Keyframe/Spline Editors - Bugs & Suggestions

First, I want to start off by saying I love the addition of the keyframe and spline editors on the Edit page. This is the feature I’m the most excited about in v20 by far. Huge thanks to Blackmagic for this! I’ve spent a good amount of time with it since it came out and here is my list of bugs and suggestions (so far ) for both the upper panel and the lower timeline panel.

If anything is unclear, I’ll try to clarify and make diagrams if I can (I’m certainly not an artist though lol). I’m also numbering them for discussion, so if anyone has ideas for enhancements I’m open to fleshing these ideas out to make them better. Thanks!


BUGS

1) The keyframe and spline editors do not work at all with any Fusion effects or macros. They currently only work with OpenFX.

2) Keyframes on Adjustment Clips do not show at all in the spline editor and are extremely buggy in the upper keyframe editor (the keyframes don’t move correctly, cannot zoom the editor, etc). So far I haven’t noticed problems with the lower timeline editor and Adjustment Clips.

3) When double clicking on a Retime Speed keyframe in the spline editor, the values typed into the textfield cannot be applied, it simply doesn’t do anything. However, the Retime Frame does work, you can type values into the textfield and apply them. This should also work for the Retime Speed textfield.

4) The Retime Speed textfield in the spline editor doesn’t match the actual value. In the image below, the textfield shows 1.5, but the actual value is 2.0. The Retime Speed textfield should match the actual value.

Retime.png (20.37 KiB) Viewed 3168 times

5) Both keyframe and spline viewers will not show negative time values on Fusion Comps. If you create a Fusion Comp and extend the start of the clip, neither editor allows you to scroll or zoom out to show the new beginning of the clip. Even adding a keyframe at the beginning of the clip in the inspector does not show up in either editor, so you cannot access that keyframe in the editors.

6) In the upper keyframe editor, using Alt+mouse wheel always zooms in whether scrolling up or down. There is no way to zoom out with the mouse wheel.

7) The mini keyframe editor located just underneath the spline editor really messes up the control points when moving a keyframe. The control points are not messed up when moving a keyframe horizontally in the spline view or in the lower timeline keyframe editor, so there is a major problem with this mini keyframe editor.


SUGGESTIONS

SPLINE EDITOR

1) Rotate only one control point. In the Fusion spline editor you can use Ctrl+drag to rotate one control point without moving the other, but this does not work in the Edit page editor. In the image below, I’d like to rotate only the point circled in green without moving the point circled in red. Currently, they are linked and both rotate together.

Move One Control Node.png (22.92 KiB) Viewed 3168 times

2) On the flip side, a modifier for symmetrical editing to change the length of both controls points together. Currently, they are only linked for rotation but not length. There is no way to lengthen or shorten both sides of the control point together for symmetrical editing. There should be modifiers to handle all of these various options. Ideally, allow us to choose which modifiers are used (via Keyboard/Mouse Editor).

3) When a point is selected, increase the radius around the point that allows you to grab it and move it. This radius is very small and far too often I end up missing the point entirely and de-selecting it instead of grabbed to move.

4) Add text fields for Time and Value (just like in the Fusion spline editor) to type in precise values for the points. The text fields should also be available for the control points (to type in precise values for the control points) in addition to the main keyframe points. The three options in Fusion for Value, Offset, and Scale are great and should also be brought over to the Edit page editor. One modification is that when multiple points are selected the “Offset” option should be chosen automatically, because typing in a single “Value” is not available for multiple points.

5) Snap to grid for control points (in addition to keyframes), with adjustable precision for the grid.

6) From the Fusion spline editor, press S to smooth curves and F to flatten curves. Plus, additional shortcuts for ease in only and ease out only.

7) Add a “Parameters” panel to the side of the spline editor so we can quickly toggle parameters on/off without having to go through the drop down menu all the time.

8) Add the “Display Parameters with Keyframes” option to the spline view. Currently this is only available in the keyframe view, so you have to switch to the keyframe view first, enable “Display Parameters with Keyframes” and then switch back to the spline view.

9) Ability to set keyframe/control point time values as a percentage of the clip length, which automatically stretch as the clip length is changed. This would behave just like the Custom Curve option for AnimCurves in Fusion where the keyframes/curves drawn into the Custom Curve editor have a range between 0 and 1, and then the curve is stretched out over the entire length of the clip (0 is the start and 1 is the end).

10) Add more easing curves in a dropdown menu (like AnimCurves have in Fusion). The menu should be accessible next to the easing buttons at the top of the panel, a right-click menu on a point (or points), and also keyboard shortcuts. The control points should be used to create the curve, so that it can be adjusted further after applying it. For more complex curves like “bounce”, “elastic”, etc. multiple control points (like high order Bézier curves) could be added in between the main keyframe points to create complex curves.

11) Related to the previous point, allow for multiple control points to be manually added in between the main keyframe points (like high order Bézier curves). When the main keyframes are moved, the custom curve would stretch/compress in between the two keyframes.

12) Add a “Shape Box” adjustment tool (from the Polygon mask in Fusion), where a box can be drawn around a bunch of curve points and they are treated as one shape for resizing vertically/horizontally. This should also follow snap to grid (both for drawing the initial shape and resizing) when grid snapping is enabled.

