@johnebaker

Thanks for your reply. I don't see range edit operations being affected by the mouse modes at all.

I have multiple tracks and I want to apply range editing on some tracks but not all tracks, and I'm using single mouse mode. So in a situation like the following, I would like say to range-cut (Edit/ Edit range/Cut) at a single track, but it gets applied to all tracks:

The result is:

If there are say 10 tracks, I would like to range-operate on say 3 of them selectively.

I can work around this by locking out unwanted tracks, but that's the cumbersome part that I was looking for an alternative to.

@Basel-Shishani

Hi Basel.

Soloing a single track (or more) should have the effect of muting all other tracks although I don't get that if the mouse is in single object mode, why it should affect other tracks unless they are linked objects like an accompanying sound track, in which case they need to be un-linked using the broken chain symbol. That is never a good idea if you want to keep sound in sync unless you are very careful.

Ray.

@Basel-Shishani

Hi

Can you post a screenshot of the timeline pane showing the full length of the project and all occupied tracks - ie similar to the one I posted above.

Use the small square icon top right of the timeline pane to make it full screen will help, use the same icon, or the ESC key, to return to normal view after capturing the screenshot.

Thanks

John EB

@Basel-Shishani There's something odd going on here. In my experience, MEP will not cut a track that is not highlighted if there are other track/s that are highlighted. I can't replicate the cutting of the non-highlighted track in your example diagrams.

The "range" (the light blue section across the top) has no bearing on the cutting of the objects below it on the timeline. Where does the term "range-edit" come from? That might help us understand what you are trying to achieve.

@AAProds
‘Range edit’ operations: 
Menu->Edit->Edit range->Cut, Copy, Delete …
I have given an example of this in my reply to @johnebaker as ‘range-cut (Edit/ Edit range/Cut)’. 
The blue line at the top designates the range affected by range editing operations.

Single point cut operations:
Menu->Edit->Cut->Split scene, Remove scene start …

Single point cut operations follow the simple rule: apply to selections, if no selections apply to all.

Range editing operations do not follow such a rule. They are applied across tracks regardless of selections. They can only be controlled by track locks. [This is the behaviour I see on my system].

All the answers I’m getting seem to be about single point operations rather than range operations. Not sure why this is the case when I'm using terms like: ‘marked ranges’, ‘range editing’ and ‘Edit>Edit range>...’.  
 
@johnebaker

The screen shots I posted are a sample project to test the problem. They're the whole timeline. Again your answer seems to be about singe point operations rather than range operations. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

@CubeAce

Soloing has no bearing on this as I can see.

Thanks to all.

@Basel-Shishani Sorry, I didn't even realise that function existed.

@Basel-Shishani

Hi

Thanks for the clarification, two of us have learned something new.

Although I do use the Range Delete function, for removing blank space from the end of the movie after editing, I had to check the manual for the Range, Cut and Copy functions.

From the Range in the manual available under Help :

. . . . provides object-based functions as well as “band-oriented” editing functions. These always refer to the whole arrangement from the first to the last track as well as to the area between the start and end marker . . . .

The operations you are wanting to do are neither 'single track' nor 'range' operations. however you have to do them using the single track operations, Cut, Delete etc not the Range functions.

Below is a quick example of removing a section from 2 tracks without affecting other tracks using the following - I have included this for other users who may have the same problem :

• Object on track 3 selected using Ctrl + Left mouse click, this can be repeated for more objects on lower tracks
• The 2 cuts were made positioning the timeline cursor where the cut point is and using keyboard shortcut T
• Deletion used Ctrl + Del to close the gap

John EB

@AAProds @Basel-Shishani @johnebaker

Thanks for the clarification, two of us have learned something new.

Make that plus three 😇

@AAProds @Basel-Shishani @CubeAce @johnebaker

Now plus four!

@johnebaker

So with cutting a section, we can break the operation, but how would you copy a section on 2 tracks out of N or even on a single track on the timeline?!

It seems to me that the designers want to send us back to the media pool for every section insertion, or we need to copy the object or group then trim it separately. I find it easier to work on objects in the time line were I can set markers and compare multiple objects.

Range operations are across all tracks as you describe (with locks excluded), but a more consistent and useful/intuitive behaviour would've been: [if anyone from the team reads this]

When selected objects intersect the range, act only on range-intersecting sections of the selected objects.

This can work smoothly even if there are multiple objects in the range with mixed selection state, as say delete or cut can remove the selected sections and shift the unselected ones. (Which is an edge case anyway).

@AAProds

Not a problem. The function is there but could be improved.

@Basel-Shishani

Hi

The same procedure as shown in the video clip I posted except copy the 2 selected clips and paste them.

An alternative, which can be quicker then copy/paste method, is to use a combination of dragging with the mouse while holding down the Ctrl key after making the cuts - this method is very quick if for example you want the titles to be the same font/size/colour etc in several locations - create the first title then click and drag duplicates then just edit the text as required..

MEP is a none destructive video editor, it does not use the source video/image files at all until you start exporting or previewing, it then copies the required parts, as defined by the edits and effects you made on the timeline, rendering them to the file you specified in the export dialog or for previewing.

What you see on the timeline is a representation of the video and image files used in the project so when you make cuts in a video object there is no real cut being made to the video clip it represents - an 'instruction' is saved specifying where the cut is.

HTH

John EB

@johnebaker

Thanks. Section cuts and copy/drag is quick, but is there a quick way to rejoin at the split points after the copy, as unnecessary partitions can be annoying. (Section cutting is the more common case but just wondering).

* I'm aware of the representational nature of the timeline objects, though it was an issue for me when I first started using the software.