Tracks and clips

Tracks are the horizontal lanes of the timeline. Clips are the tiles on those tracks. Editing happens almost entirely through clip operations: drag, trim, split, fade, copy, paste, delete. This page covers every move you can make.

The default tracks

New timelines open with two tracks:

• V1: the main video track. First place a scene's motion or image clip lands.
• A1: the main audio track. First place narration audio lands.

You can add overlay video tracks above V1 and extra audio tracks below A1. Tracks are ordered top-to-bottom: higher-numbered video tracks render on top of lower ones.

Track labels

Each track has a label on the left edge showing its name (V1, V2, A1, A2...) and three icons:

• Eye: visibility toggle for video tracks. Hidden tracks do not render in preview or export.
• Speaker: mute toggle for audio tracks. Muted tracks do not play.
• S: solo. With any track solo'd, only solo'd tracks play.

Right-click the label for more options: rename, lock (prevent edits), delete track.

Creating clips

Drag an asset from the Library onto a track. The clip appears at the drop position with the asset's duration. If you drop on an occupied region, the incoming clip displaces nearby clips (ripple).

Assets you can drag:

• Images (render as still frames for the clip duration).
• Videos (render at their native duration, trimmable).
• Audio files (to audio tracks only).
• Text assets (to overlay video tracks; render as text layers).

Moving clips

With the Select tool, grab a clip and drag. The clip snaps to nearby edges when snap is on. Hold Alt to move without snap temporarily. Drag onto another track to lift the clip to that track (same track kind only: video to video, audio to audio).

Multi-select with Shift-click or rubber-band drag. All selected clips move together, preserving their relative spacing.

Keyboard nudges:

• ← / →: nudge selected clip by 100ms.
• Shift+← / Shift+→: nudge by 500ms.
• ↑ / ↓ (overlay clips only): nudge Y position on canvas.

Trimming

Drag a clip's left edge to trim the start (the clip starts later into its source). Drag the right edge to trim the end. Trim handles are visible when the clip is selected or hovered.

Trims are non-destructive and reversible. The underlying asset is unchanged.

Splitting

Three ways:

• Cut tool (C): hover the clip and click at the desired position.
• Split at playhead (S): splits the selected clip at the current playhead position. Works without switching tools.
• Right-click on the clip at the target position: Split here.

All three produce two adjacent clips. The join becomes a valid drop target for cross-fade transitions.

Copy, paste, duplicate

• Ctrl/Cmd+C: copy selected clips to the internal clipboard.
• Ctrl/Cmd+V: paste at the playhead on the current tracks.
• Ctrl/Cmd+D: duplicate the selected clip immediately after itself.

Copy preserves trim, transitions attached to the clip, and any overlay transform (position, scale).

Deleting

Delete or Backspace removes selected clips. The gap is preserved by default. Hold Shift while pressing Delete to ripple: downstream clips slide left to close the gap.

Fade-in / fade-out

Press F with clips selected to toggle a 500ms fade-in at the start and a 500ms fade-out at the end. A second press removes them. The fades are Transition records attached to the clip and can be dragged along the clip edge to extend duration or removed via the Curve panel.

Ken Burns (image clips)

For image clips only. Press Shift+K to toggle a subtle zoom-in animation across the clip duration (the "Ken Burns effect"). A second press removes it. This animates the image's scale over time so stills don't feel static. Only visible in preview and final export; the library asset is unchanged.

Overlay clips

Clips on tracks above V1 are overlays. They render on top of the main video. Each overlay clip has a transform with X, Y, scale:

• X / Y: position on the canvas as a percentage (0-100%). Arrow keys nudge ±1%, with Shift ±10%.
• Scale: size of the overlay, 0-200%.

Useful for picture-in-picture, lower thirds, title cards, watermark-style logos.

Locking a track

Right-click a track label and pick Lock. Locked tracks reject drag and keyboard edits. The lock is visual (icon in the label) and prevents accidental changes on tracks you are done with.

Where to go next

• Transitions: cross-fades and easing curves.
• Audio and mixing: volume, solo, mute, waveforms.