Multiple timelines in one project

[Sugar_Rocket]

Is it possible to have multiple timelines in one project? Like in Final Cut Pro, Premiere Pro or most other video editing software.

[kagsundaram]

@Sugar_Rocket

most other video editing software.

I find this statement curious; I tried out several free video editing apps before settling on Shotcut. (By “free” I mean really free, not “free trial” or “limited features free version”.) None of them had more than one timeline.

[Austin]

I suspect multiple timelines became necessary to keep track of the parallel universes inflicted upon us by lazy sci-fi screenwriters.

On a more useful note, I’m not aware of Shotcut having this feature. What benefit would it provide that having multiple projects couldn’t accomplish? Maybe we can get that functionality in a different way.

[kagsundaram]

@Austin

Maybe we can get that functionality in a different way.

Perhaps with chaptering…

@bentacular

Chaptering Your Video Project in Shotcut to Streamline Your Editing and Avoid Losing Work - Advanced

The main idea of chaptering is to break up your one project into “chapters” as separate MLT files. You can then tackle your video edits in parts, then combine it together later.

[Sugar_Rocket]

I am very new to Shotcut. I used free DaVinci resolve for a while. It has multiple timelines in one project.
However, it does not support NVidia hardware H.264 encoding(paid version does). So I started searching for a free editor that supports hardware H.264 encoding and I found Shotcut does this thing.
I have NVidia 3070 and it encodes H.264 enourmously faster than CPU.

[kagsundaram]

@Sugar_Rocket

I used free DaVinci resolve for a while… …
However, it does not support NVidia hardware H.264 encoding(paid version does).

This what I was specifically recalling when I said…

@kagsundaram

By “free” I mean really free, not … “limited features free version”.

I dumped DaVinci “free” after two days because of the GPU issue.

[Sugar_Rocket]

Currently I had 20 short physics experiment videos. The only thing I had to do with each of them was to cut right In and Out. Then export all of them to individual MP4 files. Same settings for all.
Multiple timelines feature would allow to export all at once to the “Export video” list with the same export settings. Without setting each video individually.

[Hudson555x]

If you’re just extracting clips from each video, you can just use the Playlist.
Skip the timeline, you don’t need to use it.

In the Source Viewer you can do I for in, and O for out. Then hit the + in the Playlist window. You can even add titles to each playlist item, color grading, among other filters offered by Shotcut.

Then when exporting, select from “Each Playlist Item” and it will create a separate file for each playlist item.

Current version (at this time) 21.02.27 allows you to name each file before exporting.
https://shotcut.org/blog/new-release-210227/

[Sugar_Rocket]

Thanks! Works perfect.

[Sugar_Rocket]

The only thing is that it exports without .mp4 file extension. I manually added these extensions. Can I tell the Shortcut to do it itself?

[Hudson555x]

@Sugar_Rocket

Can I tell the Shortcut to do it itself?

For me Shotcut used mp4 by default.

[JeffVrenois]

This could be a very handy option when one need to create diferent versions of the same product, in example, to make a long and short version of a video clip/film/documentary, using exactly the same media, with all the effects and color grading, etc. With several timelines in the same project is possible to edit first the long version, the just duplicate the composition (or copy and paste everything from one time to another) and just take off the unneeded media, I used do these kind of things a lot in Final Cut Pro or Premiere, now that I’m working with Shotcut I have to duplicate the projects and manage more files (one for every version) to get the same results.

This is also useful to export some parts of the timeline for a preview, in that way one can copy a part of the project to a second timeline and export only that part, is easier than open the xml as a clip, set in and out points and export.