Editing on the timeline

Press Space after using an editor tab or adjustment control to focus the timeline and play or pause. Text fields, open menus and dialogs keep their normal keyboard behavior. Press Space on a cached section to play immediately. At an uncached section, picture and sound wait together while that section prepares, then resume automatically. Press Space again or Cancel to stop waiting. Previews use up to 720p at project frame rate, with transitions, effects, titles and captions already rendered. Finished sections persist on this device across panel changes and reopening; edits rebuild only dependent sections. Clear previews manually in Preferences.

Click the time ruler or empty track space to pause and move the playhead; picture and audio stop together.

Saving also remembers each timeline's playhead, zoom and horizontal and vertical scroll positions. Reloading or reopening the project restores that view with playback paused. Older projects start with the default view, and saved scroll positions adapt to the available screen space.

Audio waveforms fill the clip when you increase its track height. Preparing waveform… means the audio is still being read; Retry waveform lets you retry a failed preparation without splitting the clip.

Generation completion notices wait for required processing and timeline placement. A generated video must finish preparation, and sound effects must finish voice removal, before the notice announces completion. For multipart audio, the notice waits for the requested batch.

Replace footage or find its shot

1. Select one asset in Assets, then right-click a timeline clip and choose Replace with selected asset. Picture clips accept images or videos; audio clips accept audio or a video's soundtrack. The replacement keeps the clip's position, duration, source trim, speed, effects, transitions and other editing attributes, including its original Storyboard link. Attached sound follows a picture replacement; detached audio stays unchanged.

   Shorter media does not shorten or retime the clip. A notice lets you know when the retained source range extends beyond the replacement. Adjust the edit as needed. Undo restores the whole replacement in one step. Unlock the clip's track and any affected linked audio track first.

   Choose Reveal in Storyboard from the clip menu to select and reveal its original linked shot. The command is unavailable when the clip has no surviving shot link.

Cut a sequence

Choose Insert scene in the toolbar to generate additional footage at the playhead. Set its 5–13-second length with the handles below the timeline or exact seconds, then review both transitions before inserting. The new clip goes on a top video track and pushes unlocked tracks forward, preserving the original footage. See Insert a scene.

1. Drag a clip from the Assets panel onto a video track. A video's sound goes onto an audio track beneath it.

2. Drag a clip to move it. Drag its left or right edge to trim it. With snapping on (S), clips snap to each other, the playhead and markers. Move a video or audio clip to another track in its section; its linked partner stays on its current track. Dragging horizontally still moves the linked pair together in time. The thin green line below the time ruler marks ranges whose media is cached on this device and has begun decoding successfully. Where a clip has a transition or visual effect, the editor also prepares a short finished preview before that range turns green. These previews are stored on this device and refreshed when the edit changes. Cached source media and finished previews remain available when you visit Storyboard or reopen the project. The editor keeps them for at least three days after your last project visit before its own size cleanup can remove them. Clearing browser site data also clears the cache; the browser can remove it under storage pressure if durable storage is unavailable. The first pass can still need time to prepare. If the next clip needs more time to load, playback holds the playhead and resumes automatically. Unavailable footage shows a recovery notice; it is never silently skipped.

3. Put the playhead where you want to cut and choose Edit → Split clip at playhead (Ctrl+Alt+K). Or pick the Razor tool (C) and click the clip where you want to cut.

4. Select a clip and press Delete. With Ripple edit on, the clips after it move up to close the gap; otherwise use Edit → Close gap.

Edit → Trim start to playhead and Trim end to playhead trim the selected clip to the playhead in one step. Ctrl+Z undoes any change.

Right-click a video clip and choose Edit video to change that part of it with AI. See Editing a video in a project.

The tool bar

If a clip shows Offline, click its badge to restore browser access or locate its file. The relink dialog starts with Display only files with the exact name enabled. Choose a folder, select the matching file, and confirm; turn the filter off for a renamed replacement. See Bringing media in for automatic reopening and bulk relinking.

