16" MacBook Pro M1 Max displays video with alpha channel as black

Hmm... seems resolved in FCPX, but alpha still not behaving correctly across the board. Alpha appears OK in FCPX now, but if I take a video file with a known good alpha channel (one rendered on an Intel machine) and try to view it in QuickView (select file in Finder, then hit spacebar), the alpha still renders as black. Similarly, if I take that same video, import it into FCPX and render it as a 4444, it will render properly. But once you try to view it in QuickView, the alpha still shows as black. This is the same behavior in 12.3.1 as in 12.2.1

Try compositing the video in a professional editor like Adobe Premiere or DaVinci Resolve. It may show black background in the preview, but in the editor it should work.

Hello meriutta,

Thanks for reaching out through the Apple Support Communities about that behavior with those videos.

To verify, is this happening with videos in multiple apps, or is this only happening with a particular app?

Do you experience the same behavior with online videos or streaming content?

Hopefully those details will help to further isolate this behavior.

Take care.

meriutta,

Since you are also experiencing difficulties with videos exported using your new MacBook Pro, you’ll want to reach out to Apple Support so they can look into these behaviors further: Contact Apple Support

Regards.

Hi everyone, I am experiencing the same issues. I need to export lower thirds for clients, and other stuff, with Apple ProRes 4444 + alpha (on my new specked out and quite expensive MacBook Pro 2021 M1 Max, which are made for motion graphics and video editors?) Hoping for a solution soon. The weird thing is though, when I check an export (with alpha) on an older Intel Macbook the same blackness appears, but when I drag the export in AE it looks alright. Help, anyone?

Same here. Projects rendered on Intel are perfect, but with the latest FCPX and Monterrey they are black. It is not just an export issue, files rendered in Intel and imported into M1 lose the alpha channel (aka is not properly identified/understood by the system). Really frustrating and amazed not so many people are complaining.

Can confirm, still an issue when trying to encode ProRes 4444 with alpha channel using ffmpeg. Exports an unusable corrupted video file. How long until this is fixed!?

Please post if that works! I'm unfortunately limited by my workplace as to which version of FCP I can use. We're very much behind at the office and I'm using my new MacBook Pro for telework.

It is strange that FCP 10.5.4 is having this problem on a brand new M1 system, but not a 2013 Intel based MacPro. That's what we still have on site.

Unfortunately, it only caught their attention. New update is out, same problem still persists. My machine is M1 Pro and I have written and spoken many times since the first day I bought it, unfortunately no solution has been found for such a long time. I have no faith that they will fix it.

Well, let's bump this again. It's no big help if this works in the occasional program. I need ProRes 4444 with Alpha to just WORK. In it's intended function as an INTERMEDIATE in my workflow. It did on Intel. If there's some problem in the Hardware, unfixable… so be it - give me a working software solution!

Well, I have a M1 Pro MBP, and have the same issue. Hardware? That would be really bad.

Please make them aware, that the M1 Pro has the same Issue.

Because the normal garden variety M1 doesn't have the ProRes/H264/H265 HW Codecs… that's where the problem seems to be.