V23 worse performance on pan/crop of stills

bvideo wrote on 10/4/2025, 3:07 PM

Here is a further description of the downgrading of performance in V23 over V22 related to pan/crop on stills (I first outlined this in the VEGAS Pro 23 build 278 General Discussion).

General observation: v23 renders quite slower than v22 for identical tasks of certain pan/crop parameters of stills. In particular, the slowdown in V23 is much worse for crops that vary over time.

Outline: 1920 X 1080 project using one 4032 X 2268 (24-bit) still @ 5 seconds (from Samsung Galaxy 21). Project properties are the same in V22 & V23: HD 1080-30p (1920x1080, 29.970 fps). Pixel format is 8-bit. No effects are involved in the project. No sound track. A pan/crop is created on the event with a starting keyframe and ending keyframe, then four variations of the ending keyframe:

Starting crop: 2820.8 W X 1586.7 H centered @ 2016.0 X, 1134.0 Y for all variations.
End keyframe variations:
1: end same as start (i.e. no ending keyframe) (fixed crop, not moving)
2: end at 2442.7 X 1394.0 (fixed crop, pan moves down and right)
3: end at same center position as start, size 2394.2 X by 1346.7 Y (crop zoom, no pan)
4: end centered at 2442.7 X 1394.0 size 2394.2 X by 1346.7 Y (crop zoom, pan moves down and right)

Render setting uses the preset: Internet HD 1080P 29.97 fps (Intel QSV). The pan/crop settings were chosen by random hand-edited crops, then reproduced for the variations. This is using my machine with an i5-11400 that has UHD-730.

results in FPS:
V22 V23
-----------------------
1 102.78 65.05
2 72.18 42.92
3 79.10 22.68
4 78.46 22.95

Conclusions: V23 performs significantly worse than v22 with a 4032 X 2268 still in a 1920 X 1080 project. V23 performance dips to less than 1/3 of V22 for pan/crops with changing crop size, significantly worse than real-time.

I haven't done this for videos yet, nor for different render settings. I have noticed related similar performance problems on stills with previewing (on all qualities), and also on my other machine: i7-8700K with UHD 630. I have not checked for the difference in color space handling new to V23.

Conjecture: projects containing events with significant pan/crops will exhibit extreme slowdowns in V23 compared with V22, rendering or previewing.

Comments

Gid wrote on 10/4/2025, 3:46 PM

General observation: v23 renders quite slower than v22 for identical tasks of certain pan/crop parameters of stills. In particular, the slowdown in V23 is much worse for crops that vary over time.

@bvideo Interesting, I haven't upgraded & am just testing the Trial, but for me just general rendering is at 22fps which is a fraction that it is in VP22 (VP22 at least 50-100fps render speed). So I can't really test this Pan/Crop render issue.

I get the feeling reading the forum & from my testing any improvements that were made with VP21 - 22 have been thrown out of the window with whatever they've done to VP23, & as I'm on the Trial that runs out in a bit I won't know if this version has been improved in the coming months, therefore unless I get money to burn I won't be upgrading this yr. Maybe I'll wait to see what VP24 Trial is like 🤨

bvideo wrote on 10/4/2025, 4:12 PM

@Gid I'm on the trial too. I won't upgrade either until I hear better about pan/crop.

RogerS wrote on 10/5/2025, 8:45 AM

I don't think the trial has any time limit anymore- rather the render is low res/watermarked. So keep checking back.

Gid wrote on 10/5/2025, 9:15 AM

@RogerS Hmm we'll see.

This was on the 30th, 5 days ago. heading - 3 wks left on your trial.

I don't know what to make of it, either it is still 30days or they need to update their website. ~ (my emails say 3wks & then 18days left, I don't know if that's relating to certain offers, my trial download was on he 9th which is more than 3ks ago 🤷‍♂️)

It's the 5th now so I guess in 4days time I'll find out.

RogerS wrote on 10/5/2025, 9:21 AM

Thanks, I think you're right- from the website:

You can download and use a fully functional version of VEGAS Pro for 30 days at no charge in order to fully evaluate the software. At the end of this free product trial period, a purchase or subscription is required to continue using the application.

Too bad, the time limits are a problem given the development cycle.

bvideo wrote on 10/5/2025, 9:25 AM

I don't think the trial has any time limit anymore- rather the render is low res/watermarked. So keep checking back.

@RogerS That would work for me. Thanks for that info.

RogerS wrote on 10/5/2025, 9:29 AM

Let me clarify as that's what I thought I read but the website states a 30 day limit so I assume that's the current situation. I don't want to spread incorrect information.

https://www.vegascreativesoftware.com/us/vegas-pro/

bvideo wrote on 10/5/2025, 11:23 AM

Adding to the performance tests of pan/crop problems, I've done a brief test of a UHD video event with pan/crop. The video is 5 seconds of 3840 X 2160, about 48 Mb/s, AVC, VFR nominally 29.927 FPS. Same project and render properties (HD 29.97 progressive) as in OP. The cropping parameters are also as in OP.

results in FPS:
V22 V23
-----------------------
1 67.16 36.26 (fixed crop, no motion)
2
3
4 66.73 29.30 (shrinking crop plus moving down & right)

Clearly, pan/crop is hobbled for video also, with changing size in V23 running at half the performance of V22. This may not completely account for some other performance differences between V22 and V23, such as decoding VFR. Hopefully Magix can put assemble their own appropriate revealing tests.