continuous video playback while loading other files

maybe you can preload not all the entire files but just the beginning, let say 1 second or less like in he VPS example.

you can try reading int the quicktime movies at initialization. not preloading, or loadram-ing, but simply reading in a single time.

you can also try creating a separate java-thread to load the movies, as described here: https://cycling74.com/forums/multi-output-poly-for-movies

David,

You're asking a really good question here. I hope it gets some attention, or at least a response, from the developers. This is the reason that I have never used Max for realtime performance.

I do live video improvisation. At any point in the performance, I need the capability of loading several short quicktime loops into a patch from a large database of loops on hard disk.

I have never been able to do this in Max without the interruptions you describe. I've upgraded computers several times, moved from slower hard disks to faster ones, and eventually installed the fastest ssd's available, and still no luck. As you did, I spent a lot of time trying to find the file size and codec. Again, no luck.

Some of the VJ software in current use has the same issues. I see some problems at times with Resolume, VDMX and Modul8, but their performance is much better than Max6.

I hope someone knows a good solution for this. It's a serious limitation that doesn't appear to have a good workaround. It if could be solved by Cycling74, Max would have a real advantage over many other video app's. Right now, it does not measure up well at all.

Best regards,
Michael

Hello Robert,
Thanks for the tips. I tryed both, but they are definitly not working.
Also tested: jit.qt.movie inside a ~poly
As newdendrite, I tryed different hardware, codecs ....

From my standpoint this is a bug in asyncread, which is known since years and affects many users.

It would be great, if the dev team of c74 find a solution to avoid this interruptions while load.

An other thing is, that we always have hickups while playing a movies with jit.qt.movie.

Perhaps it is a good idea to develop a new movie object, which has less functionality but a stable, optimized loading and playing.

Just my 2 cents,
kugelschreiber

Robert,

Thanks for the ideas. Unfortuantely, they do not work for me, either, because I need to load directly from a ssd while other files are playing. There are simply too many possible files to read them all in at initialization.

An optimized movie player would be a great idea and a real contribution to users working with video. If the use of a separate java thread actually works, this would be a good candidate for a Max6 object from the developers? I am not able to get the java code in the original thread to compile, though.

Best regards,
Michael

hi guys, this has been discussed many times on the forums.
see joshua's replies in this thread:
https://cycling74.com/forums/smooth-video-playback

hello robert,

joshua's thread addresses the hickup isssue. (or call it bug)

joshua wrote in this thread:
"However, we are investigating improvements for Max 6"

it was 1 year ago !!
no improvments in max6.
very sad or all, who want to play movies with jitter.
(even smal ones)

this thread is about the interruption of a movie, while loading another movie.

still unsolved problem ....
perhaps someone has a working workaround ;-)

it would be great to get a roadmap, when the dev team is working on this issues.

@newdendrite:
the java-thread loading recommended by robert is definitly NOT working on mac (max5 or max6)

kugelschreiber

Hi all,
So...looks like I'm not alone! I knew that, actually...just was hoping others have had more success or workarounds in Max 6 land since it had been a bit since the last post on this issue. I often use Max for presentations for industrials (i.e. dog and pony shows for other companies during conventions and the like). For these we usually have one of two hd video playing in the background, then are loading on the fly a ton of png files, each often with their own "animation" (scaling, position, alpha, jit.anim, shader effects, etc. etc.). Each time I load a new image, not only does the background image stop for a moment, but all other video effects stop, too, while the image loads (e.g. if I'm moving an image in from off screen while loading another image its movement will stop while the other image loads, then continue). Obviously I've set-up the show to minimize these issues, preloading images where I can (unfortunately each show has hundreds of images, so pre-loading everything but the movies into RAM isn't an option since Max will quickly run out memory...64-bit anybody?). What frustrates me is that I don't see these hiccups in software like watchout using the same machine (which has to be the mspaint of video control software...don't make me use watchout!).

I guess the question I have is where we think the issue lies? Is it quicktime? And what might be the workaround (a non-quicktime object)?

Thanks,
David

Now that I've had a few more moments to follow all the links mentioned above I see that there really isn't an easy solution to this (not that I expected there to be, but was still holding out for something that might work better). It does seem to be quicktime, and building another engine to replace quicktime doesn't appear to be in the cards at the moment. Certainly other options to explore outside Max while still maintaining control within Max...still would be nice to have everything under one roof.

Can anyone from cycling74 comment on the possibility of a 64-bit version of max in the not-too-terribly-distant future? This would at least allow us to pre-load more files. Another option would be to create several different apps that do nothing but preload images, but that would only work on the Mac via syphon in order to get everything back into a single rendering context.

Definitely presents some challenges!

Cheers,
David