HitFilm Running Slow Editing 4K

MafRaygun · January 2019

Computer:

Intel Core i7 3.5GHz

RAM 32GB

GeForce GTX 745
Window 10 Pro
HitFilm Express 11.0.8

Files
4K MP4
23.98
48k

What I've done:
I have adjusted preview mode to "None", Audio size to "Small", Video Size to "Small".
I have changed Playback Quality to "Draft", Playback resolution to "Quarter", Paused Quality and Resolution to the smallest settings.

Problem:
Video playback is choppy, especially when playing transitions.
NOTE: There are no effects added, this is just the raw video files. They are maximum 3 mins in length, and when 2 short clips of 10 secs each are on the timeline playback is choppy.

Any ideas to help it run smoother would be appreciated!
Thanks.

NormanPCN · January 2019

"4K MP4" "... especially when playing transitions. "

There you go. I am assuming that the MP4 files contain AVC/H.264 video. "MP4" is just a generic container.

In general 3.5 Ghz is on the slow side for 4K/UHD AVC video. You don't mention how many CPU cores you have but with 4K, 8 would be preferred. That said,

You will want to transcode to an edit friendly format. Cineform is a good choice. Prores is a good choice. Both are natively implemented in Hitfilm for best performance. Fast Decode AVC is not going to work with most CPUs at 4K resolutions (circumstance dependent).

Here is a video talking editing and video codecs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yqhl0mRuTng

Here is a little test I once did on 4K timeline performance in Hitfilm.

https://fxhome.com/forum/discussion/42285/hitfilm-timeline-4k-performance-demo-video

Here is a link to a thread discussing a useful tool to transcode to Cineform.

https://fxhome.com/forum/discussion/42015/how-to-use-virtualdub-filtermod-to-fix-vfr-issues-and-convert-to-cineform