Cinelerra

some main differences of Cinlerra to other non-linear video editors for Linux..


• apart from technical stuff, the main differences are found in the UI and how clips are edited - there are two mouse modes (copy-paste and drag-drop) and three mouse drag modes (three mouse buttons)
• cutting a segment out of a media clip immediately moves the rest along to the left to cover over the time that the clip previously filled, or else mute can be used to replace the segment with silence (looks like a gap is left)
• silence can also be selected and cut, copied or pasted, there is no "close gap" command (but silence can be cut/deleted!)
• red and yellow lines above the timeline mark the last played from and paused points
• cuts of clips on the timeline are called edits
• all picture adjustments and effects are keyframable and tracks have overlay bands on which to create/remove keyframes

Main Keys

The manual lists the keyboard shortcuts quite well, here I just list the main keys.

Left/Right	moves the timeline along	X/C/V	cut/copy/paste (X also splits an edit if no area selected)
Alt-Left/Alt-Right	move insert point to prev/next edit (cut point)	del	remove selected (leaves no space)
Home/End	move to timeline start/end	M	mute selected (remove and leave space)
Ctrl-Left/Ctrl-Right	go to prev/next label	E	toggle drag-drop/cut-paste modes
Down/Up/Shift-scroll	zoom in/out (also scroll button on zoom factor, lower left)	L	toggle label
F	fit all/selection to display	[ and ]	toggle in/out points
Shift-Home/Shift-End	highlight from insert point to start/end	A	select all
Shift-Ctrl-Left/Shift-Ctrl-Right	highlight from insert point to prev/next label, or to played from/paused point	Z/Shift-Z	undo/redo
Shift-LMB on label/in-out point	highlight from label/in-out point to insert point	Shift-R	render
Space	play/pause	S	save project
Ctrl-Space	play area between in/out points	T/Shift-T	add new audio/video track
Ctrl-L	set loopback play (whole timeline or selected)	Tab/Shift-Tab	toggle Arm track with mouse over track/toggle arm all other tracks

Playback direction and speed is controlled with the number pad.

	one frame	slow mo	normal speed	fast mo
backward >	4	5	6	+
forward >	1	2	3	Enter

Pressing Ctrl with any of the playback keys and the time betwen in/out points will be played.

These shortcuts have been added to main keyboard but they are useless for the Colemak layout.


There are no shortcut settings in Preferences, but the keys available are pretty good, especially on a 105 keys layout.

My Tips

Inserting media to the project

hit O, locate your source files, select the ones you need, then select the insert strategy, either:

• Replace the current project - on new tracks or concatenated all on 1 video/1 audio tracks
• Append to project - on new tracks or concatenated
• Paste in at the Insert point, set In-point or over selected I/O region
• Make new resources only - added to media, not to timeline

With media loaded in the resource window, you can

• drag items from the Media bin to the timeline and they will snap to the start or between any edits there already
• drag them over the video track and both video and audio are added to timeline, drag over the audio track and onnlu the audio of the media is appended, disarm audio track and only video is appended
• drag them over to the Compositor and the media will be added at the insert point or at the In-point, or replacing any selection or I/O area on the timeline (as the compositor views the timeline)
• open the Viewer window and drag items into it from Media (or right-click on a file > open in new window), then play through and set I/O points and hit the To Clip button or hit I - the cut section becomes a clip in the Clips bin, and this can be dragged down to the timeluine (this could save the timeline getting full of unwanted content befor editing)
• or there are buttons to splice the selected part into the project, or to overwrite, at the insert point
• drag items from Media or clips over to the Compositor window - they will be inserted at the Insert point or the In-point if it is set or replacing the selected I/O region
• and to arrange clips in any order, that they should be added to the project, you can rename them numerically

Align Audio with Video

Some cameras make a complete mess of things, recording the audio of clips a few frames linger than the video and when you join thirty clips on the timeline the disjoint becomes enlarged as you progress resulting in some bad dislocations that take pains to set right - or you could spend hours cutting all the ends off the audio clips to keep it in sync with mouths and hammers!
But here's an automatic tool that does the whole timeline in one click! Good work Good Guy! I wonder if this function was added after my request on the mailing list?

