Hey, you might know me from around the forums, I have been using Kdenlive for about 3 years now and I love it! Here are some of my vids http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25154046

So, to my topic - I am working as a connector for Open Funding http://funding.openinitiative.com/ a new crowd funding project where Free Software users can pay developers for individual features. They can then test the features before they send the money over, so there is an emphasis on making really stable, good quality tech.

I would really love Kdenlive to get some funding this way

I will need to find some of the developers too of course (please contact me on gingerling (at) inventati (dot) org), but for inspiration, but lets compile a list of features we would love to see in Kdenlive!

Best

Anna

Here is my desire - there is a feature in openshot that I loved

http://www.openshotvideo.com/2009/07/im ... ditor.html

Basally, in their titles editor there are some templates for Creative Commons content, including templates that use the logos/attribution methods of sites like ccmixter and jamendo. This was so great, and the integration was lovely, it made it really easy to attribute and they looked very stylish too.

I would love to see an attribution system built into the kdenlive titles editor, and a few fixes to it to make it more stable, which could be done as part of the same project.

Network rendering would be a neat feature. If you have clips available on network, send a timeline and render request to a headless machine and let it render away while you go and edit more locally. Potentially even cluster rendering. This isn't too difficult now to do by hand, but the integration of such a feature set would be kind of spiffy.

sounds cool! I would like it to be easier to move a project - its prettey hard to move it to a new pc or send it to somone for them to work on. You can search recursilvely for clips etc but its a bit annoying as a system. It would be cool if you could set the the project folder as the lowest point in the tree, so you could move the project folder anywhere and as long as eveything was still in the folder it would work. There is some sort of archiving feature but it seems to be broken.

it's nice to dream, but at this time we don't have news about the main developper ... and the priority is to exploit the work done for the refactoring ... and he did not want money ..

oh you can propose the job to dan dennedy, he left kdenlive for work on openshot and for create a new nle ...

Actually Dan Dennedy is working on shotcut. Looks promising, but NLE development is no 5 minute quickie.

I sometimes teach Kdenlive workshops (often using your FLOSS Manuals book as structure, Anna!) and I used to work as an editor using mostly FCP for many years. Now teaching Kdenlive to newbies and not-so-newbies, I'm relatively familiar with the common questions and expectations of experienced and beginner users trying Kdenlive for the first time.
So the features I would suggest aren't particularly sexy, and I and other people have mentioned them on the forums before, but they bear repeating.
These are the most used, most basic features professional editors use in other NLEs, and the lack of them is a big factor keeping them from switching to Kdenlive:

3-point editing.
Set an In and/or an Out in the source clip window, set an In and/or an Out in the timeline, and hit a keybord shortcut to overwrite the chosen clip into the timeline (replace existing material) or a different shortcut to 'lift' or 'push' the existing material to the right and tidily insert the chosen clip into the gap.
I currently have to drag clips along the timeline with the mouse to make space for new material, then drag the selected part of the source clip into place with the mouse, switch to the spacer tool to close the gap (with the mouse, again) or navigate the playhead into the empty space and delete the space. a bit awkward.
3-point editing is bread and butter for most editors coming from other programs, so many people may never take Kdenlive seriously without this function.

In/Out editing in the timeline + 'Ripple Delete'
Set an In point and an Out point in the timeline, and hit delete to remove that section of all unlocked tracks. it's just 3 keyboard strokes.
At the moment, if I want to quickly chop out say, 10 frames of audio and video in the timeline, maybe around two clips centred on an edit, I will go to the point 5 frames before the edit. I click on each track, first video and then each audio track, and for each track hit my shortcut for 'extend end of clip' ('2' on my keyboard) which shortens the first clip to the playhead. Then navigate 10 frames further, to 5 frames after the original edit point, park my playhead, select each track and hit 'extend start of clip' for each track ('1' on my keyboard). I now have a 10 frame gap in all tracks. I navigate the playhead 1 frame back until it is over the last frame of this gap and hit 'g', my shortcut for 'close gap'.
With In/Out editing in the timeline, I would navigate to 5 frames before the edit, set an in point, navigate to 5 frames after the edit, set an out point, and either hit 'delete' which would leave a 10-frame gap in all unlocked tracks, or more commonly in FCP, Avid, Premiere, Lightworks etc I would hit 'ripple delete' which deletes the marked 10-frame section and automatically close the gap. This feature would vastly improve the speed of high-volume/creative editing eg for documentary, news, interviews etc in Kdenlive.

Multiple sequences within one project.
Allows an editor to copy and paste sections of different versions of edits within a project, maintaining full editablity of the clips, transitions etc.
i.e. rather than the current kdenlive setup, where you can only import another project sequence as a clip and cut it into your current project, having multiple sequences allows you to open another sequence, grab video clips and audio sections, transitions and effects, copy and paste them into your current project and still be able to edit clip lengths, effect parameters, audio fades, etc.
Multiple sequences for video editing is like version control for free software development - it give editors the safety to experiment - if you aren't sure about a particular creative decision, just duplicate and rename your sequence, make the changes, and if at any stage in the future you decide the change doesn't work, you can go back to the earlier sequence, grab the bits you need and still incorporate them perfectly into your most recent edit without loss of functionality.

