[kdenlive] Best workflow for large projects

Simon Cropper simoncropper at fossworkflowguides.com
Tue Dec 2 23:49:14 UTC 2014


Hi Pascal,

Wow, that is much easier.

After reviewing what I did yesterday I found that I was actually 
physically cutting a segment out of my originals. Considering the size 
of my files I have no desire to create new files as I intend only to use 
kdenline to do my work.

Your drag and drop method, from what I can tell by looking at the XML 
project file actually literally references the original file resulting 
in no new media being created. This is exactly what I was after. Your 
workflow was very intuitive, so I will persist with this for the first 
few projects.

A quick question. I note that next to the time for the clips used in the 
project a '(2)' appears. If I add two segments from one video a '(4)' 
appears. What does this mean? I presume '2' refers to the video-audio 
combo. Can a clip library be sorted or filtered using this data? That 
is, show only clips used in the project or clips not used in the 
project, or can once you review a directory of clips purge those clips 
not used in the project?

[off topic]

Bye and bye, I would like to comment how easy and stable kdenlive is to 
use. I have played with quite a few video packages and by the second day 
after installation, I am usually looking for alternatives. With kdenlive 
I am busy using the gigabytes of video I have accumilated and feel 
empowered to create some fantastic videos for the family, for my work 
and for the foss communities that I am involved. I am dragging clips 
around, splitting audio, applying effects and exporting new media; and 
the program has not missed a beat. No crashes, now weird GUI problems, 
no file corruption; just working as you would expect... :) :) :)


On 03/12/14 03:45, Pascal Fleury wrote:
> Hi Simon,
>
> I am just finishing such a project, with a few (~15) video files from 2
> cameras, each file in the 2GB range.
>
> My workflow is this, and it assumes that you will watch the whole thing
> at least once fully:
> 1- import the videos in full as clips into a project
> 2- optional: if playback is a bit slow, then switch on proxy clips, and
> wait for them to be computed.
> 3- I then prepare a video track called "stock", and watch the clips.
> While it's playing I use keys to set in- and out-points. When I press
> 'out', the clip is dragged to the timeline (just drag the clip monitor
> view to the timeline, it will add a clip taken between the current in
> and out points). [see this
> <https://kdenlive.org/user-manual/quickstart-guide/first-project/dragging-clips-timeline>]
> Once the clip is in the timeline, set the current position to 'in'
> again, and press play. If I want to skip material, I just wait until I
> get to the end of junk, then press 'in' again.
>
> At that point, I'm not worried too much about exact frame cuts, I merely
> want to strip off the material I will not use (I had one camera in hand,
> and I did not stop it even while walking around the public at the event,
> so I filmed a lot my feet...)
> You will end up with a chronological set of clips on the timeline, which
> you can then further edit, reshuffle, and push together if you did not
> do it yet when adding them to the timeline.
>
> I am using Kubuntu 13.04 (I know, should be updated...), kdenlive 0.9.8
> and have a ShuttlePro-2
> <http://ergo.contour-design.com/ergonomic-mouse/shuttlepro-v2> so I am
> actually not sure about the keyboard shortcuts, but I know they exist or
> can be configured.
>
> --paf
>
>
>
>
> On Tue, Dec 2, 2014 at 9:03 AM, Simon Cropper
> <simoncropper at fossworkflowguides.com
> <mailto:simoncropper at fossworkflowguides.com>> wrote:
>
>     Thanks Vincent,
>
>     I appreciate your comments.
>
>     My responses in-line.
>
>     On 02/12/14 18:12, Vincent Pinon wrote:
>
>         Le mardi 2 décembre 2014, 16:03:36 Simon Cropper a écrit :
>
>             Pretty typical, I presume.
>
>         Absolutely common ;-)
>
>             I presume when you create a clip with the Clip Monitor and
>             save it is is
>             only saving the start and end time, rather than making a
>             copy of the
>             segment.
>
>         That's it: "Non-LInear Video Editing" (what KDE-NLiVE means)
>
>             Consequently I expect there would be memory constraints to
>             consider on a large project. Multiple files in memory would
>             eventually
>             result in a crash.
>
>         Segments are not held in memory, the multimedia backend (MLT)
>         pulls only the
>         displayed frame at any moment (roughly).
>         If not, this is a memory leak bug: this sometimes happen under
>         certain
>         combinations of MLT version & codec library version (ffmpeg/libav).
>         Unfortunately the situation in Ubuntu 14.04 is such :-\ => add
>         ppa:sunab/kdenlive-release or upgrade to 14.10.
>
>
>     I am currently using
>     http://ppa.launchpad.net/__sunab/kdenlive-release/ubuntu
>     <http://ppa.launchpad.net/sunab/kdenlive-release/ubuntu> as my
>     repository
>
>             Is it better to create a clip and save it to disk, then
>             create the final
>             product using the smaller clips?
>
>         No, don't alter your original media.
>
>         If your computer seems unable to provide comfortable editing,
>         try to enable
>         "proxy clips" in kdenlive configuration (reduced resolution
>         copies are
>         automatically generated).
>         Final render will point back to full resolution originals.
>
>         Look at userbase.kde.org/Kdenlive/__Manual
>         <http://userbase.kde.org/Kdenlive/Manual> for any info!
>
>
>     That's great to know.
>
>     For the record, I had searched the manual referenced above but
>     sometimes it is hard to find the answers to specific questions like
>     this and the 'Project Monitor' issue Brian helped me with earlier.
>     Little issues that prevent you from getting your feet wet.
>
>     I feel comfortable now, got my togs on, and raring to go :).
>

-- 
Cheers Simon

    Simon Cropper - Open Content Creator

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