Set display quality for Source and Program Monitors

Last updated on Jun 23, 2025

Learn how to change display quality and adjust resolutions for the Source and Program Monitors to balance performance and quality according to your specific editing needs.

  1. Select the Settings  button in the Source Monitor or Program Monitor.

  2. To set playback resolution, select Playback Resolution or Paused Resolution to set paused resolution.

  3. Select the resolution you want from the sub menu.

    The Playback Resolution menu displays various resolutions, including 1/2, 1/4, and 1/8. Currently, 1/2 is selected.
    Choose from several resolution options that represent the playback resolution relative to the original resolution of the footage.

Some formats are difficult to display in full-motion playback, due to their high compression or high data rate. A lower resolution permits faster motion playback, but at the expense of display image quality. This tradeoff is most visible when viewing AVCHD and other H.264 -codec based media. Below full resolution, these formats have error correction turned off, and artifacts are common during playback. These artifacts, however, do not show up in exported media.

Providing separate playback and pause resolutions gives you more control over your monitoring experience. With high-resolution footage, you can set playback resolution to a lower value (for example, 1/4) for smooth playback, and set the pause resolution to Full. These settings allow you to check the quality of focus or edge details when playback is paused. Scrubbing puts the monitor in playback resolution, not pause resolution.

Not all resolutions are available for all sequence types. For Standard Definition sequences, such as DV, only Full and 1/2 are available. For many HD sequences up to 1080 frame size, Full, 1/2, and 1/4 are available. For sequences with frame sizes larger than 1080, such as RED, more fractional resolutions are available.

Tip:

If your previews are rendered at a resolution below the sequence resolution, the playback resolution is actually a fraction of the preview resolution. For example, you can set your preview files to render at 1/2 the sequence frame size (1/2 resolution) and your playback resolution to 1/2 resolution. The rendered previews play back at 1/4 of original resolution (assuming that the resolution of the original media matched the sequence resolution).