• select the area with the edits to align or the whole timeline with A
• Edit menu > Align edits
• make sure that the track with proper ends (shorter) is set master in the patchbay to the left, as alignment will follow this track - if only 2 tracks top video will be master

Patchbay controls

To the left of each track is the patchbay where certain controls are found.

• Play track - decides if track will be rendered and appear in Compositor
• Arm track - an armed track means that edits will apply, unarmed means edits will not apply - so if you want to cut off some audio but not affect the video track, disarm the video track first, make the cut, then re-arm it again to carry on.
• Draw media - toggles thumbnails on video tracks or waveform on audio tracks
• Don't send output - mutes the track so that it will be blank when rendered or viewed in Compositor
• Gang fader - applies fader adjustments across tracks from the track enabled - including setting keyframes and dragging curves
• Track data height - shrink or grow track display
• Fader slider - drag this to left to fade the whole track.

-click and drag a button from one patchbay to another it applies to the other.
-Shift-click on a button it applies to all tracks.
-Tab with mouse over track toggles that track armed
-Shift-Tab toggles only that track armed

Timeline appearance

• you can change colours of bars for any edits - click select them in drag-drop mode, then rightclick on them
• If you enable auto colour of assets in Preferences > Appearance, each clip will be ueiquely coloured in its title bars, so that when they are cut and moved about you can still see if two edits belong to the same clip
• also you can use the alpha slider at bottom to colourise the content area too.
• the arrow button at right edge of the patchbay folds up the track to only title bar - click one this button and drag down over all track patchbays to close them all and make the timeline more compact (if there is so much clutter)
• cycle the track positions with Shift-Up and Shift-Down - affects armed tracks, so unarmed do not move
• set she colour inversion of the selection drag in Preferences > Appearance, to something other than default white
• Shift-T adds a new video trackT adds a new audio track (or else use right click menu or drop down menu)

Jumping about on the timeline

• Use Shift-mouse scroll "pull" to zoom in close and Shift-mouse scroll "push" to retract from the timeline
• This means that if you need to get to a point way down the timeline, you can do it easily by Shift-scroll push to show more clips and then click on a point further down and Shift-scroll pull to get in closer to those edits
• pressF to show most of the timeline
• Shift-Left and Shift-Right or Ctrl-scroll-down and Ctrl-scroll-up moves the timeline along

Selecting edits and areas - Cut and Paste Mode

• to select an edit (really a column of time passed by an edit) double click on it
• to select a time length, click and drag on timeline, and Shift-click-drag to extend/shrink the area already selected
• to select everything left or right of the insert point, press Shift-Home or Shift-End
• to select the whole timeline hit A
• to select with more accuracy, play to or find a start point and press [ (set in-point), then play until the end point is found and press ] (set out-point), then click on the in-point and Shift-click on the out-point to select the time between them
• to remove in/out points, just double-press [ and ]
• you can also do Shift-Alt and click on a point along the timeline to select from that point back to the insert point
• another way is to adjust the selected time using the entry fields at the bottom panel - press Bkspace, enter new value, Enter
• to cancel selection, press A twice, or click in the timeline (only copy paste mode)

Further...

• With any edit or time space selected, you can perform copy, cut, remove or mute actions, or send to a clip that will be stored in the Clips folder (see below);
  
• Also, you can attach effects to that selection;
  
• If you double-click on an edit, hold Ctrl and drag, you can move both video and audio of a clip together - but they need to be aligned on same frames, and with some stupid source media this never happens! It is actually far more effective if you switch to drag and drop mode with E for moving edits
• To reduce the timeline content to only what is wanted and discard the rest, make a selection by dragging cursor, then Edit menu > Trim selection