Above the tracks, from left to right: Selection, Snapping, the Rate stretch tool (R, drag a clip's edge to speed it up or slow it down), the Roll, Slip and Slide tools (see Trimming), the Razor, Ripple edit, Linked selection, Generate video (G), Generative extend (Shift+G), Add text (T), and the marker buttons.

Add text is a one-shot tool: select it, click a video track, and the toolbar returns to Selection after placing a static five-second title. Five seconds is only its starting length; drag either edge of the title clip to keep it on screen for as long as the edit needs.

To select several clips, drag across empty track space with the Selection tool. Selected clips move together in time. When you drag to another track, clips in that video or audio section preview their destination tracks and keep their track spacing. Clips in the other section stay on their tracks. The track change is refused when there is not enough room or a destination track is locked.

Generate video and Generative extend make new footage, so both are paid. Generative extend automatically uses H3 Max for the end and LTX 2.3 for the beginning. Set the added duration and source context, describe the continuation, and hover Generate for its Estimated price. End extension accepts 1.625–60 seconds of context and adds 0.71–15 seconds; beginning accepts 1–20 seconds of context and adds 2–20 seconds. See Generating in the editor.

Tracks

Click a track's name to change its green focus indicator. Clicking a clip, the lane background, the track badge or another header control preserves focus. Video and audio focus are independent. Deleting the focused track clears its indicator; it does not choose a replacement.

• Add a track with the + at the top of the video or audio section, or from the Track menu.
• The badge at the start of a track is its target; see Three-point editing.
• Each track has buttons to hide (video) or mute (audio), to lock it against changes, and to delete it. Deleting a track that holds clips asks first.
• An audio track also has a solo button (the headphones): while any track is soloed, you hear only the soloed tracks. Track levels and pan are in the Mixer.
• The yellow line across an audio clip is its volume, with +6 dB at the top of the clip. Drag it to change the clip's level, or Ctrl-click it (Cmd-click on a Mac) to add a volume point; see Mixing sound.
• An audio effect dragged from the Effects panel lands on an audio clip. Dropped on a video clip whose sound is on an audio track, it goes to that audio clip; anywhere else it is not added. See Mixing sound.
• Drag a track's header to reorder it.
• A project with captions has a C1 row above the video tracks. It stays in view while the video tracks scroll, keeps one fixed height, and takes captions only. Clicking a caption there opens it in the Text panel's caption list; while the Storyboard is open, double-click it instead. See Captions.

Resizing tracks

Video tracks sit just above the divider and audio tracks just below it, so the tracks you edit most stay together. The video and audio titles stay in view however many tracks you have.

• Drag a track's outer edge — the top edge of a video track, the bottom edge of an audio track — to make it taller or shorter.
• Hold Alt while dragging to give every track in that section the same height.
• Double-click the edge to reset the track; Alt + double-click resets the whole section.
• Right-click a track's header for Small, Medium and Large, or to apply one height to every video or audio track.
• With an edge focused, press Up or Down to adjust it, Shift for a larger step, and Home or End for the smallest or largest height.

Taller tracks show bigger thumbnails and waveforms. Very short tracks show just the clip name. Your project remembers each track's height.

Frame-exact editing

Every edit lands on a whole frame of your project's frame rate. Clips move and trim one frame at a time, splits happen exactly on a frame, and the playhead stops on a frame when you click, scrub, step or stop playback. Snapping only controls whether a clip pulls towards other clips' edges, the playhead and markers; edits are frame-exact either way. Musical beat markers retain their measured audio times, with edits landing on the nearest legal project frame. Clips in older projects are put on the frame grid the first time you move or trim them.

Trimming

Three tools sit beside the Rate stretch tool:

• Roll (N) — drag a cut between two clips. One gets longer, the other shorter, and nothing else moves.
• Slip (Y) — drag a clip to change which part of its footage it shows. Its place and length stay the same.
• Slide (U) — drag a clip along the track. The clips either side lengthen and shorten to make room; its footage stays the same.

