Flickering video in QuickTime and/or Premier Pro CC 2019

Question

Flickering video in QuickTime and/or Premier Pro CC 2019

Hello,

I am experiencing flickering of videos in QuickTime and/or Premier Pro CC 2019.

I do not see flickering happening when I watch video recorded on my phone.

The flickering I see on the Macbook is spontaneous and is just happening a couple of times during the video as you can see on the pictures below.

I am not quite sure whether the flickering occurs due to a file failure when I transfer videos from my iPhone to my Macbook through Airdrop, or if there is a problem with QuickTime or if the problem is in Premier Pro.

I have a feeling the flickering is in QuickTime because the flickering occurs even before I start editing in Premier Pro. The funny thing is that when I start editing in Premier Pro, the flickering suddenly disappears - but when I export the video, the flickering re-appears again.

iPhone: iOS 13.4.1

Camera on iPhone: 1080p at 30fps

Auto Low-light FPS on iPhone: ON

Macbook Pro 15": Version 10.15.3

QuickTime: Version 10.5 (1015.2.1)

Premier Pro CC 2019: 13.1.1 (Build 11)

Please let me know how to proceed. Would highly appreciate it.

Thanks in advance!

Flickering

Non-flickering

MacBook Pro 15", OS X 10.11

Posted on Apr 10, 2020 8:31 AM

Reply

Answer 1

a brody

Level 10

85,296 points

Apr 10, 2020 9:11 AM in response to martinesorthe

10.15.4 just had an update to address some video issues. Clone backup your 10.15.3 before attempting to install 10.15.4 to see if it makes a difference.

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Answer 2

Kurt Lang

Level 9

68,454 points

Apr 10, 2020 9:28 AM in response to martinesorthe

You should upgrade the suite to CC 2020. It's the only version really meant for Catalina.

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Answer 3

Kurt Lang

Level 9

68,454 points

Apr 10, 2020 1:03 PM in response to martinesorthe

I did assume you have the entire Adobe CC subscription suite, though you can pay for one app at a time.

Launch Premiere Pro and then from its menus, choose Help > Updates. You should get a prompt the CC 2020 version can be installed. Or, you can launch the Creative Cloud app separately. Personally, I keep it on the Dock for easy access. Location is:

/Applications/Utilities/Adobe Creative Cloud/ACC/Creative Cloud

Drag the app to the Dock to create an alias for it if you like.

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Answer 4

Kurt Lang

Level 9

68,454 points

Apr 11, 2020 9:59 AM in response to martinesorthe

You need to scroll that part of the window up (where Basic Video Settings is showing) to see the bitrate. Generally, the default for Target and Maximum is 20 and 25. I use this for Blu-ray resolution:

If you go too high, the exported video cannot be decoded fast enough to keep up with the frame rate and it breaks up or stutters during playback.

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Answer 5

Kurt Lang

Level 9

68,454 points

Apr 11, 2020 12:12 PM in response to martinesorthe

We're using the same version of Premiere Pro, so I have to kind of guess why you're not getting the same options.

Mainly, I would have to believe your MacBook Pro can't handle the playback. You note it's running Catalina, but not how old it is. It could also depend on what else you have installed on your Mac. Such as, if it's wasting large amounts of system resources on completely useless AV software, then that's a problem you can fix by deleting all such junk.

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Answer 6

Kurt Lang

Level 9

68,454 points

Apr 11, 2020 7:28 AM in response to martinesorthe

By "export", I assume you mean you exported a new .mp4 (or whatever format you're using) and it still flickers?

If so, you probably have the bitrate too high.

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Answer 7

a brody

Level 10

85,296 points

Apr 10, 2020 9:28 AM in response to martinesorthe

Every change you make can be lost between the last backup and the current state of the machine.

If you don't clone, you won't be able to restore the operating system directly if something gets really messed up, you will have to go to System Restore instead. A clone is an exact replica you can boot from.

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