Moving edits - Drag and Drop Mode

• hold Ctrl and left click on an edit then drag it along the timeline - it will change its position on the timeline, so that edits will shift into the space where it was and no edits will be deformed or cut - but if you drag an edit without pressing Ctrl... God have mercy on you!
• hold Shift and drag selected edits means that they will overwrite whatever edits they are dropped on
• insertion arrows will appear to show you where it will be placed, and just drop it between two edits
• if there is blank space on the track when you drag an edit a coloured box moves about to where you want it - green, can drop; yellow, carn drop and will align with another edit; blue can't fit; green wrong track type
• select multiple edits with left clicking while holding Ctrl, or middle mouse button > Select edits, to select edits on the insert point, or all edits between I/O points, or within a selection
• to cut/copy selected, press middle button > Copy pack/Cut pack - then V will paste them back in at another point (be careful if I/O are set), middle-button Paste will drop them at the mouse cursor
• to remove the selected edits use Ctrl-X or Ctrl-M to mute them
• Ctrl-Shift-A clears selections
• there is also some functionality while in cut and paste mode, if you hold Ctrl and click on edits it selects them, but you can only drag one edit at a time in that mode

Create a group of edits

• In drag and drop mode, select clips holding Ctrl, then Shift-left click on them - they are grouped and given a colour code, which surrounds the group when you click on it, or can be seen in each of the group's edit's title bar when no longer selected. They will stay as a group until ungrouped with Shift-click again
• creating groups has some good advantages, as if you need to frequently move a number of edits, being grouped you can just select them all with a single click, or select multiple groups, and move them, copy them, send to clip and so forth, and it also keeps them together so they won't be modified
• you must use Ctrl-X, Ctrl-C or Ctrl-M with groups, delete key has no function

Cutting on the TImeline

• press Del or X to cut a selection (edits move up, no gap created)
• press X with no selection and a hard cut is performed at she cursor
• press M to mute a selection (edits stay put, gap created), press CM to first copy selected area then mute it
• if in/out points are set the time between will be removed, cut, copied or muted
• press V to paste any cut/copied edit (including copied muted time), it will insert at the insert point and the edits will shift up to the right
• select Trim Selection on the Edit menu to crop the timeline to keep only the selection!
• To make sure that video and audio tracks cut together, set Settings > Align cursor on frames
• Shift-Space to make blank space (1 frame) at insert point - hold down to increase length of the blank, e.g. to make space for titles at the start (speed it up by selecting some of the blank, press C then V repeatedly)
• To move up all edits to the right from a point, you can drag with left button the right edge of the edit to the left - think of it as trying to extend that edit, but actually it can't extend so you get blank space created and all edits to the right shift along, (won't work if edit to left is already cut at right edge!)

What happens if you are playing the video on the timeline with an In-point set that disappears off the left because the timeline is moving along, and you reach a point to set the Out-point and then you remove that section?
The point which was Out-point will shoot off the visual space to the left and...
-if you pressed X or del while still playing, the cursor point will still be infront of you but at a totally different place in the clips.
-if you paused play before cutting/removing, the cursor point will have shot off with the Out-point off to the left.
So to get back to that point which was cut, you may need to do Ctrl-scroll-down, or if its really far off, Alt-Left

removing gaps

• to remove empty space, double-click in the space to highlight it and then press X or Del

Transforming edit ends

when you move the mouse pointer to the edge of an edit an arrow appears, click on this and drag the end left or right. The mouse button you use decides what the dragging does.

by default, mouse buttons Left, middle, Right (1,2,3) do the following:

• LMB: only the selected edit end transforms, shortening, or lengthening and following edits all move up to make space or fill space - edits on other tracks (eg audio) will move together, if they are synchronous and the tracks are armed
• MMB: the selected edit end transforms, and the following edit also retracts/extends in time to make space for or replace what the selected edit retracted from
• RMB: the edit is slipped, meaning, the start/end time is changed to earlier/later from the source media
• when dragging an edit to transform its length, pressing Ctrl-Alt will allow clip end to snap to any edit end (on tracks above or below) or to a label etc.
• there ari also Slide edit and drag edge options that can be set

Snapping edit ends

This method is used for cutting the front or end of edits off.

