Filmora 9 is an excellent video editing software for beginner video creators and YouTubers. Having a good video editor installed on your computer and making the most of that software are relatively different things.
What I mean is that you need to learn how to optimize Filmora 9 for smooth playback during editing. Otherwise, you’d end up frustrated while editing your videos on Filmora 9, especially if you don’t have a high-end machine.
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I have an i7 Dell laptop without a graphics card, and when I bought this machine, I thought the Filmora video editor would work flawlessly, but it turned out, I didn’t know about optimizing the Filmora 9. Therefore, I struggled during my video editing at first, but then, everything worked out just fine.
I found out that optimizing the timeline is essential for smooth video editing. Furthermore, I also learned that you may have to do the same for other video editing softwares as well. I might also talk about optimizing DaVinci Resolve for smooth playback during editing in a future blog post.
For now, let me walk you through all the steps you need to optimize your Filmora 9 software so that your user-experience gets better. If you like the following Filmora 9 optimization tips, consider subscribing to this blog.
5 Ways to Optimize Filmora 9 for Smooth Playback During Video Editing
Are you ready? Take a look at the screenshot below while going through the following five points. You may need to apply all of these tactics to optimize Filmora 9 timeline.
1. GPU Acceleration
GPU Acceleration is a feature in Filmora 9, which you can find through the “preferences” option. Once the two checkboxes under GPU Acceleration are checked, it enables hardware acceleration for playback as well as video decoding.
In plain English, upon activating those options, you’d be allowing the software to use the computer resources for making the process even smoother. And, let me tell you, it does make a difference.
2. Render Preview
If you edit videos for YouTube or social media, you’d know what rendering is. It’s a procedure of preparing a smooth-running version of the video while you’re editing the video. It would have been much better if I knew the actual definition of rendering, but you got my point.
Anyway, I found out that activating this option in Filmora 9 has made the video editing a little bit easier just because the software does the rendering in the background during video editing.
Plus, you can set the render time; for example, I set 15 seconds, so Filmora renders the clip I’m working on every 15 seconds. It doesn’t end here; I also checked the box that says “automatically delete render files when a project file is closed,” which means the software automatically deletes the rendered files when I close the project.
3. Proxy
The third thing I did to optimize my Filmora 9 software for smooth play during editing is that I checked the “automatically create proxies when media resolution is higher than” box. What this option does is that it allows you to create a proxy when the video clips are higher than the selected resolution.
The proxy setting lowers the quality of the media to accelerate the editing process, but it doesn’t affect the final export quality. To make this feature work, you need to choose the right resolution; for example, I chose 1920x1080p resolution, and once I add a 4K video clip to my timeline, the software would immediately create a proxy for smooth playback and whatnot.
4. Render Preview
The latest version of Filmora has a render preview button on the right side of the software panel. What this does is that it generates a cached version of the footage, which allows the editor to playback it smoothly.
Take a look at the (point #4 on the) screenshot above, and you’d see a small play button, which is the render preview button I’m talking about. Once you click that button, the software prepares a rendered preview for smooth playback. If you make a tiny change on the timeline, you’d have to generate the rendered version again.
5. Playback Quality
The last thing you could do to optimize your Filmora 9 timeline for smooth playback during editing is reducing the playback quality. Look at the point no. 5 on the screenshot; you’d see a small drop-down button that allows you to change the playback quality.
You can transition to 1/2, 1/4, 1/8, 1/16, or else stick to full quality. Let me explain if this seems confusing; 1/2 means half the playback quality and 1/4 means one-fourth of the original playback quality. In my experience, changing full playback quality to half the playback quality does the job.
Would You Optimize Filmora 9 Now?
Are you excited about optimizing your Filmora 9 software for a better user experience?
I’m sure you’re because if you have to spend money on this video editor or you’re about to buy this Filmora 9 software, it’s necessary to understand how to make the most of this tool.
I’m so excited for you to try these Filmora 9 optimization tips for smooth playback and hassle-free video editing experience.
When these tips help you out, which they will, you must reach out to me via comments on this blog post and let me know how it improved your video editing experience.
I’ve seen a drastic change in my video editing on Filmora 9 after applying these tips — so will you.