While you drag, a readout shows the change in frames and the new In and Out of the footage. It says Footage limit when a clip has no more footage to give. The preview shows the frame at the edit while you drag, and returns to the playhead when you let go. A clip's linked sound moves with it, and locked tracks are never changed.

Edit points. Click a clip edge without dragging to select it; it shows a green bracket. Nudge it one frame with Alt+ArrowLeft and Alt+ArrowRight (Option and the arrow keys on a Mac), or five frames by adding Shift. With no edit point selected, the same keys nudge the selected clips, by one frame or by five with Shift. A nudge trims, ripple-trims while Ripple edit is on, or rolls while the Roll tool is active.

Trim to the playhead. Q and W trim the start or end of the clip under the playhead to it and close the gap. E moves the selected edit point to the playhead.

Ripple delete. Shift+Delete (Shift+delete on a Mac) removes the selected clips and closes the gap. Plain Delete leaves a gap unless Ripple edit is on.

To follow Premiere Pro, the Export panel is now Shift+E and the keyframe lane Shift+U. If you changed either key yourself, your choice is kept.

Three-point editing

Targets. The badge at the start of each track (V1, A1 and so on) is its target. A solid badge means edits may use that track; click it to take the track out, and it turns dashed. Alt-click a badge to target only that track in its section (video or audio), and Alt-click it again to target them all. A locked track cannot be targeted.

Insert and Overwrite. Mark a range on a video in its preview, or select the video in Assets, then press , to insert or . to overwrite. Insert pushes everything later along on every unlocked track; Overwrite replaces what is under the new clip and moves nothing. The picture goes on the first targeted video track and its sound on the first targeted audio track. With no audio track targeted, only the picture is placed. The playhead moves to the end of the new clip, so with no marks on the timeline, pressing the key again places the next one straight after it.

Where it lands. With no marks on the timeline, at the playhead. With an In mark (I), there. With only an Out mark (O), the clip is placed so that it ends there. With both, the marked range sets the length: the clip starts at the source In and is cut to fit, and a source Out that disagrees is not used.

Lift and Extract. With In and Out marked, ; removes that stretch from the targeted tracks and leaves a gap; ' removes it and closes the gap on those tracks, then clears the marks. Without both marks they act on the selected clips. A picture and its sound that are cut on one side only are unlinked, so nothing claims a sync that is gone.

Linked selection. The chain button in the tool bar decides whether clicking a clip also selects its linked sound. Alt-click a clip to do the opposite for that one click. Linked clips still move and trim together either way.

The same four commands are in the Edit menu. Each is one Undo step.

Adjust your timeline space

The track grid fills the available space down to the bottom scrollbar, even when you have only a few tracks.

Drag the line under the timeline's tools bar upward to make more room for tracks, or down to shrink the timeline. Tracks first shrink to their smallest height; keep dragging and the extra tracks scroll out of view, until two video and two audio tracks are left. Scroll a section to reach the others. The scrollbar and zoom controls stay at the bottom of the editor. Drag the divider between video and audio to give either section more space; each section scrolls vertically on its own, while both move horizontally together.

Double-click that line to reset the timeline height, or the video/audio divider to restore equal space. You can also focus either divider with Tab and use Up or Down to adjust it; hold Shift for a larger step. Press Escape during a drag to cancel it.

Your project remembers the height and split for all its timeline tabs, including when you reopen it on another device. A smaller screen temporarily fits the layout to the available space without replacing your saved sizes. Collapse and expand the timeline to return to the same layout.

More than one timeline

A project can hold several timelines — alternative cuts, or scenes built separately. The tabs above the tracks switch between the open ones.

• + creates a new timeline.
• Double-click a tab to rename it.
• ✕ closes a tab. Closing never deletes the timeline: it stays in your assets.

Markers and the work range

• Add marker puts a marker at the playhead. Give it a label, a colour, a range and notes; the arrows beside it jump between markers.
• Mark in (I) and Mark out (O) set the work range, the part of the timeline that loops when you play it and that you can export on its own. X marks both around the selected clips, or around the clip under the playhead when nothing is selected. Shift+I and Shift+O move the playhead to a mark.

