Understand the timeline

The timeline under the player shows every part of a video made from your recording in time order: the steps and scenes, the zooms, the elements on top and the music. This article explains each lane, what you can move or trim and why some blocks can't be, and how hiding, muting and deleting differ.

Before you start#

• This covers how-to videos, product demos and Polish videos. The social clip timeline works differently; see Edit a social clip.
• Without edit rights you can play and scrub, but not change anything.

The lanes#

Lanes have no names on screen; you tell them apart by what's on them. From top to bottom:

┌ Elements ──── [Text Box]   [Blur]       [Sound Effect]
│               [Image ───────────]
├ Scene row ─ [Intro card][Step 1 ▒▒▒▒][Step 2 ▒▒▒▒▒▒][Title card][Step 3 ▒▒▒]…
├ Zoom ─────────── [1.5×]        [2×]           [1.6×]
└ Music ─── ♪ Breathe Easy ─────────────────────────────────── Volume 40%

An empty lane isn't shown: a video without zooms has no zoom lane. Captions and chapters don't have lanes. Captions follow the narration automatically; chapters are headings in the Script tab.

Selecting opens the right tab#

Click a block to select it. The playhead moves to it and the side panel switches to the tab that edits it:

Double-click goes one step further. After you hover a block for a second, a hint tells you what it does:

Move, trim and nudge#

Rules for moving and trimming:

• A block is at least 1 second long.
• Blocks on the same row can't overlap, and nothing goes past the end of the video.
• Blocks snap to the edges of blocks on other rows and to the playhead.
• Drag an element clearly up or down to move it to another row, or to a new row (a New track line shows where it lands).
• ← / → nudges the selected zoom or element by one frame; with Shift, by one second. Delete or Backspace removes it. Neither works on steps and scenes.

Zooms and elements are tied to their place in the recording. When a step before them gets longer or shorter, they move with it.

The playhead#

• Click an empty part of the timeline to move the playhead there; drag to scrub.
• While paused, hovering the timeline previews that frame in the player. Move the pointer away and the player goes back to the playhead.
• Space plays and pauses. Go to start, Previous frame, Next frame and Go to end are in the toolbar.

Zoom the timeline#

Videos longer than a minute open zoomed in, about a minute at a time.

Hide, mute or delete#

Three ways to take something out of a video, with different results:

Introduction and conclusion#

Many videos start with an Introduction and end with a Conclusion: narrated steps that hold one frame of the recording (or, for some introductions, play a short preview of moments from across it). On the timeline they show their narration text. They can be hidden, but not muted. Pick the frame they hold with Edit sync and pacing.

Shape the music on its lane#

Select the music lane to expand it ("Select to expand — adjust fades, music region & volume dips"). Then:

The music doesn't lower itself under the voice-over automatically in these videos. Add dips where it competes with the narration. To undo all lane edits: Audio → Music → ⋯ → Reset timeline edits…. See Change voice, music and sound.

Split a clip (Polish videos)#

Polish videos have Split clip at playhead in the toolbar. Put the playhead inside a Clip or Voice clip and click it to cut the clip in two at that point, for example to delete a mistake in the middle. It's off ("Move the playhead inside a clip to split") when the playhead isn't inside a clip, or is within 0.1 seconds of its edge. How-to videos and product demos don't have it: change what a step shows with sync and pacing instead.

Add things between scenes#

Hover the seam between two scenes:

• + (Add timeline item) opens the same menu as the toolbar's +, at that spot.
• Add transition adds a transition between the two scenes (Edit transition once there is one). See Add and edit elements.

Aspect ratio and crop#

Both are in the timeline toolbar, and both apply to every language of the video.

Aspect ratio sets the shape of the finished video: "The shape of the finished video. Your background fills any space around the recording."

Changing it doesn't cut or stretch the recording. It stays centered at its own shape, and the background from the Style tab fills the space around it. A wide recording in Vertical therefore shows as a band across the middle; zooms help it fill the frame.

Crop video cuts the recording itself: "Keep the part of the recording you want to show. The crop applies to every language." Drag the crop box or pick Free, Original, 16:9, 1:1, 9:16 or 4:5, then Save crop. The button shows a dot once a crop is set. It's available for recordings from the desktop app and uploaded videos.

Related#