have projects with hundreds of layers which have very few pre-comps (and would actually cause issues if I started pre-comping everything). I would just love the ability to put layers into basic 'dumb' folders (the same as PS) purely for organisation and to reduce scrolling headaches. I would also hope that this then has the added advantage of improving performance on layer heavy projects too.

[Jim5C97]

I updated to 23.2.1 and the timeline performace is much better. Thank You.
It still stutters compared to 22.0 but the keyframes are not getting "stuck" anymore.