Moving around the timeline

• ArrowUp and ArrowDown jump to the previous and next cut on the targeted tracks.
• Home and End go to the start of the timeline and to the end of its last clip.
• ArrowLeft and ArrowRight step one frame, or five with Shift.
• D selects the clip under the playhead on the targeted tracks.

These four jump keys move the playhead while you work in the timeline or the preview. Inside a side panel, the inspector, a menu or a dialog they keep their usual job of moving through a list, and they do nothing while the Storyboard is open, because it takes the timeline's place. ArrowUp also stops at the very start of the timeline.

Zoom

Zoom with = and -, the slider at the bottom left, or Fit (\) to see the whole timeline. Whether the mouse wheel zooms is set in Preferences → General.

Analyze audio

1. Right-click an audio clip, including a video's linked audio, and choose Analyze audio. The current trimmed source interval is analyzed locally, up to 30 minutes, without uploading the recording or a generation charge. Unlock the track first; relink unavailable media in Assets.

   Beat ticks appear automatically on the timeline. Hold Shift while clicking or dragging the playhead to snap to beats, manual markers and clip edges. With snapping enabled, moving or trimming a clip also snaps to markers. Cuts use the nearest project frame.

   Open Beat settings… from the clip menu to see the estimated BPM. Half tempo retains every other original beat; Double tempo adds a beat between each pair. Enter a Beat offset in milliseconds and choose Apply offset; positive values move guides later. Reset corrections restores the detected rhythm. Tempo estimates work best with steady music; changing tempos and ambiguous rhythms can need correction.

   Guides follow the clip when it moves, trims, changes speed, reverses or splits. Extending a trim beyond its analyzed interval needs Analyze audio again for the added sound. Reanalysis replaces that clip's guides and resets corrections. Clear beat markers removes only that clip's guides. These changes support undo and save with the project; guides do not appear in exports.

   Canceling, unreadable audio or no reliable beat leaves existing markers untouched. If the clip changes during analysis, its old guides remain and the result is not applied.

Denoise audio

1. Right-click one audio clip and choose Denoise audio. On a video clip whose sound is on an audio track, the same entry cleans that sound; the clip inspector's Audio section has it too. If it is greyed out, hold the pointer over it to see why. Only its used source interval is sent, up to 30 minutes. Unlock the track first. For offline media, relink the source in Assets.

   Review the estimated price before cleaning. Advanced offers strength and loudness normalization. This tool preserves speech and may remove background music; the result is 48 kHz mono audio.

   Compare Original and Cleaned, then choose Apply. Apply replaces only that audio clip, preserving its timing, speed, fades, gain, pan, keyframes and linked video. Undo restores the original; both recordings remain in Assets. If the clip changed during processing, the result stays in Assets without replacing it. Close the dialog safely and reopen it to review or Check original job without generating again.

Recast people

Right-click a video clip and choose Recast people… to replace people using 1–4 ordered photos. Select 5–30 seconds using In/Out marks, review the automatically detected shots, and choose 1080p or 768p. Every shot must be at most 15 seconds. Normal forward playback at speed 1 is supported.

Compare the source range and result before Apply selected range. Apply splits the clip at the marks and replaces the middle without moving other clips. Effects, keyframe motion and existing timeline audio stay in place. The edit is undoable, and the generated result remains in Assets. If you close the dialog or interrupt a generation, reopen it from the clip menu and choose Check original job to retrieve the same request.

See Recast your video for reference ordering, instructions and pricing.

Next

• The clip inspector
• Keyboard shortcuts

Relight a clip

Right-click a short video clip and choose Relight…. The studio prepares its current speed, reverse or freeze playback, while effects remain editable. Compare the generated lighting before Apply. Applying keeps the clip position, edit length and original audio, adjusting output speed visibly to fit. Undo restores the original; the paid result remains in Assets. Locked tracks and clips outside about 2.33 to 15 seconds cannot start Relight.