WHY AFTER EFFECTS STILLS SO SLOW IN THE NEW MAC PRO?

[duranduran]

I have the new mac pro with this settings:

3 GHz 8-Core Intel Xeon E5

64 GB 1867 MHz DDR3 ECC

AMD FirePro D700 6144 MB

Software OS X 10.9.2

And the AE performs slower than in my old mac pro. I have set the preferences as seen on all those tutorials on this site, I have an SSD external disc for cache files, memory and multiprocessing settings correctly...and previews are very very slow, and I can not even render a single comp without waiting 10 minutes. I am very disappointed and frustrated with this situation...

Am I missing something?

[Bird™]

It's probably just an anomaly. Ignore me. I just realised that none of this really matters as long as the client is happy…ish. 
We'll definitely go PC next year and make use of all of those high spec video cards:) 

2009 MBP was still my favourite MBP for OB graphics, although I don't think she'd handle 4k! 

[Szalam]

Bird™ wrote:

I haven't touched ray tracing yet (is it useful if we're already using C4D and Modo?).

No. Ray-tracing is dead. See this: http://motionworks.net/after-effects-3d-future/

[Matthew Hotchkiss]

‌Hey guys, im using nvidia Titans on a 14 core PC and when I turn on GPU it speeds up rendering 10 fold. It looks like the Mac Pro is suited for FCP editing but not for adobe products. Apple should warn people of this as the majority of previous Mac Pro (silver) desktop users expect an even better computer than the awesome tower that I previously owned. Now I have had to go to PC which is a shame but at the same time as a professional where time and cost matters Apple have forced my hand(last year). I feel sorry for the loyal Apple users that trusted Apple and by this chain of info I'm suprised that Adobe are getting so much stick!! Maybe the next release AE might accept other GPUS but AE haven't provided a newer product that is slower as I checked that on my old Mac Pro desktop throughout the old and cloud versions.  I do not know where the speed charts have come from on the Apple site but they are not true unless rendering a solid at SD. AE clearly stated that CUDA GPUs from Nvidia are useful to speed things up but Apple have stayed with the GPU that is hardly used in our industry probably due to not being able to come to a costing agreement.  I love Apple and use many products but I would advise to keep with the old Mac Pro and upgrade or switch to a PC if your a creative hard hitter.  There is a new Mac Pro coming out soon that might make me eat my words... Hope this info helps for people who are thinking what new computer to buy that runs great with Adobe products

[Stephen Barrante]

My two cents, but... this conversation is straying far beyond it's original purpose which was to discuss why AE may be performing slower on the new MacPro's and if there are solutions that we can share to improve the performance. OR consolidate feedback from Adobe that may include product improvements. I'd kindly request that back and forth conversations be re-directed to private messaging...etc... for the benefit of all subscribed.

Much thanks!

[rlmilton]

"I'd kindly request that back and forth conversations be re-directed to private messaging...etc... for the benefit of all subscribed."

Yes, please... I agree.  I want to follow this thread, but I'm going to need to unsubscribe if the off topic stuff keeps spamming my inbox.

[martinc13962311]

Think I already said that 6 posts back in response to PC users saying they were fine! Give yourself a star!

[Bird™]

Hey ya'll. 

Could ya’ll please start another forum each other if you need to work this out:) 

It’s really up to you, your studio and your project brief what you work with and how you work in it: Use Anime Studio, a pinhole and boil off a polaroid if you have to. Go for it. 

Beofore someone trolls us: Sorry I can’t unsubscribe from this as we need to listening in on this issue.

Thanks! Back to work.  and … Back to AE 2014

[RealSting]

‌I'm unable to playback 25/50fps H.265 low bit rate material on the timeline! Is anyone experiencing the same thing? Using L2013 MacPro 8core/D700/32GB RAM !!! Without RT playback, I'm having to render out everytime.. Super super slow!!

[martinc13962311]

Try re-encoding as prores as see if that helps. We have had all kinds of issues with h264 just as you say.

[martinc13962311]

Seem to recall it being mentioned that h264 is not a timecode based codec/multiplexed or something...

[Dave_LaRonde]

H.264. any kind of MPEG and other codecs use temporal compression -- keyframes at intervals with complete image information, with frames of partial information in-between.  AE needs complete image information for each and every frame.  So the first thing AE does is to reconstruct that missing image information to make a a complete frame.  Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but it ALWAYS slows AE down.

That's why H.264 files are so crummy to use in AE.  They really stink.  Ugh.

