"Rendering Required Files" - huh?

[Stevedocmaker]

I'm editing a sequence with a couple of nested sequences and a multicamera edit.  Suddenly I'm encountering huge delays when PP RANDOMLY decides it needs to do some rendering. I (seemingly at random) get the message "Rendering Required Files" and then I have to wait for minutes to do anything!

• There are no compilicated effects in any of the sequences.

• There are only a few tracks in the master sequence, and only one or two tracks of audio and/or video in the prior sequences.

• I have a dual quad core MacPro with 16GB of RAM.

• I have 4x1TB hard drives.

I can not for the life of me understand why it needs to render anything.  I get the feeling this has to do with audio, but I can not pin this down.  Can anybody explain what the heck the program is rendering so I can figure out a workaround?????

[Stevedocmaker]

I should add as a follow-up that in the projects where this is happening, if I let the program render the files, save the project, close the project and reopen it right away, it wants to render all over again!  It seems like for whatever reason it is not finding the files it just rendered!!!

[excited_Genie16B8]

I get the feeling this has to do with audio

It does.

[lasvideo]

Jim can you elaborate? It sounds like an important concept for me to understand.

[excited_Genie16B8]

The nested sequence often needs to be rendered before playback begins.  This is especially true for multicam sequences.

Knowing it's coming, I just do it manually before I try and play the sequence.

[Stevedocmaker]

You are probably right that this has to do with audio, but there is more to the problem.  I have three projects I'm working on, all were done exactly the same way.  Started with a multicam sequence, nested the multicam and then nesteda again to a third  sequence where aditional edits are being done.  One project plays fine.  If I make changes to the audio in the origianal sequence, then I have to wait for a render in the final, but I only have to do this once.

The other two projects act as though they can't find the render.  This is the problem.  I've searched my hard drives and the reneders are where they are supposed to be, in the scratch disk specified.

Waiting for a call back from Adobe... (almost 45 minutes...)

[excited_Genie16B8]

The other two projects act as though they can't find the render.

Ah.  That's a separate issue.  I don't know how to solve that one.

[Stevedocmaker]

Yeah.  The Adobe tech support guy first tells me to update my graphics card driver.  Oh ya, that will do it.  Then he says that different hard drive manufacturers is the problem.

Sure. Thanks.

Any other ideas (besides switch to Avid)?

[Keith Moreau]

I have had very strange problems like this with PPro on Mac, there is a 'voodoo chicken dance' that I sometimes do, in this order and try each thing, each has it's degree of disruptiveness but eventually effective:

1) Restart PPro

2) Restart Mac

3) Clean system caches with Cocktail and restart Mac

4) Clear media caches (PPro prefs)

5) Start with a new project, import the problem project into the new project

[Stevedocmaker]

Thanks, I had not heard of Cocktail.  Looks like a great little application.  Unfortunately, it did not solve the problem.

To shed more light on this issue, everytime I open a file, PP decides it needs to Generate Peak Files for all the files in the timeline (which takes forever, of course).  And I'm seeing each of these generated files on the hard drive in the same directory as the source files.  Not only is there no clear reason why the program thinks this is necessary, it's not even recognizing that the files it just generated minutes ago already exist.  This has never happened before of course.

Tech support was of little help, other than to confirm the problem.  At least they finally admitted it was not a hardware issue.  They are supposedly looking into this and will get back to me.

Of course I've tried deleting preferences, etc.

HAS ANYBODY ELSE EXPERIENCED THIS?

ANY IDEAS AS TO WHAT'S CAUSING THIS?

[Stevedocmaker]

Correction: the program starts "generating peak files" as soon as a file is imported.

[excited_Genie16B8]

the program starts "generating peak files" as soon as a file is imported.

That's normal and unavoidable.

[excited_Genie16B8]

no clear reason why the program thinks this is necessary

The .pek files are necessary for waveform display.

[excited_Genie16B8]

it's not even recognizing that the files it just generated minutes ago already exist.

THAT part is unusual.

[Stevedocmaker]

I do have three drives set up as you suggested, so that's not likely to be the problem.

However, I noticed that somehow I must have checked a box in media preferences a few days ago to store the cache files near the originals.  Unchecking this may have cleared the problem up.

It seems as though, for some reason, with this box checked it was not recognizing the files it had just generated.  Unchecking the box has definitely solved the continuous generation of peak files, and it SEEMS at this point to have solved the continuous "rendering required files" as well, though I'm not willing to go to the mat on this yet.

Also, the "rendering of required files" seems to have more to do with audio than video, and everything to do with nested sequences.  I rendered the audio in my primary sequence and saved it as an AIFF file.  Then imported this and put it in the timeline of this sequence, turning off the other tracks.  After that, when PP needed to do it's "rendering", it went MUCH faster.  The original source footage was AVCHD with LPCM audio.

I have to conclude, through all of this, that this check box in media preferences is BUGGY, and should be avoided at all costs!

[ExactImage]

Steve,  I have this problem too.... BIG TIME.   I did exactly what you did, created a multicam then embedded that within another sequence.   Now it wants to sped 3hrs and 24mins "Rendering Required Files" and is taking HUGE amounts of HDD space to do it too.