• use in/out points: play until the cut point is reached and pause, then press [ to set in-point... press Alt-Right to move to the end of the edit and press ] to set out-point... press del or X to remove the end of the edit
• select area: play until the cut point is reached and pause... press Alt-Right to move to the end of the edit... then press Shift-Ctrl-Left to select from end of edit back to the pause point... press del or X to remove the end of the edit
• to contract the edit from the start you'd need to either make an in-point before playing, and out-point at the cut point, or do Alt-Left to return to start (after played until cut point) and Shift-Ctrl-Right to select up to pause point and then delete.
  
  

Three new functions in CinGG that make this work much faster:

• press Ctrl-Alt-comma to snap left handle to insert point, or Ctrl-Alt-fullstop to snap right handle to insert point - this makes work much easier!
• Also, press Shift-Ctrl-Alt-comma or Shift-Ctrl-Alt-fullstop to snap from insert point to next label, to left or right (this instantly removes the everything between these points, so watch out)
• and press Ctrl-Alt while clicking on the edit handle to snap edit end to insert point

Inter-view Mode

Here is a very useful tool, enabling you to see where a source file or clip has been used on the timeline...

• In the resource window, turn on Full play in the top drop-down
• middle-button on a clip and a large thumb comes up, with a top black/white band (the source) and a bottom black/red band (the timeline), where the white is the parts of source used in timeline, and the red is where the used source is placed on the timeline
• click on the top band to open the clip in Viewer to make adjustments
• click on the bottom band to focus to the clip's place on the timeline
• Shift-click on the bottom band to select the clip's content on the timeline

Labels

• toggle a label at the insert point with L
• to remove one, click on the label and hit L or select an area and use Edit > Clear labels
• jump to prev/next label with Ctrl-Left/Ctrl-Right
• select from insert point to label with Shift-Ctrl-Left/Shift-Ctrl-Right
• or Shift-click on a label/in-out point

Loopback play

• press Shift-L to toggle loopback on/off
• select an area of timeline first to set the loopback to an edit area

Keyframes

• use number keys 1-0 to toggle show different overlay controls
• click on an overlay band (such as fade) to create a keyframe, then drag it up or down to make adjustment

Fading video

• zoom in closer to the area that will fade in/out (Shift-scroll-down)
• fade out: click on the video fade overlay band to create a keyframe at the point where the fade out should begin
• click again on the band at the point of fade out completion (eg at end of the movie) and drag it down to the bottom of track
• fade in: similar, just make a keyframe first at point of the end of fade in then make one and drag down at point of the start of fade in

still another method: drag a video transition onto the end of the edit and make sure there is no video after the edit end and no video on tracks above. The video will transition to black! Nice!

this can be done for fade in, and also audio fades.

Fading audio

note: the overlay band for audio fade by default is set to normal level at base of track, which means you can't achieve reduced audio or silence until you adjust that base level...

• first select Audio Fade at bottom and lower the "Automation adjust minimum" quite a bit, say, to -45.0 (with the mouse scroll button over it) so that the base line will reach negative level
• then you can set keyframes as per video fade in/fade out

Speed auto

Easily make changes to media playback using the speed auto band

under View menu, check Speed - if the speed line does not appear, set to Speed and adjust range to be shown, e.g. 0.005 to 5.125 which will allow speediing up five times, or set negative to 0 to enable slowing down

set a keyframe and then drag the speed line up to create fast-motion, or down fo slow-motion - the edit wiiil adjust its length to reflect the time used by the new speed

then you might want to ajust audio in the same way - or leave it normal.

