Need to see the entire video when using size, position and rotate

Say you have a 16x9 video and you want to use if for a 9x16 short. You need to move the video around considerably to make a good short from it. When all you can see is the 9x16 area that will be shown when the video is exported it is very difficult. Is there a way to expose the entire 16x9 video when using a 9x16 project size? How do you guys use keyframes without being able to see the whole video?

1x1 is better than zooming in totally to fill 16x9.

We need to see the parts of the 16x9 video that are outside the 9x16 template so we can see what parts of the image to include in the short. At this time a good 2/3 of the 16x9 video cannot be seen.

The player controls include a zoom button so you can zoom out to see more of the canvas.

That just makes the template bigger. We need to be able to see the parts of the image hidden by the template. If you have a 9x16 template and you are using a 16x9 video a very large area on either side of the video cannot be seen. You are aware of the keyframes feature? It enables you to move the video around. How do you know where you want to move it if you cannot see it?

You need to reposition the video with the frame with a filter to see the parts of it that are not within the frame. You can wish for something different, but that is all that Shotcut has. The software architecture does not support what you want.

That’s a problem you should have thought of before having a 16x9 footage and expecting it to easily fit 9x16 is just stupid in my opinion.

So zoom out so further to fit the whole video in frame,and do 1x1 by just cutting and moving the frame, then zoom in back on each clip again.

If the part you want to show is not in the frame, just grab the moving handle and move left or right. Your clip is not a mile wide. Takes a fraction of a second to find any part of the video.

1 Like

We have been turning 16x9 videos into shorts, as we have already stated. We know you have to move it around to see the 2/3 of the video that are being hidden. How could you turn videos into shorts without moving them?

It takes an enormous amount of time to do that. Look at your example, you cannot see 2/3 of the video. We have been doing this, we know how long it takes.That area needs to be transparent so you can work with the video. We obviously know you can move the image around. It can change completely every 10 or 20 seconds. You need to know what is there in order to work with it.

What are you talking about? If you would like to contribute to the topic of the thread please do. If not, stop spamming the thread.

To get a quick look at the full video you can temporarrily disable the size filter.


Alternatively, one workaround for this is to use a larger video project mode (for fullhd use (1080*3=3240)x1920) and enable the 3x3 grid overlay, this makes the center vertical area exactly 9x16 vertical and you can see everything (almost, at it’s not perfectly 16x9, but really only a bit of edge is left). Then export as is in an intermediate format then crop and export again for the vertical part.

There are downsides of course, like having to export twice and also you’re basically now editing a 4k-ish video so you’ll need a powerful CPU, but you can see the entire video at least.

3 Likes

We tried opening an MLT as a clip into a 9x16 project and the resizing it. It worked but for some reason the clip will not play properly. We also saved it to see if it would smooth out when saved and it did not.

Is there a way to flatten the project in Shotcut? Combine all the tracks and the sections within the track?

What would be the most lossless format you could export in Shotcut? I do not see MKV as an option.

I don’t use MLT as a clip so don’t really know to answer that one.

Scroll down in the export panel to the intermediate section and choose any of the presets, DNxHR is very popular for windows, Prores for macs. There is also a lossless section but intermediate is better for this case, it will playback smoother and export faster than any lossless option.

I don’t have any problem with you.
I am simply presenting my opinion because according to me converting a landscape video to vertical is already not fine, I just simply find it stupid, it doesn’t matter who’s doing it.

And as I said, it’s better to zoom out and then just do splits in the clip, and zoom in on the important frames of each splitted clip. I have no ways do it better. To represent a 16x9 best in 9x16 ratio, doing 1x1 is the best choice.

And also, I could say the same that you are spamming here because you simply don’t understand a landscape isn’t meant to be transformed in a vertical video. The best you can do is a square out of it.

It’s actually very common practice, especially for interview-style videos like Joe Rogan. Micro Four Thirds cameras are popular for this very reason. They can record in 4:3 aspect ratio which allows a single piece of footage (translation: the expense of a single shooting session) to be cropped to both 16:9 or 9:16. The producer knows they are going to do this in advance, and frames the scenes accordingly. Lots of 16:9 content adapts well to 9:16 with a little planning. Given how much YouTube promotes their Shorts platform, it’s free and easy publicity for a channel to create a Shorts video from a long-form video. There is nothing wrong with OP’s request.

3 Likes

We brought the video into Shotcut and set the project to mimic the 16x9 video. We then created a transparent guide that outlines a 9x16 aspect ratio and a guide that only shows the 9x16 ratio. After creating the short, we saved it via the .mov format. Then we brought it into Shotcut with a 9x16 project ratio, resized it to fill the screen, and saved it. Works well, but it would be nice to be able to pull it off without having to convert the file twice.

I’d like to see the original clip (or a part of it) if it’s possible for you to share it.
I’d be interested to understand why it takes an enormous amount of time to find hidden parts of the video.

Yeah, that process of using transparent guides and intermediate exported sounds more time consuming than having to tinker with positioning. However, the ideas in that guide technique do seem like an interesting reframe feature that might be possible to add. Imagine you can keyframe a fixed-size 9:16 Crop: Rectangle filter over a 16:9 or 4:3 video, and Shotcut actually crops to that rectangle at export time. This could also address the ongoing complaints about how to simply (and obviously) “crop a video.” Imagine if you can also use motion tracking to generate those keyframes and get the automatic reframe being offered in other popular editors.

1 Like

All you have to do is open the templates in Shotcut and put them in a video track. It takes about 30 seconds. Time-consuming? You have to be able to see the full video to edit it and create a short from it. Things move all over the screen. The issue with doing it this way is that you have to save the file twice. If anyone has a better alternative that allows you to see the entire video while editing and only requires saving it once, we would like to hear it.