I just unchecked the box you suggests, cleared the cache and deleted all peak files etc.  I restarted the program (it's now re-conforming - so much for native editing) which will take a while, but we'll see if it makes any difference at all.   It's getting pretty frustrating.  All the time saved on using Multicam is lost while it "Rendered Required Files"!!!

[Colin_Brougham]

An easy way around this is to not use the the multicam audio in your edit sequence. I park at the beginning of my multicam edit sequence, hit Shift+T to reveal the nested multicam sync sequence at the same point, target the audio track I want to use, hit M to match frame into the Source Monitor, and then edit that audio track into my multicam edit sequence for reference audio. I never have the "Rendering Required Files" dialog then, and in general, multicam runs much smoother since PPro isn't dropping edits into the audio track.

[ExactImage]

Thanks Colin - that does seem to help.  Moving the audio to the final sequence was even better.

For reference, deleting the peak files and not storing with the source media made no difference at all

[Stanley Arthur]

Colin is absolutely right. I've been copying and pasting the audio from what I call the "sync" sequence into the multicam sequence since CS3. It eliminates all difficulties II've experienced working with audio in multicam sequences.

[Colin_Brougham]

I seem to remember us discussing this before, Stan; thanks for adding another data point.

What baffles me is that Premiere Pro is now capable, with reasonably modern hardware, of playing back multiple tracks of CPU-torturing source media with various effects, transformations, etc. all in realtime, and yet, a lil' bit of audio forces all sorts of time-and-space-wasting workarounds. All this audio conforming nonsense needs to go to Dodoland before CSNext rolls out; I'm sure there were technical reasons why it was necessary before, but surely, the only reason it exists now is because its grandfathered in.

Off with its head, Adobe... off with its head.

[ExactImage]

"Colin : All this audio conforming nonsense needs to go to Dodoland before CSNext rolls out; I'm sure there were technical reasons why it was necessary before, but surely, the only reason it exists now is because its grandfathered in."

Here Here!   I took two long Canon MXF clips and placed in to PP CS5.5.  I took the same two clips and using Log & Transfer to Native format ingested in to FCP.   I was editing in FCP faster than PP because PP was still conforming!   Arrgghh!!!

And.... why is it conforming takes a long time using almost no CPU time and almost no hard disk bandwidth?   Can't we at least get it to use all the CPU power to speed this up, running multiple files at once?    I sometimes have to wait a couple of hours for all the audio to conform and trying to edit while it's conforming is sluggish at best, and often no audio is available on the clips I want to edit until it's conformed.  Another Arrgghh!!!! 

C'mn Adobe.... can't be that hard

[Toomany3-KEeYrp]

Any other ideas (besides switch to Avid)?

Hate to say this, but raise heck with the first few guys at Tech Support and work your way up the food chain till you get past the guy with the "update your driver" script.

I had to do this with CS5.0.1 and got 2 or 3 nice, but clueless guys that wasted about an hour of my time.  Then they finally passed me off to a guy that knew what he was talking about and remotely controlled the computer and did an excellent job with follow up.  My problems went away with the subsequent upgrade.  Sorry to say, but you got to work your way to the top.

BTW, Avid can't dynamically link to AE.

[andi_urra]

Hi, I have the same problem right now, in a sequence with multiple audio and video tracks, some nested sequences, too. Usually this rendering message has to do with audio in my experience. But now, even if I make every track invisible and muted so that absolutely nothing would have to be rendered, still the "Rendering required files" comes everytime I hit J or K. Even worse, with J and K it will not play at all. That is, I hit the key, the message shows very briefly and nothing else happens. Interestingly, space bar still works for forward playback - still showing the message beforehand. This really is a pain.

[Stevedocmaker]

I have discovered (after hours of screaming at no one) that occasionally an audio clip in a nested sequence will get "corrupted."  This is the highly technical term was bestowed upon the problem by someone at Adobe.  If you can find the corrupted clip in the nested sequence and remove it from the timeline, the problem goes away.  You can replace the clip from the source clip and it seems to be fine.  Why it gets "corrupted" in the first place is anybody's guess.  As for how to find the corrupted file, trial and error seems to be the only way.  As to why no one at Adobe thinks this important enough to fix, go figure.

Another gem straight from the source is that all NLE's have this problem.  Really?  I've been editing for over 15 years and this is the only platform I've experienced this on.

It's a good thing Adobe doesn't make airplanes, or we'd all be dead by now ('oh yeah, it's normal for the engines to cut out at 30,000 feet, Airbus planes do the same thing').

[Toomany3-KEeYrp]

I'm glad this thread has been resurrected.  I've been trying out CS5.5 at work and the problem still exists.  We now have 2 computers at each work station so that when Premiere decides to render "required files" we can go work on something else in the mean time. 

Same thing goes for bigger projects that have 1500+ clips to conform.  Open the file and wait 15-30 minutes is our average.

Not complaining (ok, I am)... We love Adobe, but this really needs to get fixed in CS6.