Make clips from edited material on the timeline

• select an area on the timeline
• press the "To clip" button or hit 'I' and the selected part of edits will copy to the Clip resource window
• also you can right-click in Clips and click Paste clip
• you can copy/paste clips to the timeline, or a new timeline window
• if you right-click on a clip and then click Nest to Media, it will be found in media, from there it will insert onto timeline with just one vid and one audio track, regardless if clip made from many tracks
• you can also copy a selection from the timeline/compositor and then paste it into another timeline
• to copy a clip made in one instance over to another, right-click on the clip in resources > View in new window or drag to Viewer, set In-point at the start (Out-point will be automatically set to end), press C, open new instance, press V on timeline

Nesting sequences

You can import project xml files (EDLs) into any other project, whereby you can compile lots of individual editing sessions into a bigger work, without all their sometimes complex tracks and plugins cluttering up the whole timeline.

• open media and select xml of project to import
• then choose either load strategy of create new resources only, to add as clips to resources window
• or EDL strategy of Nested, to insert directly to the timeline

Open EDL

When you import project xml files (edit decision lists /EDLs) into a new project, you can adjust the plugins already applied to the imported project - that is now a clip in the master project. If you just pile the clips onto the timeline you won't see the plugins that the original pre-import projects had attached to their media on the timeline.

• In resources window, rightclick on a clip that was imported from xml, then select Open EDL
• the clip is focused and you can make changes to its plugins
• when done, look at the top right corner for a number -usually 1- and click on that to close the clip's EDL and return to master project timeline
• the clip icon disappears from the resource window while its EDL is open (logicaly because now the resource window shows you what is in the opened EDL, not the main EDL)
• However, if you add a clip to the timeline, opening its EDL and making changes to plugins will not affect the timeline content you must either: - Open the EDL before adding the clip to the timeline, make adjustments, close the EDL then add in to timeline - first NEST the clip to MEDIA and add it from there to the timeline. When nested it becomes a main project asset and media is reflected on the timeline.
• an imported project xml may itself have imported and nested projects! So when you Open EDL on a nested clip, in the media window you will see if it has previous nested clips - then those too can be opened with Open EDL (and the number at top right will jump to 2, and clicking on it returns you to 1 - the numbker 2 means 2-layer open EDL)

Use proxy clips

This can be a very useful thing, especially with very large video dimensions and/or low powered CPUs - but even a 16 core Ryzen 3700X at 4.2GHz will keep motoring just with playing back video in the compositor

• Settings > Proxy settings
• check the Use scaler option and set 1/2, keep mpeg, set to 1000000 or even 500000 if it's bearable (depends on detail needed in editing)
• check Auto proxy and hit the Tick
• during edits you can disable proxies, via a P or S button at top right, to see better detail at times
• Before render, reset scale to full size in Proxy settings

Rendering

• Hit Shift-R to open render dialogue, then set target file
• File format: for h264 encoding, select FFmpeg/mp4
• click on the wrench icons by audio/video and set the bitrate: a= 192000, v= 2000000 (i.e. 2Mbps) etc
• To render to a quality format for storage, you can try OGG TheoraVorbis/ogg (or FFmpeg/ogg) with a constant bitrate or quality (7 or 8) - but it's slow as it doesn't cpu multithread 100% (50fps 25M mpegts, @q8, 4min movie took 28min).
• you can enter a name for this render setting and save as preset (though your last setting will be stored)
• insert strategy: insert nothing
• note: if you open new media onto the timeline and replace existing, the render will terminate

Batch Rendering

You can render one project in different formats, just add it to list multiple times, or multiple projects in same or any format.