Much, much less important than those three features would be:

Portable projects
Plus one for the ability to move a project - whenever I have moved projects betwen computers in the past it has been a case of using a lot of Find/Replace in the .kdenlive file and tidying up afterwards. Messy, slow and inaccurate.

Match Frame
hitting a 'Match Frame' keyboard shortcut would bring up the exact frame the playhead is over in the original clip in the Project Tree. Right Click>Show in Project Tree is useful, but if it's a very long original clip and you've taken many different In/Out sections from it to use in the timeline, it can be difficult to find the right part again.

Improved Title Editor
A more reliable title editor with working animation controls which previews the title over the clip in question to help with composition would be nice, but this is less vital right now, just making PNGs in GIMP/Inkscape and importing them is an okay workaround.

Keyframable speed/effect controls
Some effects are keyframeable (great!) and there has been some discussion on the forum (https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=270&t=116429) of the possibility of having keyframeable speed controls. Slowmovideo seems the best workaround for now.

I really think Kdenlive is a wonderful project and it's fantastic to see activity picking up on the mailing list and in the forum - many people think you can't make nice videos with free software, and I love showing them that's not true! Of course the focus right now should just be on tidying up the code and getting development started again, but when it comes to funding and new features, I don't have much to give but I would gladly chip in whatever money I can, and time for testing, towards getting some of this basic but important professional functionality developed for Kdenlive.

I've found that being new at something can often give really good insight towards entry-level barriers. I've edited video for 6 or 7 years but just recently shifted my digital life over to Linux. I found it pretty easy to edit but came across a couple trouble spots.


Audio automation
I was happy to find the keyframable volume plugin in the audio tracks. It is a feature so ubiquitous in sound that it would be prudent to include a button for it right next to "mute track".

Background rendering
Transitions like alpha mask titles that don't play back in real time could be "frozen". Have a surrogate clip rendered either on command or in the background to use during playback.

These are the two features that stand out to me as absent. I hope they strike a chord with other users.

Cheers,
rdriedger

Lossless editing
I would like to be able to do lossless editing. Say I add an AVCHD 60p videos from Panasonic HD TM-700 and after trimming the clips I would like to get the same .m2ts files as a result without any re-encoding. And when I apply any effects or transitions to some clips, there can be only partial encoding of the result video.

bins, racks
The same bins and racks that Lightworks offers.

I'd like to see them make a serious attempt to fix some of these bugs before even thinking about new features. It's pretty terrible for me, random crashes, random hangs, some days it just won't render for not apparent reason at all. It seems like every time a new version of Kdenlive is release there are more bugs and no fixes. It's stability really needs to be sorted out before anything else. It's a little silly at this point. I've been using it for over 4 years now and it's always been pretty terrible on whatever system or distro I have it installed on.

christopherwere wrote:I'd like to see them make a serious attempt to fix some of these bugs before even thinking about new features. It's pretty terrible for me, random crashes, random hangs, some days it just won't render for not apparent reason at all. It seems like every time a new version of Kdenlive is release there are more bugs and no fixes. It's stability really needs to be sorted out before anything else. It's a little silly at this point. I've been using it for over 4 years now and it's always been pretty terrible on whatever system or distro I have it installed on.

Just for the record, NLE's are among the most complex applications out there. In terms of integrated features and capabilities, from multitasking to multithreading, data structures, framework integrations, API compliance etc. etc. etc....an application such as KdenLive is not your run-of-the-mill project. I suspect that few of the users of KdenLive are really in a position to make substantial changes to it.

That being said, what KdenLive really needs is a corporate sponsor.

Just for the record, NLE's are among the most complex applications out there. In terms of integrated features and capabilities, from multitasking to multithreading, data structures, framework integrations, API compliance etc. etc. etc....an application such as KdenLive is not your run-of-the-mill project.

I certainly don't doubt it. Kdenlive isn't the only NLE to suffer from bugginess, but I'd find Kdenlive very feature rich already if all of the featured didn't bug out. I've ad times where I've saved a project and reloaded only to find all the clips rearranged in a random order. I'd really love to see things like that worked on.

christopherwere wrote:I certainly don't doubt it. Kdenlive isn't the only NLE to suffer from bugginess, but I'd find Kdenlive very feature rich already if all of the featured didn't bug out. I've ad times where I've saved a project and reloaded only to find all the clips rearranged in a random order. I'd really love to see things like that worked on.

I totally agree with you. Kdenlive has the features, if Kdenlive is more stable and intuitive to use, it would be a killer. I also have the problem of clips rearranged, causing me a lot of stress sometimes.
But I think Kdenlive is still the best option of all the (free) Linux editors.

