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File Menu

The File Menu contains the normal file operations as well as the option to import and export project files using the OpenTimelineIO format.

New​

Creates a new Kdenlive project. The default keyboard shortcut is Ctrl+N.

See Quick Start.

The default settings that appear on this feature are defined in Menu ‣ Settings ‣ Configure Kdenlive. See the chapter Configure Kdenlive for more details.

Open​

Opens a .kdenlive project file. The default keyboard shortcut is Ctrl+O.

When opening a project and the needed clips are moved to another place, Kdenlive gives you the possibility to search for the clips needed in the project.

In the dialog, sort the column as you need it when click on Type, Status, Original Path, New Path.

  • Recreate missing proxies if the proxies were deleted

Selected Items

  • Search Manually search manually for the new path

  • Remove removes selected clips from re-assigning to a new path (useful when source clips are not available anymore)

All Missing Items

  • Search Recursively point to the new path where all project clips are stored and Kdenlive re-assign the clips automatically

  • Use Placeholders instead of the original clips

Open Recent​

Displays a picklist of recently saved files (up to 10) to choose from. Click the Clear List choice when you want to start over with a fresh list.

Revert​

This abandons any changes to the project you have made since last saving and reverts back to the last saved version of the project.

Save​

Saves the current state of the project including the current layout. Prompts for a file name, if this is the first time the file is being saved. The default keyboard shortcut is Ctrl+S.

Save As​

Saves the current state of the project in a .kdenlive file. Prompts for a file name. Kdenlive then continues with the new project. The default keyboard shortcut is Ctrl+Shift+S.

Save Copy​

Saves the current state of the project in a .kdenlive file as a copy. Prompts for a file name. Kdenlive returns to the current project.

Archive Project​

This function allows you to copy all files required by the project to a specific folder of your choice.

Please refer to the archiving section of this documentation for more details.

Render​

This function opens the Rendering Dialog with which you can create your video clip. Please refer to the Rendering section of this documentation for more details. The default keyboard shortcut is Ctrl+Return

OpenTimelineIO import​

  • Import a timeline with multiple tracks and clips

  • Support for markers and timeline markers

Note OTIO files do not contain information about rendering, so we get the render resolution from the first video clip.

OTIO markers on the timeline stack are converted to Kdenlive timeline markers.

OTIO markers on clips are converted to Kdenlive clip markers. Note that clip markers work differently between Kdenlive and OTIO; in Kdenlive they are shared between each instance of the clip, in OTIO the they are unique to each instance of the clip.

If the OTIO marker metadata does not contain the Kdenlive marker type, we pick the Kdenlive guide/marker with the closest color to the OTIO marker.

OpenTimelineIO Export​

  • Export a timeline with multiple tracks and clips

  • Support for markers and timeline markers

Note Timeline markers are converted to OTIO markers on the timeline stack.

Clip markers are converted to OTIO markers. Note that clip markers work differently between Kdenlive and OTIO; in Kdenlive they are shared between each instance of the clip, in OTIO they are unique to each instance of the clip.

The Kdenlive marker types are stored as OTIO metadata for round-tripping files. This allows the timeline markers and clip markers to be properly recreated when importing an OTIO file that was created with Kdenlive. The metadata is stored under the key “kdenlive” to keep it separate from metadata of other applications.

Open Backup File​

This function opens the list of automatic backups of the project Kdenlive creates.

From here you can select the restore point you want to go back to. More details are available in the backup section of this documentation.

Project Settings​

This function opens the Project Settings dialog where you can set all basic properties of the project.

More details about the various parameters and tabs are available in the Project Settings section of the documentation.

Attention

Certain things cannot be changed once assets have been added to the project or put on the timeline. Changing certain properties of the project may lead to unwanted results. It is highly recommended to create a copy of the project file before changing project settings.

Note Changing the project folder location does not work properly. In most cases the files are not moved.

Quit​

Exits Kdenlive.

Prompts you to save any unsaved changes. The default keyboard shortcut is Ctrl+Q. *[RGB]: Red Green Blue *[VFX]: Visual Effects *[feathering]: Smoothing or blurring the edges of a feature *[LFO]: Low-Frequency Oscillation *[dB]: decibel *[LUFS]: Loudness Units Full Scale *[AI]: Artificial Intelligence *[LLM]: Large Language Model *[HSV]: Hue, Saturation, Value *[SOP/Sat]: S(lope), O(ffset), P(ower) / SATuration *[CDL]: Color Decision List *[HSL]: Hue, Saturation, Lightness - Using HSL color space is useful for subtle color changes *[px]: pixel *[hh:mm:ss:ff]: hours:minutes:seconds:frames *[Hz]: Hertz *[CIE]: Commission internationale de l'éclairage, French for International Commission on Illumination *[DCI]: Digital Cinema Initiative *[nadir]: direction pointing directly below a particular location *[OS]: Operating System *[decibel]: Unit of measurement (dB) for sound levels *[clipping]: A form of distortion that limits a signal once it exceeds a threshold *[Spectrogram]: Visual representation of the spectrum of frequencies of a signal as it varies with time *[prevent clipping]: Dynamic range compression (DRC)is an audio signal processing operation that reduces the volume of loud sounds or amplifies quiet sounds, thus reducing or compressing an audio signal's dynamic range. *[SNR]: Signal-to-Noise Ratio *[dbFS]: Decibels relative to full scale *[QHD]: Quad-HD *[UHD]: Ultra High Definition *[XML]: Extensible Markup Language *[fps]: frames per second *[NTSC]: National Television Standard Committee - defined the TV system used in the United States, Japan and many other countries *[PAL]: Phase Alternating Line - a colour encoding system for analogue television *[LFE]: Low Frequency Effects *[RAW]: The RAW file format is digital photography's equivalent of a negative in film photography: it contains untouched, raw pixel information straight from the digital camera's sensor *[DSLR]: Digital Single Lens Reflex *[DOF]: Depth of Field *[NDF]: Neutral Density Filter *[AVI]: Audio Video Interleave *[BT.601]: A standard from 1982 defining how RGB color primaries get turned into the YCbCr channels used by modern codecs *[BT.709]: A standard from 1990 which does the same at BT.601 but the transfer coefficients are slightly different *[grep]: A Unix command-line utility for searching plain-text data sets for lines that match a regular expression *[MLT]: Media Lovin' Toolkit - An open source software multimedia framework designed and developed for tv broadcasting *[SD]: Secure Digital - a proprietary, non-volatile, flash memory card format developed by the SD Association *[SFX]: Special Effects *[VBR]: Variable Bit Rate *[HD]: High Definition *[GUI]: Graphical User Interface