Loosing Render Files

Hi guys, maybe just a simple question - but I noticed on my last edit, that everytime I open up fcpx my timeline is not rendered. But it was! I already playout the file so it was rendered for sure. Anyone knows why or where I have to take a look?

I´m on 10.4.3 and High Sierra.

thx

Happens to me too, Mojave 10.14.1, FCP 10.4.4, happened before too. New (or relatively new): rendered parts often play back less smoothly than unrendered. Delete lost renders, re-render only if necessary, feedback to Apple.

My renders are always disappearing too. But doesn't seem to matter too much not related to new version in my case

Happens to me a lot, has since I can remember. Sometimes even happens as I'm editing. Not really huge deal. Good thing, too, as it's not something they're keen on fixing. That's OK as there are definitely more pressing things they could devote attention to.

missing renders not serious but no longer being able to render flow effects is serious. I had to re output a series for tv of short stories in which I used the flow effect a lot in interviews where I didn't weant to cut away. It worked very well in the original output, althout each effect threw the synce out by the length of the effect, but latter outputs refuse to render and loof terrible.
Anyone else?

1. thx for your response - how I turn email alert on here?

2. ok, i´m not the only one, but I think its a huge mistake. Never had it before, or at least al most never. But this is a time consumer - everytime I open up a already rendered edit, I have to render it first to playback, make changes and rerender again. So I dont get it. there must be something corrupt with the render files, location of where they are saved or fcpx reading the files out. I think this is a HUGE mistake and should not happen. Render files also take up some space on disk. Maybe I have to delete them all. Rerender it and see what happens. As soon as I have time for this, I´ll try that out.

Hello

Happens here as well. Send feedback to FCPX team on a regular basis...keep it in the loop.

This happens to me too. In fact, this has been an issue for me since 10.0 - it's happened across several hardware configurations, and I've never had any luck getting to the bottom of it.

It's super annoying. It costs me time, on occasion. But, in the big scheme of things I can't say it's been a big, hairy deal.

My experience tells me that every editing system has it's quirks that can get under your skin. In this case, if you're not prepared to deal with it, then it can cost you some serious stress when you're render files are gone, and you have a client breathing down your neck.

So, I try to always anticipate what things a client will need to look at, and back time another 10-15-30 (whatever) minutes to get their latest project rendered and set for smooth playback.

With all that being said- Apple, please fix this. There's no reason why rendered media files should just evaporate into the ether. (Unless there's something my little editor brain is missing)

Let's all jump onto the feedback, and let them know we want our render files to stop evaporating. - Also, tell them that we want proper mesh warping and extended bicubic warping built into FCPX.

Cheers,
Scott

Oh I'm sure they're quite aware of it. The only time I render is if I need to see something complex played back at full framerate. If I'm good with it I move on. If the render vanishes it's no big deal unless I need to change something in which case I'd have to render that part again anyway. And rendering isn't even indicative of the final exported quality anyway even when you have "Better Quality" selected. Your export will always look better than the rendered video.

Trying to remember the last time I rendered something in the timeline...

No. I get it, guys. I am a big believer in the No-Render necessary philosophy.

Most of my jobs are perfectly fine never rendering.

But we also do political ads at my facility, and those can become super complex. I don't always have the luxury of working on the most beastly of macs either.

Yes, It's not that huge a deal to rerender a timeline when it's a 30 second spot or a :15.

Yes, all things taken into account, it's still much much faster to do this work in FCPX compared to Smoke or After Effects like I used to do back in the day. But we recently did a job where we provided visual support for a 30 minute live performance. There were complex effects and composites and multiple levels of compound clips, and color grading, and keying, and all kinds of chach! Guys, that really sucked when I had to rerender the 30 minute timeline every morning for the client to see where we were at.

By no means am I bagging on Apple's FCPX team. I love them to pieces! But, come on... I think it's a reasonable ask that render file should stick until the timeline is actually changed.

Scott Markowitz wrote: ...that really sucked when I had to rerender the 30 minute timeline every morning for the client to see where we were at.... I think it's a reasonable ask that render file should stick until the timeline is actually changed.

I used to see this frequently, but I seem to see it less often on FCPX 10.4.4, macOS 10.14.2 and after installing Pro Video Formats 2.0.7. But after doing more testing, it still happens. The other day I couldn't make it happen when using a managed library and in-library cache, so maybe it's partially related to media location.

I saw some cases where after a restart, the render dots would flash up on the timeline for a second, then vanish. I have background rendering off. This might be some kind of "presence check" that in some cases fails to detect existing render files. I also see it sometimes when switching between proxy and optimized/original, even if render files exist for both. Just switching modes without restarting FCPX can make it happen.

It feels very flaky and unpredictable. Certain clips will suddenly show render dots, then go away, then come back -- yet background rendering is off. This is *without* restarting FCPX. It's probably a bug, not by design or due to an unavoidable limitation.

Examination of the cache folder before and after rendering with proxy mode and opt/orig. mode reveals there are two separate sets of render files, in the /Render Files folder of the .fcpcache package -- and one in the /Thumbnail Media folder.

This explains why the different "render dot" behavior between proxy and regular mode, but not why the render dots unpredictably appear (or vanish) when switching view modes, restarting, or for no apparent reason. The dots are not being drawn improperly -- when they are present the clip performance is non rendered, and vice versa.

In another test, after rendering a complex timeline in optimized/original mode, then restarting FCPX, one small clip showed render dots. I then compared the before/after state of a snapshot of the Render Files folder, and there was no change. This indicates the files are still there, not updated or modified in any way, and it's an error by FCPX or the underlying data management layer.

I think FCPX uses macOS Core Data APIs to manage the data, which in turn uses the SQLite data store and on-disk format: developer.apple.com/library/archive/docu.../CoreData/index.html

developer.apple.com/library/archive/docu.../TP40001075-CH23-SW1

Whether the deficiency is at the app layer in how FCPX is calling Core Data or in the Core Data layer itself, it definitely needs improving.

As an aside, I notice Apple's docs say AppKit is for the most part not thread safe. This could explain why certain aspects of the FCPX UI are poorly threaded, such as the tendency to lock up the UI when compute-intensive plugins are active.