If I open a new project and set the mode to 1080p 59.94 and set the length of a transparent clip to 00:01:00;00 it will actually reset to 00:01:00;04 if I try to scroll past the one-minute mark. Changing the mode to 1080p 60 will remove the last four frames and the time will show as 00:01:00;00.
I know it has something to do with the frame counts but I don’t quite understand why it add four frames to the end only.
This is the difference between drop frame time code and non-drop frame time code. Four frames were not added to the end; four frames of time code (not actual video frames) were subtracted from the beginning of the next minute of time.
The basic issue is that 59.94 is a fractional frame rate that will not be in sync with a wall clock. “Drop frame time code” was invented to label frames with time code in a way that would sync with a wall clock. This means skipping units of time in a predictable manner to bring them in sync. From Wikipedia:
drop-frame SMPTE timecode was invented. In spite of what the name implies, no video frames are dropped or skipped when using drop-frame timecode. Rather, some of the timecodes are dropped. In order to make an hour of timecode match an hour on the clock, drop-frame timecode skips frame numbers 0 and 1 of the first second of every minute, except when the number of minutes is divisible by ten.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SMPTE_timecode
Their explanation was for 29.97 video. Since you have 59.94 video which is twice as fast, then twice as many frames are skipped per minute (hence 00:00:01;04… frames 0-3 were skipped).
When using 60fps, it does not require any hackery with the time codes to sync with a wall clock. It just works because the frame rate is a whole number, not a fraction. This is called non-drop frame time code because no frames are dropped in the frame-labeling process.
A semicolon in the time code is an indicator that drop frame time code is in effect. A colon means non-drop frame time code is used.
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