diff --git a/app/widget/viewer/viewer.cpp b/app/widget/viewer/viewer.cpp
index 3d26d6ee9..43d599ef3 100644
--- a/app/widget/viewer/viewer.cpp
+++ b/app/widget/viewer/viewer.cpp
@@ -1833,7 +1833,16 @@ void ViewerWidget::renderer_generated_frame_for_queue()
 					memcpy(oakengine_codec_frame_data(f), pf.data,
 						   qMin(fls, pf.linesize) * pf.height);
 				}
-				QVariant frame = QVariant::fromValue(f);
+				// The display expects an OakSharedBuffer (see set_display_image);
+				// a raw void* QVariant fails to unwrap and paints blank.
+				QVariant frame = QVariant::fromValue(oak_make_shared_frame(f));
+
+				if (qEnvironmentVariableIsSet("OAK_DEBUG_PLAYBACK")) {
+					qWarning("PLAYBACK-DEBUG: queue append ts=%lld/%lld %dx%d data=%p ls=%d",
+							 (long long)pf.timestamp_num,
+							 (long long)pf.timestamp_den, pf.width, pf.height,
+							 pf.data, pf.linesize);
+				}
 
 				foreach (ViewerDisplayWidget *dw, playback_devices_) {
 					dw->queue()->append_timewise({ Rational(pf.timestamp_num,
diff --git a/app/widget/viewer/viewerdisplay.cpp b/app/widget/viewer/viewerdisplay.cpp
index b8cb5775f..fa62a100e 100644
--- a/app/widget/viewer/viewerdisplay.cpp
+++ b/app/widget/viewer/viewerdisplay.cpp
@@ -1854,6 +1854,16 @@ void ViewerDisplayWidget::update_from_queue()
 
 	Rational time = Timecode::timestamp_to_time(t, playback_timebase_);
 
+	if (qEnvironmentVariableIsSet("OAK_DEBUG_PLAYBACK")) {
+		qWarning("PLAYBACK-DEBUG: update_from_queue t=%lld time=%lld/%lld qlen=%d front_ts=%s",
+				 (long long)t, (long long)time.numerator(),
+				 (long long)time.denominator(), int(queue_.size()),
+				 queue_.empty() ? "-" : qPrintable(QStringLiteral("%1/%2").arg(
+												 queue_.front().timestamp.numerator())
+											 .arg(
+												 queue_.front().timestamp.denominator())));
+	}
+
 	bool popped = false;
 
 	if (queue_.empty()) {