Blank screen during playback

[Guest]

Hello,

I was working on an After Effects project and when I added an effect to one of my precomps my ae got very laggy and glitchy. Whenever I moved the time indicator it was still stuck on one frame and it wouldn't go away. I had to force quit ae and when I reopened the project it was gray like nothing was even there. I use ae 2021 and a macbook pro 2020.

[nishu_kush · Accepted solution]

Hi Tanner5C5A,

Sorry for your issue.

After Effect could get demanding when it comes to system specs while using some effects. Would you mind sharing the following details so that we can understand the issue better:

• What are your system specifications (CPU, GPU, RAM, OS)? 
• Which Effects did you apply?
• What happens if you hide the layer on which you applied the effect?

Try switching to Sofware Only renderer from File > Project Settings and see if it brings any change.

Let us know how it goes.

Thanks,
Nishu

[Guest]

Thank you for the help!

- GPU

- I applied the effect "motion tile" and I have had problems with it in the past, but I was able to fix it back then.

- I tried hiding the layer and deleting it all together, but I still had the same result.

Switching it to "Mercury Software Only" seemed to make a differnce!! Hopefully I won't have any more problems, Thank you again for the help.

[nishu_kush]

Glad to hear that.

What's the resolution of the media you're applying Motion Tile on? Try to keep its resolution as low as possible because the Motion Tile effect repeats the image it has been applied on which could end up using a lot of resources and then leading to the issue.

Hope it helps.

Thanks,

Nishu