Additional tools
A/B Splits
It is possible to perform an A/B split comparison between the base clip and any item in the effects stack.
The A/B split button:
toggles the A/B split on and off. There are three split modes, "Wipe", "Dual locked" and "Dual fixed B". The split mode can be set by right-clicking on the A/B button. This brings up a pop-up menu listing the available modes. "Dual locked" mode shows the A and B side next to each other with the same zoom level and position. "Dual fixed B" mode lets you zoom and position both sides individually and compare different frames.
The "A" side of the split shows the current effect and the "B" side of the split shows the base clip.
When in split mode, the A/B split line can be adjusted by simply dragging the central box using the left mouse button. The line can also be rotated about the central box by dragging the line using the left mouse button. These adjustments of the A/B split line allows orientation and positioning to a convenient position for review.
Adjustment of the split line is not available when viewing in side-by-side mode. Instead, the two halves of the Cinema view show the same portion of the "A" and "B" clips, replicating the zoom and pan for each side.
Frame markers
User-defined frame markers can be created to tag individual frames using the keyboard shortcuts in the Cinema window. For a full list of keyboard shortcuts, see the Keyboard Shortcuts page.
Bad frames
The scrub bar can show the location of bad frames in a clip, using red markers. A bad frame could be due to missing frames or corrupt files. To toggle the display of bad frames, click the
button. Note that to analyze the clip for bad frames can take some time so use this function sparingly.
Frame number/Timecode
The frame/timecode button provides an option to toggle whether the GUI displays timecodes or frame numbers. This option switches all instances of temporal display throughout the application.
To toggle the frame/timecode mode, press the / button. The status of that button shows the current mode - for time codes and for frame numbers. Note that timecodes are not read from the frame header but rather are calculated based upon the clip frame number and frame rate.
Clip information
The clip information button will pop up a dialog which shows information about the current frame and/or the current clip. Most of this information is extracted from the original source files where available. Typical information displayed in the dialog includes fields such as edgecode, timecode and the source file format. Not all information is present in all files, nor in all file formats.
Overlays
PFClean has support for text and image based overlays. Overlays can be composed of user-defined text, textual information automatically extracted from the clips and project, and images. Overlays are applied individually, and each overlay item has a number of parameters to edit and place them. Overlays are rendered into the Cinema in real-time; act on any and all clips loaded into the Cinema, i.e. they are not clip specific; and are purely a display tool and have no effect on any processing performed on the clip although they can, optionally, be burnt in to exported footage if this is required.
To toggle overlays, click on the button.
By default, there will be a single overlay text field defined which will show the current frame number or timecode (depending on the setting) in the lower-left of the image.
To create, or modify the overlays to be displayed, click the button next to the toggle overlay button to open the Overlay Text options dialog which is shown below:
At the upper left of the dialog is a list of the currently defined overlay items. Each of these item can be edited by simply selecting it in the list and modifying the parameters in the dialog.
It is possible to disable individual entries in the list by toggling the checkbox to the left of that entry.
For permanent removal of an overlay item, click the Remove button when the item is selected in the list.
To create a new, additional overlay item, press the Add button and select whether the new item should be a text or image overlay.
For an image overlay item, enter the path to the image in the "Image" field, or use the "..." button to browse to the image
For a text over item, simply type the text required into the "Text" field. There are a number of special text codes which can be entered into this field, and will provide information about the current project and/or clip. These special text codes can be used alongside plain text to create a combined field, and are listed below:
[[TIMECODE]] | The current frame number or, if using timecodes, the current timecode value. |
[[PROJECT]] | The current project name. |
[[SEQUENCE]] | The current sequence name. |
[[CLIP]] | The current clip name. |
[[CLIP_IN]] | The clip in point (either as a frame number of timecode depending on the mode). |
[[CLIP_OUT]] | The clip out point (either as a frame number of timecode depending on the mode). |
[[CLIP_LENGTH]] | The clip length (either as a frame number of timecode depending on the mode). |
[[CLIP_TIMECODE]] | The timecode for the current frame as read from the file header. |
[[CLIP_EDGECODE]] | The edgecode for the current frame as read from the file header. |
To adjust the position of a overlay item, use the X/Y sliders. The values represents a percentage position in the image with (0, 0) being the lower-left of the image and (100, 100) being the upper right of the image. This location defines the lower left corner of the overlay item.
On text overlay items, use the Size slider to adjust the size of the entry.
FG colour and opacity control the foreground colour of the overlay item.
BG colour and opacity control the background colour of the overlay item (not applicable to image based overlays).
In order to transfer overlay item settings between projects, the current configuration can be saved via the "Save..." button, and a previously saved configuration loaded into the project using the "Load..." button.
Safe grids
PFClean has support for safe grids to highlight or mask the title safe, action safe etc... areas of the image. Safe grids are rendered into the Cinema in real-time; act on any and all clips loaded into the Cinema, i.e. they are not clip specific; and are purely a display tool and have no effect on any processing performed on the clip although they can, optionally, be burnt in to exported footage if this is required.
A set of standard safe grids are provided with the application, however it is possible to produce custom safe grids in addition to these (see the "User-defined file format" chapter of this manual for more details).
To switch on safe grids click the button.
To control the safe grid parameters select the button next to the safe grid button to open the safe grid settings pane.
Safe grids are extremely customisable as each parameter can be individually tuned, including it colour and the opacity of the blanking panels. Safe grids are rendered in OpenGL as an overlay allowing areas outside the safe area to be shown as translucent.
OpenColorIO display view
The following controls:
allows the OpenColorIO display LUT to be toggled on and off, and for the OpenColorIO preferences to be displayed.
Hovering the mouse over the LUT button will display a popup showing the colour profile assigned for your display, and the colour profile assigned to the current clip, if any.
Please note that in order to use the OpenColorIO display LUT, you need to set an OpenColorIO profile for both your clip and your display. The profile for display can be set in the preferences window, and the profile for a clip can be set or changed in the Media Admin panel. A default OpenColorIO profile can also be specified for clips that are imported into the project if desired.