Hi all,

I would like to offer my thanks to Kdenlive here, but I must say this first.

The latest version of Kdenlive with the addition of "movit" just bombs out on this machine. Now I put this down to, most probably, my ageing integrated Radeon HD4200 graphics which I assume doesn't support openGL. This new version of Kdenlive works fine on my other (a lot lower spec) box which hosts an Nvidia card, so I know now what I need to do. I am still working here though with a 'build' copy of a few weeks ago.

Having said all that (sorry), I can't remember the last time Kdenlive crashed (with the above exception). It just plods along coping with whatever I throw at it and renders to whatever I want.

christopherwere said:- "but I'd find Kdenlive very feature rich already if all of the featured didn't bug out. "

I would like to ask you please, what do you mean by 'bug out'? If you mean such features as 'effects', there's only one or two effects possibly I steer clear of, if I can, but the rest all seem to work fine. Maybe, one might just not do what I was hoping for but 'bug out'? That interests me, so if you could enhance on that a little, thanks.

Shaking the little brain cells, it was way back in 2011 when I experienced moving timeline clips but I have never had that since. As there's two of you now, you're scaring me a little.

What mystifies me is that I can have a fairly good stable version that serves me well while others are in "Crash hell" etc. Is it just our varying versions of Kdenlive, Distros or our boxes full of chips. No idea.

Hey, what we need is a Poll just to find out how many are suffering more than others but to give us a clearer picture, incorporating which Distro and version would probably be impossible.

I never upgrade until forced. Stuck with ubuntu 10.10 to it's dying bed, then added another hard drive and loaded 12.04LTS. As soon as that was how I wanted it, stable etc. with Kdenlive, I moved over to that and will stay with it until whoever goes first, it or me. I do keep it fully updated.

I would like to thank those, most probably, very busy guys at mantis who give up some of their free time to swat those nasty little bugs that slowly come to the surface. Thanks also go to the main Developers', jbm & Co., who now seem to have moved to new pastures. All the best of luck guys. [That last statement is only my opinion and is not known as fact]

Oops, better hand you back to "What features you would love to see".

Sorry.
norm.

Hello,

I wish improve timeline markers feature

1. improve onmouse over - when I put mouse over marker I wish to see comment - not "alt" type like now after a second, but comment. Maybe need add option in settings VISIBLE AUTOHIDE / VISIBLE / HIDE.

2. markers colors - when create new marker I wish to set color, and this marker should displays in selected color.

3. markers thickness - when create new marker I wish to set thickness - 1 / 2 / 3px.

***

I wish also add mini markers to clips on timeline. I wisht this mini markers move with my clip left / right or on another path.
edit: sorry I wanted just such as the existing, great!

***
I wish also Improve S/X/M keyboard shortcut. Today when I press and release S/X/M key kdenlive is turning permanently to Select/Cut/Move mode - it is great! But I wish when I am in Select mode and I press (and hold) X key for this moment Kendlive should turn me to Cut mode - I do what I need holding X key - and aftere release X key Kdenlive should automatically turn me to previous mode.

edit: I know there is Shift+R keyboard shortcut, but in this case clip must be selected first, and with above feature I just take cutter for a moment and can cut any clip on timeline I want.

For permanently change to another mode It is enough You change keyboard shortcut from S to shift+S, from X - shift+X, from C to shift+C...

***

edit: I remembered some important things

FADE effect
When I drag top left / top right clip handle for set fade in / fade out effect Kdenlive always set fade to AUDIO - I wish you change it to VIDEO fading. I wish also you add case when I put mouse over handle and press and hold CTRL and then set audio fade. Or dragging with left mouse button add/edit video fade and with right mouse button add/edit audio fade.

Remove effects from selected clips or from group. When I have selected e.g 10 clips on timeline I wish to allow remove all effects from all.

Remove effects from path. I wish remove all effects from all clips on path.

Allow paste only few effect (as submenu of Paste effect). I wish to select which effects will paste to my clip - like pasting part of profile in RawTherapee.

Overwrite or add new effect option when paste (as submenu of Paste effect). Today pasted effects are always added as new. Overite effect can be helpful.

Idea for cutting clips on timeline - I wish you add new feature - cut selected clip with current timeline area [ ] without and with automatically move all elements on path to the left

Ungroup shortkey Ctrl+U

Polish translations mismatch:
- Shift means "przesunięcie" but is NEVER translated when you mean Shift key on keyborad. "Ctrl+Przesunięcie+G" have not sense use Ctrl+Shift+G
- File is "Plik"
- Edit is "Edycja"
- Settings is "Ustawienia"
- Help is "Pomoc"
is there another place for post translations proposition?

I wish quite easy change Kdenlive language - in settings (need Kdenlive restart is OK), or as run paramter e.g. "kdenlive -lang=en"

I wish also
- duplicate Title clips and Color clips in Clips tree.
- copy and paste clips between two opened Kdenlive windows


have a nice day!
Piotr