• Open File > Batch Render
• Set output file and format, and the project EDL (xml file) and hit New to add to the batch queue
• when a job is highlighted in the list, its format or output name can be set
• a project must have an active region for rendering - selection, I/O region, or the insert point should be placed before the content!
• Run them from the Batch Render window or hit Save Jobs to save a batch list (but job does not match session?)
• close Cin and render from the command line.. run `cin -r batchjob.xml`
• command line render will abort if an output file already exists

---

Some effects that are very handy

Attaching plugins/effects

• Simply drag an effect from resources to the video or audio track or right-click on a track and attach effect
• the effect will be applied to only a single edit, a selected area or I/O points
• drag the effect to the patchbay for it to apply to the entire track - but first remove I/O points
• when attaching effects, they will stack up under the edits
• resize an effect on the timeline by dragging its ends - and to prevent other effects to moving along too hold Shift when dragging to make only that effect move and no others to be affected.
• to move the effect, switch to drag mide with E and click drag
• if there is no space on the effect bar to move the effect into (it will probably jump to space at the end if you try fit it into a small space), just drag a hew effect down to an edit and it will extend the stack of effects, then move theeffect into empty space on the lower bar just created.

Video transitions

• drag a transition from the Resource window onto a join between two edits, A and B: hovering over the start of edit B will show a box over the join on which to drop it
• Right click on the transition effect icon at the edit join to set the duration or drag the duration bar
• note: the transition between edits will begin at start of edit B, which means preferably there is some time left of 1st edit that will show in part during the transition - if there is no more of source media after end of edit A end then edit A picture will freeze during the transition!
• the transition may not look very good played realtime in the timeline but it should be good once rendered - you can set in/out points to render that part to run a test first.

note: if you have applied an effect such as colour-correction to edit A and the effect is not attached (not wanted) on edit B, you will run into a small problem with a video transition.. do you stop the effect at end of A (and then visible edit A suddenely returns to pre-effect picture during the transition) or do you extend it to the end of the transition (and then edit B gets coated with edit A effect for the duration of the transition, which is bad)?

Answer: what you need to do in this case, is add a video track above and drag edit A onto it, then drag-extend the effect attached to edit A to the end of the transition - the effect will then not alter edit B picture!

Colour correction

Cinelerra offers some outstanding tools for control of colour output, but mastering them might take you some time!

• blue banana: in controls check Combine and Mask Selection, check Filter Active, then check which control is needed: hue, saturation, value (from the middle controls - not sure how the top controls affect the middle ones)
• dragging the pointers apart increases the control range, then moving the dot point along adjusts the control
• brightness/contrast: set values in the Preset window
• color 3 way: probably easier tool to use for saturation control, just increase Saturation control and leave the color adjustment alone, increase Midtone and Highlight values to increase brightness
• color balance: adjust cyan, magenta and yellow levels - for example if a camera made bad WB and the picture is tinted blue etc
• gradient: to set a coloured light effect.. linear: adjust angle, inner radius zero, reduce outer radius a little, set inner and outer colours.. radial: move the radial center off the picture on X or Y axis and also reduce outer radius
• histogram: drag the three pointers to set pre, mid and end of curve - to adjust brightness and shadows
• histogram: control the histogram curve with points -move the left arrow to affect blacks, right arrow for whites, middle for mid-tones.
• hue saturation: easily increase colour or reduce to b/w picture

Keyframe an effect

easily set keyframes in effects to alter the parameters through time..

• Add an effect to the timeline and turn on auto keyframing
• then click in the timeline at the start of it click the glass icon - set what you need, e.g. slight contrast
• set the insert point halfway along the effect and then increase the contrast a little, then set the contrast higher at the end
• each adjustment will set a new keyframe (visible on the effect with a key -the sharp end of the key at the keyframe point) and they can be dragged along - how sweet!
• if you click drag to extend an effect, the left button will drag all other keyframes along, including fades and all, also the keyframes on the effect will moves
• if you click with middle button you will control just the one effect (though you can set what the mouse buttons do in Settings)
• to adjust a certain keyframe, right click on it >> Show Plugin Settings or just left click on it if settings is open
• render a short in-out segment to test ow the effect will look on the finished film - as the effect may appear less harsh viewed from the composer window

Rotate video

• the effect you need is obviously called "Rotate" - you either set it to the entire track with right click >> Attach effect, or you can drag it from Resources to the edit or selection
• click on the glass icon to set the degree of rotation

but, rotating a video (e.g. 16:9 aspect ratio 90 degrees) will crop top and bottom (as obviously 1920 pix wide can't rotate and stand up in 1080 pix high - its top and bottom won't fit in), so you can either attach the "Scale" effect (above the rotate effect, to scale the video width down to the new height dimension before rotation).

