Proxy layers render slower than original. Video layers in general are extremely slow.

Forum|Forum|4 years ago
September 23, 2021
1 reply
3564 views

When I'm exporting a composition, using proxy layers of simple elements, it takes a lot more time than disabling the proxy and having it render 'from scratch'. Or it's barely any faster.

If I'm adding a single video to a new composition to render it out again as a test it's extremely slow.

In this case AE only has to read the videoframe and rerender it without doing anything, and I'm getting 2-3 fps.

Shouldn't proxy layers always render quicker than the original, regardless how sophisticated or simple the composition?

Is there any codec that handles video better/faster in AE?

I'm using prores 422/4444.

It's such a shame, since old versions (pre 2014) handled video much faster.

We have faster computers with slower AE performance.

Performance

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R

Rick Gerard

Community Expert

Check the frame size and frame rate of the Proxy. It's easy to get that fouled up.

Some system details and workflow details would help us diagnose your problem.

G

Gijs_Author

Inspiring

It's a 1920x1080, 60 fps composition.

I'm using a M1 macbook pro, though it's faster than my old workstation(W10, 6700k, 32gb ram) in 3d and most AE motion, it seems far slower in AE with video. I'm hoping this is contributed to not being a native Apple Silicon app yet, so a future release might fix this.

I did a test on my old workstation in Windows 10, and it rendered @ 20-40 fps (can't recall specifically).

The same composition with one video layer on the M1 got only 3 fps, which regardless of lacking a native version seems tremendously slow.

G

Gijs_Author

Inspiring

Most folks use the term pre-render since a proxy is used to refer to a lower rez version of an asset - oftentimes, the original asset is a high rez footage with a high datarate and a proxy is created, ideally within AE. This prooxy should ideally be 1/4 the rez of the original footage and rendered to a CODEC that is less computationally intensive; something like a Constant BitRate, 5MBps or 10MBps, H264.

On your specific issue, how have you used or re-introduced your pre-render into the render chain? ANd have you disabled the composition and all of its layers that were used to render these pre-renders after you introduced the pre-render into the render chain?

Pre-rendered, thank you, that was the term I was looking for.

"On your specific issue, how have you used or re-introduced your pre-render into the render chain? ANd have you disabled the composition and all of its layers that were used to render these pre-renders after you introduced the pre-render into the render chain? "

Exactly.

Say for instance I have composition with a background with some elements, some video footage on top of that, and on top of video footage some other elements. I'd render background and front elements as 2 pre-rendered videos, turn off those layers and replace them with the prerendered versions, compound all 3 (background, main video, top) as final export. On the M1 this is excruciatingly slow. As a test, I put one of those pre-rendered layers in a single comp and export it, a single video layer, just to see where the timesink was in the composition. To my surprise this video only rendered at 3 fps. Much slower than the original composition it replaced. On my old windows workstation the prerendered layers would render fine. So this really feels like an Apple Silicon issue.

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