Learn how to use the Timeline in Kdenlive - Video Editing on Linux
437In this part, we'll take a look at Kdenlive's timeline, and how you can interact with it and configure how it works.
What I use to make my videos:
Microphone: https://amzn.to/2PsNWXl
Articulated mic arm: https://amzn.to/2Iy6DZ2
Tripod: https://amzn.to/2VeLRUt
Monitor: https://amzn.to/2UQRZTb
Speakers: https://amzn.to/2IR7qDR
Bluetooth USB adapter: https://amzn.to/2UQS89b
Keyboard: https://amzn.to/2IAuIyD
Smartphone lenses: https://amzn.to/2DnNrcr
Graphics card: https://amzn.to/2XCEaVo
Motherboard: https://amzn.to/2KZt63t
CPU: https://amzn.to/2IFjKrw
The timeline
The timeline is how your video is going to play out. It's divided in tracks, whether they are audio tracks, that won't display any image or video file, or video tracks, which will generate an image and audio at the same time.
On top of the timeline, you'll notice a ruler, with timecodes. This represents the length of the video. This is where the playhead will be situated, and move when you play the video preview.
The tracks
Tracks are ways to position your clips relative to each other. On one specific track, you can't overlap clips with each other, they have to be placed one after another. If you want to display, for example, an image on top of a video clip, you have to use two different tracks. The items placed in the upper tracks will be shown on top of the clips placed in the lower tracks. Think of it as layers on GIMP or photoshop: the top layer is the one in front, and hides the content of any layer placed under it.
The audio tracks work differently: at any given point on the timeline, all audio will be played, whether it's the audio included in a video clip, or on a clip placed in an audio track. This means that if you include a video clip with music, for example, and your own music track, both will be played simultaneously.
Each track has a type: video, or audio, and you can create an almost infinite number of them, depending on what you need. I found that I never needed more than 8 or 9 video tracks for complex projects and 3 audio tracks, but your mileage may vary. To add a track, just right click on any track, and choose "Add Track". You'll then get to choose where to add the track, above or under the one you right clicked, and select whick kind of track, audio or video.
First, you can lock a track: click on the lock icon, and you'll block adding or removing clips to and from that track. Click that icon again to unlock it. I mostly use this to lock the audio in, once I've finished editing it, just to make sure I dont accidentally mess it up.
You can also mute a track by clicking on its speaker icon. This means that no sound will be played from this track, while previewing it. Careful though, it doesn't remove the sound from the final rendered video, it only blocks it while you're editing the video.
You can also block the video from a track. This means that no image from this track will be played in the preview. This can allow you to filter out incrustations, added text, or images, to preview how a clip looks like with its effects applied, for example.
More options are available with a right click on a track, or on the small toolbar located above the tracks. This one contains icons to resize the track height, and to display more or less tracks.
The Toolbars
The big uppermost toolbar contains tools to interact with the clips located in the timeline. From left to right, you'll get a dropdown menu to control the compositing quality, which you can lower to make previewing faster, another dropdown for changing the edit mode, from normal, to overwrite, and insert mode, a few tools, such as the select tool, to select a clip, the cut tool to cut clips, and the spacing tool, to add space between clips.
Next is the timecodes: the first one is the position you are in, in the video preview, and the second one the total length of the current video. Finally, you get a bunch of tools to overwrite, insert space etc. We'll look at them in the next part of this tutorial.
The Timeline cursor
Just up of the uppermost track, you'll notice a small bar with time codes, and a marker. The time codes are self explanatory, they represent the length of your video in time, and vary with the zoom you're using.
The marker is your playhead, or position cursor. It indicates where you are currently in your video. You can simply click on the timecode you want to bring the cursor there, or drag the cursor from left to right to seek a specific position in your video. The Project monitor can also be used to select the position in the video where you want to go, or you can use the right and left arrows to move one frame at a time, and add the Shift key to move 1 second at a time.
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