Investigating TVPaint lag(s) on MacOS

[Xavier]

Hi,

As the number of lag-report increases on MacOS, we need to investigate the root cause.

Please reply to this topic only if you experienced such lag.

Do you use a Cintiq ? if yes, is your Cintiq connected through USB-C ?
If you noticed a reproductible pattern, please explain us the operations you made before the lag occurs.

[ChristopherC]

Hi Xavier,

Although you know of my problems with the lag, i'll drop it in here too just for reference for anyone else running into similar problems.

I've tried both USB-C and HDMI/USB and there is no change in behaviour between them. TVPaint 11.5.3 64 bit, M1 Mac Mini 16gb Ram.

I've been having 2 seperate but possibly related lag issues:

FIRST LAG ISSUE

The first kind of lag occurs if i use tvpaint on a monitor resolution of anything over 2k. at 4k any brush in the program will lag severely, with the issue severely worsening if the canvas is zoomed in. To me, it seems the lag is related to the physical size of the brush on the screen, and no relation to the in-program canvas size, a 1920x1080 project gets the exact same lag as a 4k+ project.

The lag has always been exclusive to the 64-bit version of the program. The first instance brush engine problems was with jagged lines back around 2018-2019, and possibly whatever work-around was introduced to solve the jagged lines problem brought in the lag problems? It does not seem to be a Wacom driver issue due to tests with the tablet both plugged in and un-plugged, and drawing with the mouse or pen makes no difference.

I feel that this kind of lag could be not as prevalent due to most people not running a monitor that is anything over 2k. For instance if i set my 4k tablet to 2k, the program runs pretty much without issue (though still brush performance is less optimised than it was on the old 32-bit version, even at lower resolution, but it's work-able). the real shame is that for Mac TVPaint users, a 4k monitor is a huge waste of money, considering it's been 4 years and still seemingly no plan to fix that major underlying issue. There is no longer any work-around for this problem until it's actually fixed or TVPaint 12 gets released.

SECOND LAG ISSUE

The other form of lag happens to me whenever the Mac goes to sleep and wakes up, or TVPaint moves from one screen to another at any time, the program will begin to lag severely until it is closed and re-opened again. This form of lag is more manageable, because it doesn't directly affect the actual usability of the program and can be worked around.

To be honest since i lost access to 32-bit at the end of last year i've only used TVPaint a handful of times. It used to be that outside of video editing, TVPaint was the only program i'd use for everything, these days the program doesn't hold up as a main software for me sadly.

I will be upgrading to a Mac Studio M1 Max next week, so i can provide an update on if any of these issues do carry over to a fresh install on a seperate and more powerful system, though i have experienced the first lag issue on multiple other Mac systems.

[cf-mankit]

Cintiq Pro 27 4K, latest version of TVPaint
14" MacBook Pro M1 Max

The lag happens sometimes, sometimes not.
A. When you don't save the file for a while
B. Walk away from the project or having TVPaint in-active on your desktop for a while and then coming back

The Lag Experience
The brush starts to trail ( lag ) behind your cursor and not in a "line smoothing" type of way. Line smooth off anyways.

---

thanks

[ChristopherC]

Quick update on the lag issues now i've installed on a new system (M1 Max Mac Studio), The 'sleep / switch display' form of lag is still something that happens.

The 4k display lag also still occurs heavily, though if the 'boost line smoothness' is turned off within the settings, the brush lag completely goes away. the only issue left being the jagged lines when drawing at any decent speed, so unfortunately 4k is still a no-go.

I know that Clip Studio had the same jagged line issue (though not quite as severe) and there is a setting within the program that solves the issue, by switching the tablet settings precision mode to 'raw input (instead of 'prefer quality' or 'prefer speed').

When i get a bit of free time next week I'll try out factory resetting my previous M1 Mac Mini and installing TVPaint on it without Wacom drivers or anything else possibly interfering to see if the issues still occur.

Update after a day of testing:

Using 4k, turning off 'boost line smoothness' really does improve functionality hugely for every brush, to the point that all of the old brushes that would previously give me lag even when the monitor is set to 2k or lower, no longer do at all, in that way, everything feels the same way that 32-bit felt. The only issue left, being that lines tend to be slightly jagged if drawing fast, also occasionally leaving long straight lines mid-curve, regardless of the brush used. small / thin brushes are almost un-usable as the jagged line issue is much more noticeable, but thicker and textured lines can usually be used perfectly well if not drawing too fast. If you draw while zoomed out, the jagged lines issue is exaggerated a LOT more, which is a big problem for thumb-nailing out any drawings.