[Bird™]

Could you report back and let us know if re-encoding improves things on the timeline? That'd be super useful.
Thnks

[RealSting]

Yes! Encoding to ProRes as greatly improved playback on the After FX timeline. Though I also tweaked settings (mentioned elsewhere on this forum). Thanks.

‌

[sdandrus]

I'm sure you guys saw that poll that opened up asking how likely you were to recommend AE to a friend when you opened it the other day. I would love to see the results on that one. Perhaps that had something to do with the change in management? Either way I've got one last project where all my assets are in AE so I'm stuck using it for a few more weeks then I'm mothballing it. Canceling CC too. The new spline tools in C4D R17 make illustrator pointless for me and gimp etc works as well as photoshop for what I do. The only thing I'm going to kind of miss is premiere - any suggestions for that one? I havent used Avid in almost 20 years. Fusion has a plugin for Avid so I was thinking of going in that direction.

[martinc13962311]

DaVinci Resolve

[sdandrus]

Holy crap, DaVinci Resolve is an NLE now? And it's free too?

[martinc13962311]

Give it a go, and Fusion. You won't believe how well your mac can work!

[Herbert2001]

Well, free for up to 4k editing, and no noise filters or stereoscopic support.

But yeah, it is a mind-blowing deal. I switched to Resolve for my editing - I just do not like the digital Serf model.

The NLE part is quite good - especially considering the short development time span since its inception.

[dissidently]

I'm baffled by the joy I feel finding ways to use how Fusion works.

[RealSting]

RE: FUSION

Are you using the free version? How many people here have purchased it? Is it a perpetual license .. Im presuming at £645 (V8 Mac), it is?! Can it totally replace After FX ?

[dissidently]

For me, it hasn't completely replaced AE, yet. I'll be gone from these whacky forums when it does.

But for lots of stuff it has. Compositing in Fusion is dreamy. So fast, so logical.

There's a bit of a lack of good resources for getting up to speed in it, but the thinking and discovering is fun, for me.

It's not yet possible to buy Fusion for the Mac. It's still in Beta. Or was when I downloaded it.

[Dave_LaRonde]

Despite having a distinctively '90's look and feel to it, Avid remains a darned good editor.  I personally don't like it, but I'm forced to use it and it does the job.  People have ALSO said good things about Sony Vegas -- I think there's a tryout version so you can see what you think of it.

I wouldn't touch FCPX with a 10-foot pole.  It's just too weird in the way it works.  If you like seeing distinctive video and audio tracks in a timeline, you'll hate it.

[Bird™]

Darn funny part of all male-centred tech forums; watching how quickly ego-fights pulls a topic away from the original question! 

BIG thanks to whoever the person was who mentioned BM Fusion! I had no idea it was out there.

It's beautiful and the learning curve is shallow and so we'll be using it this week with AE (2014 of course!) to spit out some shiny, cheesy TV Idents. 

I know you professionals are already doing this but I always advise keeping the last three devs of every application for a year.

Going back to AE2014 has been easy for us here.

I'm sure Adobe will eventually figure out how to leverage the new Mac Pro architecture. In the meantime, there's always a workaround. 
Or trade that Mac Pro back in on a far faster HP-Z Series: PC's aren't a bad option to consider and it might be a relief to get off this expensive subscription to Apple machines. 

Pshkkrrrrkkk*** out.  

[martinc13962311]

It was me that advised switching to Fusion, I did advise this back in the summer as a fix to this ongoing inability to get AE to work on a Mac. Seems to have been lost in the constant stream of waffle and some users/Adobe to even admit there is an issue!

Wait until the full version comes out... There will be no need to use AE for anything else than vector animations! Although I have advised Blackmagic to add layered illustrator file support too.

‌

[dissidently]

Thank you, from the bottom of my cold, furious heart. THANK YOU!!!

Fusion has been a complete revelation. Like @Bird, I had no idea about Fusion on the Mac. It's a revelation. Though I disagree about the learning curve. It takes a deep dive into nodal thinking to begin understanding its paradigms and processes. I'm struggling, and often baffled, but each new insight brings intense speed in operation and function, then joy.

I gave up on vector work in AE the moment I tried it. Straight back to doing it in 3D apps. I was under (for a brief while) the misconception that AE might be good at vector animation. It's not. It's more infuriating than Illustrator, which is saying something.

As to the Mac Pro... yeah. Apple and Adobe have both gone off their original tracks. The loss of Jobs was probably felt strongest in gimping of the iPads and the Mac Pro. There must be some very weird personal issues between the CEOs of Apple and Nvidia to cause the lockdown to ATI/AMD GPUs.