VSE strip syncing via parenting
VSE strips should be able to be parented or linked.The VSE treats every strip individually, but it would be more useful to lock sound and pictures together. You can do it with the metastrip function, however that does not allow you to keyframe the volume of sound strips (relative to other media) nor can you see the strip's waveform.It would be useful to link strips so that they can move in unison with each other. Just like parenting regular 3D objects. A parented strip would inherit start frame and relative offset values for head and tail trims as well as track number + 1This would be useful if you need to create separate stereo tracks from your source media, you may want to have an independent left and right strip to change volume. In that case you would need to parent multiple audio strips to the master vision strip or indeed to each other.
11 Comments
Maybe instead of a parent relationship, they could just be linked. If you move either one, the other should move as well. Visually, it would be easier to see whether a strip is linked or not, rather than trying to find the pointer (ie arrow pointing) to the next strip to show the parent. What about strips that aren't completely aligned (directly above/below in Y axis)? Upvoting this because I think it would be very useful.
Yep. What you describe is how it works in Premiere Pro. I don't see a need to have parenting, but rather linking like this.
A line could be used to show the connection, but that may get messy when you have lots of tracks between your video and audio.
Can be done with this add-on: github.com/snuq/VSEQF
The VSE Quick Functions add-on actually has the parent-child feature the OP is asking for: github.com/snuq/VSEQF Demonstration: youtu.be/rJg8xH8PyGc
How about if you can expand/collapse meta strips on the main editor (Rather than switching into the inside of a meta). Then you can use the idea of parenting and synching with the benefit of editing the inner tracks in context?
@ammusionist: Yeah I like this, but I think that would be a larger UI change
@David McSween: True - But if it's worth doing... :-)
@ammusionist: This would be neat but it would abscure the waveform. It would be especially nice to expand more than one metastrip at a time.
Ideally, markers should be part of parenting - they are useful for marking when something starts/stops and its a pain to have to remember to select the marker when moving the strip they are aligned to. You could even imagine actions in the NLA being part of this parenting - that would be insanely powerful.
Would a line (solid or dashed) be enough to indicate the parenting relationship? Should that line slide and always be visible has you horizontally scroll the timeline area? Also, how would you visually indicate which strip is parent and which is the child?
Looking at for example how premiere does it (well it's not an equal comparison since there is a dedicated audio & video space, but regardless..), essentially if you select an item that is linked with anything else, both items get selected at the same time automatically. Same for trimming start/end, the same offset/change is applied to all. However, if you hold a key (option) and select or trim something, only the single item is selected/modified
So it's more subtle, you don't physically see the relationship but is clear once you select it. I agree that having lines will clutter the UI. Plus, this could be added as a pretty easy additional handler/modification of selecting in the VSE with no visual change.