I finally got time to try edit in the latest version ShotCut for a few hours and I collected my various observations here.
I know I should report the bugs as repeatable bugs and suggestions as suggestions, but I don’t have the time for that right now. This is just a messy and mixed bag of things, so it’s stuff to keep an eye out for.
BUGS
“Ripple insert” (ripple button highlighted and push arrow down) doesn’t push the following clips to the right, but overwrites the existing clips. A glitch? Paste is doing this correctly. (Maybe having an Insert and an Overwrite button instead of an Append button(adding to the end of timeline) would simplify things too? (Like mirroring the Lift and Remove functions))
Minor cosmetic thing: Right thumbnail in timeline needs to be moved one pixel to the right. A one pixel wide line of the blue background is showing. Left clip thumbnail in timeline needs to be moved one pixel to the right too. It’s one pixel over the black start clip line. (On Windows - Source: 1024x576)
Unable to drag from source player or playlist into timeline top two tracks(1. video + 1. audio), however it is possible to drag into 2. audio track. A glitch? (Already reported, sorry!)
Undo insert when using “ripple all tracks” makes Shotcut crash, if it is a complicated operation(3 tracks with dissolves/fades). With simple operations - no crash. A glitch?
Adjusting zoom level in timeline when playback crashes Shotcut. Maybe the waveform have to be visible in order to get it to crash? Better to stop playback when zoom function is touched?
Deleting fade in/out filter video+audio doesn’t remove dark triangle in timeline.
Remove active area visualization from text filter, when doing playback. You’ll have to select another clip before hitting play or else it will be visible throughout the playback of the entire timeline.
If files dragged from “Downloads” folder – the folder is called “Overførelser” by default in danish Windows 8 - then the files will be missing when reopening the project.
SUGGESTIONS:
Snap to the end of clips in the timeline. Good for ex aligning audio in different track to video clip.
“Slide clip” function where the duration in the timeline of a clip is kept, but the contents of the clip is slided forwards or backwards. Good for keeping sync over several tracks.
“Open as source/clip” from timeline – right click on a clip and select in menu – is missing currently or am I not remembering correctly? (I see this function in playlist, but not in the timeline, wasn’t it there once?). Very useful function for ex. going back to source clip to investigate for better parts of that clip.
“Fit to fill” insert mode. Insert source clip into empty area at playhead between playhead and next clip in timeline. In other words the out point/in point(depending on which is specified(missing function to remove source I/O points?)) of the source clip is adjusted to fill the timeline until the next clip. Very useful when you need to lift a clip and insert another clip without changing the duration(in order to keep sync of the following clips).
“Drag-snap” playhead to nearest cut. On Avid you press ctrl and move the playhead with the mouse to make it snap. Maybe “Alt” is a better choice for Shotcut – since it’s already using alt+arrows to toggle between cuts.
“Slide cut-point”. Move out point of first clip and in point of second clip without affecting the total duration of the two clips together. Good for keeping sync in all tracks.
Missing file window: When the file has been pointed at then automatically check if the rest of the files are located in the same folder. I don’t know if there are scenarios where this isn’t useful, but if there are, then a pop up asking to attempt to read the rest of the files from the same folder could be nice?
Missing file window: Open the previously selected folder and not Desktop and maybe save the folder path to ini too.
Missing file window: When a file is found the icon is changed to a yellow exclamation mark, maybe it should be a green checkmark instead?
Thumbnails of color clips(from Open other…) in timeline.
Add timeline headstone menu option to show filename on/off. Not really necessary in the timeline?
I hope that someone with real talents(not like me, who did some of them way back) could give the timeline edit function icons an overhaul, so they would become more meaningful and have a consistent look.
OVERALL
Though this may look critical, listing stuff like this, I’m really really impressed with the current state of Shotcut and I’m really thankful for all the time and talents put into this project. It is a great gift to the floss world. Thank you!