• attach the scale effect and then right click on it >> Move up to set it above Rotate
• Scale: just click on the glass, click on "Constrain ratio" then use mouse scroll button to raise the value to something less than 1.

OR, after applying rotation, click on the "Adjust camera automation" button in the compositor window, and the Shift-left-click-drag to resize the video so that as much as you need fits onto the canvas (and turn off key-framing first!).

Scaling down video

To produce video with smaller dimensions than the source, you need to set the format dimensions and then add a video effect to the entire timeline.

• Open format settings with Shift-F and set the canvas size to the scaled down dimensions - sets format of output video when rendered
• then right click on the timeline >> Attach effect >> Scale, click OK (or open Video effects in the resource window and find Scale, drag it to an edit, the selected area, or the patch bay if i/o are not set).
• Then click on the glass icon button on the effect and set the dimensions or scale.
• you can also use Auto Scale effect and then Right click >> Presets and click and enter new values

But even EASIER.. after setting canvas size, click the "Adjust camera automation" button in the compositor window, and the Shift-left-click-drag to resize the video (but make sure you turn off key-framing first!).

Note: if you set the output format to a smaller scale than the source media, the project will be cropped. This might be a valid technique, say, if your media is in 3K or 4K and output is 2K (1080p), but it may not be suitable for the entire track as detail such as faces could be lost.

Image overlays

this is easy as resizing/positioning in the compositor window with only one track armed -so that an overlying track is positioned over the full-size track underneath

• arm only the track you want to resize as an overlay with Shift-Tab on the track (disarms all other tracks)
• show the Compositor window and click on Projector tool
• with insert point at the start of the track or start point of the edit that will overlay, click drag the projector box to the overlay position and Shift-click and drag to resize it
• if you move along some time in the edit or track and change the projector position/size then you will create a new keyframe and the video position will jump when played - so make sure that only one keyframe (ie postion set at start and no keyframes added) is active for the duration of the overlaid picture

Projector animation

This technique will create a movement and transform shrink/grow of the video picture across or around the screen - you are advised to look at the good Heroine manual first! (find/copy it after install at /usr/share/cin/doc/cinelerra.html)

• In the Compositor, turn on auto keyframes, select Projector tool, then drag the frame a tiny amount to create first keyframe (the point to start the picture movement/shrink) - without that keyframe to start the movement a slow linear change will be applied right from the start of the timeline to your first projector change - not so happy :(
• further along the time in the Compositor, drag the projector frame to a new position where you want it to reach at that time and resize it with Shift-click drag if necessary - and repeat for as many changes of transformation/direction you need
• for example, you want the picture to wipe off to the top right and shrink into an inch size (the following edit could then grow out of the same position and you get a disappearing/appearing transition)
• or perhaps you want different pictures or still pics to move across the screen from all directions
• or you could have a picture shrink to half size and bounce around the screen and then bounce back to full size
• turning on auto-keyframing first before making the change to projector position is important as it will create progressive changes (you can have either smooth or linear) from one keyframe to the next
• The projector changes will show on the video track as X and Y axis and Z (Z is the shrinkage or zoom)
• Increase track depth by bottom "Height of tracks" to see whats happening with your keyframes on those axis bands... but moving them on the tracks is too complex, you can just about remove them and that's all... you need to work in the Compositor to make sensible changes.
• Click on Show Tool info button to get full control, ..how?
• turn off auto keyframing after the work is done witht he projector, as other wise when you make new keyframes on a track it will adjust automatically from the last keyframe, instead of from the point you click.

Warping video

• Lens adjust Radius, Center X and Y to create a book page flip effect and use auto keyframing with projector to have the picture flip into view

Note that the Show Tool button can hide tool windows and if they don't pop up its because you pressed this before while it was open.