Auto Scroll v. Page Scroll of the PRE Timeline

[George Tyndall]

The following statement is from Steve's post of Jan 14, 2010, entitled "10 ways to keep Premiere Elements running efficiently":

1. Turn off Timeline Scrolling
By default, your timeline moves smoothly to the left as it plays so
that the CTI playhead remains in the center of the interface. But
this process takes a tremendous amount of resources, since this
means that the program is not only reading your files as it plays
but it’s also constantly redrawing the thumbnails for every clip and
waveform on the timeline.
You’ll see much smoother playback if you set the Timeline Auto-
Scrolling to Page Scroll. Page Scroll refreshes your timeline only
when the CTI reaches the end of the visible files on the timeline.

Steve, I tried your method yesterday for a long movie, and I did find Page Scroll to be advantageous to Auto Scroll in terms of PF Usage and, even better, the length of time that it would take for the CTI to "settle down" when pausing the editing process.

However, today I am in the process of shortening that 45-minute movie to 10 or 20 minutes, and here is what I've discovered: If I want to "scrub" the Timeline with the CTI as a method of quickly deciding which clips or portions of clips to eliminate, I must set the preference back to Auto Scroll, otherwise, the thumbnails will not change as I scrub.

It seems that the optimal preference to use depends upon what one is trying to accomplish.

[Bobby]

A decision I made a long time ago, but I never display thumbnails in the timeline at all - just set each track for the thumbnail at the beginning only. AutoScroll then seems to run fine for me, and I don't have the need in my workflow to see the individual thumbnails anyhow.

[Steve Grisetti]

You do make a good point, George.

But I still stick by my recommendation that, for best use of your resources, you set the timeline to Page Scroll (Or else press the \ key so that you can see your whole timeline at once). You'd be surprised how much power it take to continually refresh that timeline as it plays!

You can easily compare Page Scroll to Auto Scroll by opening your Task Manager and watching power usage as you play your timeline.

[Chuck Engels]

I have my timeline set to No Scroll and have the thumbnails set to Show All.
That seems to be a good combination and works well for my workflow

[Bobby]

My issue with thumbnails is that they are, well, inaccurate. The placement of the thumbnail vs. size causes the number of thumbnails (i.e. the time between them) to vary so much that I can't really use it for anything useful.

If I am doing close-in work, it doesn't matter because I am paying attention to the monitor. If I zoom the timeline out to see the "bigger picture" then the single thumbnail at the beginning is enough. In a sense, it them becomes more like the Sceneline than the Timeline.

But personal preference rules!

[George Tyndall]

I have my timeline set to No Scroll and have the thumbnails set to Show All.
That seems to be a good combination and works well for my workflow

Where does one make the selection whether to show the thumbnails?

Unrelated: What is the grayed-out area on the latter portion of my Timeline, just above the red line which indicates that my Timeline has not been rendered?

Second unrelated: Why is it that, when I import into PRE7 1440x1080 m2t footage that HDVSplit has dropped on my HDD from my Canon HV30, the red line appears? Isn't m2t supposed to be the native format for HD work?

[Bobby]

...Where does one make the selection whether to show the thumbnails?

At the very left of each track display is a small icon; run your cursor over it and the popup will say "Set Video Track Display Style". Clicking cycles through:

- see all possible thumbnails (the default) (clip filled with thumbnails)
- thumbnail at beginning and end of clip only
- thumbnail at beginning of clip only

[alaskamovieguy]

George Tyndall wrote
Unrelated: What is the grayed-out area on the latter portion of my Timeline, just above the red line which indicates that my Timeline has not been rendered?

I believe the area your refering to is the 'work bar' area. It has 'handles' at either end of it where you can drag to cover just the area of the time line that you want for exporting that portion only or rendering that portion only.

Second unrelated: Why is it that, when I import into PRE7 1440x1080 m2t footage that HDVSplit has dropped on my HDD from my Canon HV30, the red line appears? Isn't m2t supposed to be the native format for HD work?

My understanding is the m2t file on the time line is converted to an mpeg 2 just for viewing purposes, thus the red line appears.
EDIT: It was actually Bob that explained this to me, here is the comment by Bob:

Re: AVCHD editing and conversion
by Bob » Tue Dec 01, 2009 2:43 am

I don't know when it changed, but recent versions of Premiere Elements support TWO preview file formats -- AVI and MPEG2. High definition projects, including AVCHD, will get MPEG2 preview files. You can easily verify that by looking in the project preview files folder after rendering previews.

[VernonRobinson]

So does that mean that all M2T files will need to be rendered in order to get a smooth preview?

-Vernon

[Bobby]

So does that mean that all M2T files will need to be rendered in order to get a smooth preview?

-Vernon

I think that depends a lot on your hardware. I edit M2T files from my HV30 and get good preview without rendering. I should put my real system in my sig, but it is a quad with 4GB of RAM.

[alaskamovieguy]

VernonRobinson wrote:
So does that mean that all M2T files will need to be rendered in order to get a smooth preview?

My system is underpowered for the M2T files so rendering does help noticeably thou I definitely don't get a smooth playback. I just have to grin and bear it, zoom in and go slow.

[George Tyndall]

So does that mean that all M2T files will need to be rendered in order to get a smooth preview?

-Vernon

....I edit M2T files from my HV30 and get good preview without rendering. I should put my real system in my sig, but it is a quad with 4GB of RAM.

Same here, sir.

[George Tyndall]

I believe the area your refering to is the 'work bar' area. It has 'handles' at either end of it where you can drag to cover just the area of the time line that you want for exporting that portion only or rendering that portion only.

No, sir, it's above the work area bar and above the red line--where the numerals for the time are located.

[George Tyndall]

I have my timeline set to No Scroll and have the thumbnails set to Show All.
That seems to be a good combination and works well for my workflow

Soooo, I've been editing all day, I've tried them all, and I've discovered that this method works best for me, too.

Thank you, sir, and thanks, too, to Steve and Bobby.



BTW, Steve, I know you mean uncheck "Show Audio Tracks" rather than "Hide Audio Tracks."