diff --git a/croppa/main.py b/croppa/main.py
index 1626167..245d16f 100644
--- a/croppa/main.py
+++ b/croppa/main.py
@@ -1587,10 +1587,13 @@ class VideoEditor:
                 self.render_progress_queue.put(("error", "Could not open video writer!", 1.0, 0.0))
                 return False
 
-            # Simple sequential processing - the I/O is the bottleneck anyway
+            # Optimized sequential processing - seek once, then read sequentially
             total_output_frames = end_frame - start_frame + 1
             last_progress_update = 0
 
+            # Seek once to the start frame
+            render_cap.set(cv2.CAP_PROP_POS_FRAMES, start_frame)
+            
             for frame_idx in range(start_frame, end_frame + 1):
                 # Check for cancellation
                 if self.render_cancelled:
@@ -1598,8 +1601,7 @@ class VideoEditor:
                     self.render_progress_queue.put(("cancelled", "Render cancelled", 0.0, 0.0))
                     return False
 
-                # Read frame using the separate VideoCapture
-                render_cap.set(cv2.CAP_PROP_POS_FRAMES, frame_idx)
+                # Read frame sequentially 
                 ret, frame = render_cap.read()
 
                 if not ret: