flash frame rate
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- CyBrainX0
I would never touch anything less than 31. 120 doesn't sound like it makes much sense, but the look it gives is quite nice. My whole site is 120 fps.
- dsmith70
i think I am going to go with the concensus and start using 31 as a standard then play around with fps as projects dictate.
- dgtl_rchtct0
you'd be better off at 120.
- arlo0
I dont see the point of going over 31- a lot of users are on older machines and if you have actions or EnterFrame loops running (or both) that means that many more calculations per second.
- dsmith70
it just seems that 120 could pose too many problems, but I'll experiment with it.
- dgtl_rchtct0
actually frame rate has nothing to do with either of those. its graphics cards.
if a users graphic cards is a generci version, it will chunk. if you plan on running video and even worse, streaming sound, the file will chunk. (oddly enough, streaming audio has the strange affect of speeding up your .swf)
now, when it comes to benchmark testing, if i run my files ate 120fps and test on older maching with standard issue graphics card and we'll say, PII processor, the result will be a fps of roughly half to about 90fps what i was originally running. for me, thats no big deal because that is equally fast and eough to playback animation so it looks smooth.
in regards to commands, they don't count by fps. so it doesn't matter. that is based on whatever interval you set or how you choose to eval the function.
if you run 30fps, on a machine with a poor graphics card you will get lucky to run 15-20fps.
if you count in video, that also plays another big role. more on that another day. for now, trust me, 120 is fine. but to each his own.
- Jnr_Madison0
Mmm I didn't know that dgtl_rchtct, interesting.
- dgtl_rchtct0
"...that means that many more calculations per second."
if this were truly the case, running a movie at 1fps would be ideal for programmers.
but, as mentioned earlier, a second is a second to a function();
whether it be 31fps or 120fps. still. a second is a second in the realm of OOP.
- intoxicated0
This is a very interesting thread.
I use 31.
And I see so does Arlo, which is good enough for me.
Also in Turkish, "31" means "wanker" - think the 3 is supposed to represent the hand and the 1, well you know - I holidayed in Turkey for a few summers...so therefore, it has to be 31.
- autonoma0
I still disagree, dgtl_rchtct. Although 120 is obviously faster and probably smoother, I feel like it might pose problems on some macs.
Like I said before, with my fps set to 60, even after removing all code, the movie would give the "A script in this movie is causing it to run slowly..." error. No matter what version of Flash I used to build the movie (MX or 5) the same error occurred. Once I reduced the fps to 31, the error ceased. Hasn't happened once.
- dgtl_rchtct0
sorry to hear your problem autonoma. but thats not an fps issue. never will be. you may want to recheck your code. there could have been an infinite loop going.
i build on mac's and pc's. all source files i deliver run at 120fps. to date i have had no one comment on problems with fps. maybe coding convention and rational, but not fps.
playback on a mac is slow and always will be. although a neat trick that sometimes work, hold down a key while the flash movie is playing and it should increase framerate..sometimes works.
in any event, i am not making this up. again, if you like 31fps, 12fps, 22fps, 67fps, it doesn't matter, choice is yours.
my argument is simply to dispel the myth: if its too fast and won't play. which runs quite the contrary, the faster it plays the better off you may be.
- dgtl_rchtct0
also keep i mind my friends that flash will always play faster on faster machines and slower on slower machines (by slower i am referring to processor + graphics card. with graphics card being main contributor to problem)
no matter what your framerate, 12fps on a fast graphics card will run 6-9 fps on a stadard issue low grade graphics card. known and documented fact.
so, naturally, i decided to shoot high with my framerate (also following suggestion of a few other developers) and the rest is history.
happy coding.
- autonoma0
"sorry to hear your problem autonoma. but thats not an fps issue. never will be. you may want to recheck your code. there could have been an infinite loop going."
That's just the point, though. There wasn't even a stop(); action in the movie - anywhere. I even thought there may be a problem with my copy of the program, so I used Flash 5 instead, and still the same thing.
- dgtl_rchtct0
open a blank .fla.
set fps to 120.
test movie.and you run into scripting errors?
- autonoma0
It was weird also because it only happened on her (clients) computer. Didn't happen on mine or anyone else's.
- dgtl_rchtct0
i think i am not understanding. you are saying you are testing this now and it doesn't work?
again, its not framerate. i guarantee that. rethink code. maybe something was changed. but the rate at which is plays will not cause errors. only script.
if its animation, it will run slow period on a slow machine as stated earlier. no way around that. a machine will clock out nearly at 100% when running flash (thats any machine). the upside is that flash shares its resources, but will hog as much as it can for its own usage. hence the reason it plays deathly slow on antiquated machines or generic graphic cards.
again, i suggest debugging movie. its not fps.
- corin0
From macromedia (regarding flash5 player):
Movies which have been set with a high frame rate (30-120 frames per second) may consume more system resources (CPU cycles).
The Macromedia Flash Player 5 will try to achieve higher frame rates than previous players. One result of this is a machine may be forced to work too hard to achieve this higher frame rate, reducing overall system performance.
To prevent this, set the frame rate of the movie close to the actual target rate. Use 15 to 18 frames per second as a guideline.
from Moooooock:
because in flash the "fps" setting doesn't actually stay the same between different machines. fps is like a speed limit: you can tell a movie not to play faster than the specified fps, and all machines will obey, but you can't tell a movie to stay above a certain frame rate. if a machine doesn't have the processing power to render the frames at the specified fps, the movie will simply run more slowly.
- autonoma0
I'm sorry if I was unclear.
This is a job I completed about two months ago for a client. During the building process I would upload what I'd done for her to approve. She kept telling me that she was getting the "A script in this movie..." error, but always in different places in the site. I checked and checked and checked and found nothing wrong. Then I had a few other people check, and still nothing.
Without changing a single line of code, I reduced the frame rate from 60 to 31, and the error never occurred again.
The site's been up for two months now and she's never gotten the error again.
In the whole site there is only one enterFrame loop, and it's killed just as soon as it's performed it's function.
- dgtl_rchtct0
corin, you do understand that that is what i have been saying.
do any benchmark test. colin even did one.
test your movie at 15fps. then test it on an older machine and it will run guaranteed 6-9fps.
as stated in moocks post "...you can't tell a movie to stay above a certain frame rate..." thus, setting a higher fps guaratees that the minimum will play within a higher goal rather than the least common denominator. make sense? if i am comfortable with my movie playing at 30+fps on a users machine, i will always set my frame rate as high as possible so that on a potentially slower machine my fps will essentially play at optimal settings for user.
thus, colin is correct as is my statements that fps does not matter. a slow machine will play flash slow. a fast machine will play flash fast. so might as well set fps higher to ensure fastest "possible" playback.
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macromedia's recommendation for flash 5 player was actually during the release of flash 5. previuosly with flash 4 it was not possible to achieve frame rates beyond 24fps no matter what you did or how high you set your fps. thus, when flash 5 player came out, everyone was buggin out cause their flash files were now playing much faster. the flash engine has matured greatly since then. setting 15-18fps cycles would hardly be a recommendation for anyone serious about doing flash work. keep in mind context of macromedia's post. if you slowed your flash 5 fps down, it would play like original flash 4 files. since 4 is now obsolete and f5 and f6 can render and process fps faster and a bit better (still not prefected) it is wise to set your own fps limits that you are comfortable with.
- dgtl_rchtct0
key point for my developers.
this was posted in 2001:
http://www.flashmagazine.com/htm…