Hi Chris,
thanks again for helping me get this "codec issue" sorted out, and for taking it into consideration for the CVS GEM.
chris clepper wrote:
Can you fit all 48 clips uncompressed into RAM? A 1 second clip at 640x480 30fps in YCbCr is about 18.5MB (double that for RGBA) which would allow 3 and a half minutes of video to fit in 32bit address space.
I didn't even think about addressing! I just assumed that if I had all my clips in buffers, then they would be more quickly accessible. Thanks for pointing that out. Guess I'll need to read a bit more about how buffers are accessed. Suggestions? Use the Source?
Try creating a RAM disk and copy the uncompressed clips into that. RAM disks might even allow for greater than 32 bit sizes.
For shorter clips, loading direct from the HD is pleasantly faster than I expected. But when the clips get bigger, I might look into a RAMdisk. I found quite a few tutorials on making a RAM disk on OSX via Google, using everything from command line to Freeware.
One more question: if I use the "ram" message to [pix_film], does it stay in RAM when I load another one? My guess is no, of course. I suppose if I really needed speed I could make 48 [pix_film] instances, each with the clip loaded to RAM. But of course, using a RAM disk might be more efficient at that point anyways!
best, d.