When using the same settings on the M1 machine, the jagged lines were incredibly more obstructive, so there's a noticeable improvement between the systems at least, but some form of optimisation still is sorely needed. along with a fix to the other lag problem.

[ChristopherC]

Cintiq Pro 27 4K, latest version of TVPaint
14" MacBook Pro M1 Max

The lag happens sometimes, sometimes not.
A. When you don't save the file for a while
B. Walk away from the project or having TVPaint in-active on your desktop for a while and then coming back

The Lag Experience
The brush starts to trail ( lag ) behind your cursor and not in a "line smoothing" type of way. Line smooth off anyways.

---

thanks

Also quick question as you don't seem to be having trouble with running 4k resolution with similar specs as mine, the cintiq you have, is it possibly 24 or 32 inch? I took a look and there are no 27 inch 4k cintiq monitors, the only 27 inch maxes out at QHD (2k). Also do you have 'boost line smoothness' checked within the programs preferences?

Also if you haven't already, it might be worth checking to see if the lag occurs when your computer goes to sleep, or if the program is moved across displays, those are the only conditions that cause that kind of lag for me, took me a while to figure out what it was, it could be the same with yours too.

[jonathan_tvpaint]

Hi Christopher,

just a comment about this option that i'm discovering ( as i'm new developer on the company ). According to the help of this option ( when hovering it), we can read "Add some extra smoothness to your lines. This option may impact performance when using some heavy brushes.

This is at least an explanation even if it doesn't solve the issue.

Jonathan

[ChristopherC]

Hi Jonathan,

Yes i suppose it's expected that it would cause some amount of lag, but certainly doesn't solve the issue to turn it off. I've found the best compromise is when opening TVPaint to drop my display resolution from the usual 3840x2160 to 3008x1692, and run TVPaint in low resolution mode with the brush smooth setting turned off. There's still the jagged lines occurring if you try to draw fast (standard drawing speed it isn't that noticeable, unless you try drawing a nice circle or fast curve, got to slow down for those now..) but at least brushes don't lag. And the lower resolution improves general navigation lag like zooming and panning quite significantly. (I can never remember having that kind of lag on 32-bit tvpaint in 4k either). Turning off boost brush smoothness completely fixes the lag you'd get if the canvas is zoomed in.

also with the 'boost brush smoothness' turned off, the lag from sleep/wake or switching displays now just turns to an exaggerated version of only being able to draw jagged lines until TVPaint is closed and re-opened.

[jonathan_tvpaint]

We succeed to reproduce the issue.
It is now in our bug tracker for further investigation even if i can tell directly the bug (and fix) can be difficult to solve.

Anyway, thank you for you investigation in your side which help us a lot.

[cf-mankit]

HI Christopher,

Sorry I meant Cintiq Pro 24 / 4K

--

Yes your case also happens with me, when I accidentally enlarge TVpaint beyond one monitor or move it across two monitors.
It doesn't always happen, but when it does it does.

I have not tried turning off boost brush smoothness, let me try. I thought this was a default 'must' to turn on.

Thanks!

[ChristopherC]

That's good to hear it's been re-produced. Thanks cf, I see, same set-up then!

The Lag i've been having outside of the one that comes up with sleep / wake etc. seems to be more on the line of resolution scaling. I.e. when using a true 4k scaling, the interface looks like this (and lags a lot)

Screenshot 2022-07-21 at 09.51.11.jpg (27 KiB) Viewed 4300 times

and setting the resolution scaling to 2k (which makes the interface proportionally bigger) is when those lag issues are pretty much un-noticeable:

Screenshot 2022-07-21 at 09.55.14.jpg (27.7 KiB) Viewed 4300 times

But yeah the main issue with this is that everything on-screen is 2x more blurry making it more preferable to draw in other programs that handle 4k perfectly fine like clip studio or photoshop, there's less space on the screen, and it's a hassle changing the screen resolution every time the program is opened.