13) Add separate modifiers to lock movement to the x and y axis. For example, Ctrl+drag to lock horizontal and Shift+drag to lock vertical, instead of using a single modifier for both directions as that can be finicky and take several attempts to get it to lock in the direction you want. Also, allow us to choose which modifiers are used.

14) Include a few time scale options: frames, seconds, percentage of clip length, etc. for setting keyframe timing. Optionally, a second ruler bar could be added at the top in order to keep the frames ruler bar visible at all times.

15) The ability to save custom curves as curve presets, which can be loaded on splines and keyframes in the keyframe editor. These would apply the general curve shape in between existing keyframe values, and the curves would resize depending on the position/values of the keyframes.

16) Mouse wheel+modifiers to scroll horizontal/vertical and zoom in/out for the Keyframe and Spline editors. Currently, the mouse wheel does nothing in the spline editor and it’s not complete in the keyframe editor. The zooming should follow the mouse cursor (just like how the video preview window now zooms to the mouse cursor) instead of zooming to the play cursor or to the center of the panel.

17) Middle mouse button to pan around in the keyframe and spline editors (just like other panels in Resolve).

18) Ability to move Fusion parameters to the Edit page and be used with the keyframe/spline editors. Something like a Right-Click -> “Publish to Edit Page” option in Fusion (for individual controls, nodes, and groups of nodes) to quickly and easily move controls from Fusion to the Edit page. Once the controls are on the Edit page, then they could be keyframed with the new editors.

19) Do not limit the size of the Spline editor panel when docked. For example, on my screen when the Inspector is visible, the Spline editor width can only be expanded to a max of 1/3 of the screen width and with the Inspector hidden, it can only be extended to a of 1/2 of the screen width. The Video Preview window should be able to collapse down to an extremely narrow width if necessary to show more of the Spline editor. The buttons at the top of the Preview window could fold into a drop-down list at the right if there is not enough room for all the buttons to be displayed.

20) When the Spline Editor is free floating, the size of the window cannot be changed. I tried everything (including every combination of the function keys) but nothing allows me to grab an edge to resize the window.

21) Currently, the keyframe/spline editors do not show anything if more than one clip is selected. The editors should be able to handle multiple clip selection to be able to match curves across multiple clips. When it comes to editing with multiple clips selected, here are a couple options we could have available:
- Option #1: the keyframes/splines for only one clip is editable (selected via a dropdown list) with the keyframes/splines for the other clips grayed out but still visible in the background. This could be very useful when editing one clip to match other clips without accidentally changing the other clips.
- Option #2: all keyframes/splines for all selected clips are editable, making it possible to edit keyframes/splines across multiple clips at the same time. For multiple clips that have keyframes at the same location, they would be placed on top of each other in the viewer and a way to select individual keyframes would be necessary. One option is to have a list of clips that can be made visible/hidden to select keyframes only for those clips. Another option is when a keyframe is shared across multiple clips, have a popup list showing the clips so you could choose which clip(s) to include in the selection, then moving the keyframe will move only the keyframe for the selected clip(s) without having to hide the other clips. (Hopefully this last one makes sense, if not I could try to make a diagram to better illustrate it).


TIMELINE KEYFRAME EDITOR

22) Include the same list of easing curves from the spline editor (when it is added) in the keyframe editor.

23) An option to toggle to the spline editor inside of the lower timeline editor (just like we can for the upper panel). Since the lower timeline panel is synced with the timeline, having the spline editor here would be very useful for timing effects/speed ramps/etc to the clips because the splines would also be synced to the clips.

24) An option to show keyframes that are located outside of a clip. Currently if a keyframe is moved outside of a clip it disappears completely. The keyframe icon could look different to show it is located outside of a clip, such as a dotted outline and a different color. This way keyframes can easily moved back inside of the clip if necessary.

25) Allow the timeline keyframe panel to be visible when displaying Stacked Timelines. Currently, the timeline keyframe editor is grayed out when Stacked Timelines is enabled.

26) Do not limit the minimum height of the keyframe panel so we can make it smaller. Currently, the miminum size is four keyframe tracks (on my monitor), it should be able to go as small as we want.


GENERAL USER INTERFACE

27) An option to link/follow parameter selection across the other panels. If you select a keyframe in the lower timeline panel, that keyframe would also be selected (highlighted) in the upper spline editor. The spline panel should move (pan, zoom, etc) to follow the selection. It would also be great to have the ability to select parameters in the Inspector which would also follow the linked selection across panels, jumping to the parameter selected in another editor. The option to follow selection should be enabled/disabled for each panel individually, this way certain panels could be omitted from following selection if you want them to stay in one place.

28) Customizable docking UI. I know this one has been recommended a lot already, however with the addition of the new spline/keyframe editors, a customizable UI where the panels can be moved around and resized while docked is now more important than ever. Currently we can’t even have the effects window and the spline editor open at the same time, which makes for a terrible workflow. We need a lot more customization now. I’d also like to be able to position the Inspector near the keyframe/spline editor instead of moving back and forth across the screen all the time. And of course, remove any sizing restrictions on the panels. We should be able to shrink or expand each panel to any size we want. I do not like having arbitrary size restrictions on the panels, so those restrictions need to go.

29) Related to the last point, the ability to save custom layouts and assign them to keyboard shortcuts for fast switching between layouts.

This is a lot of suggestions , but I agree with so many of them! +10

1) The keyframe and spline editors do not work at all with any Fusion effects or macros. They currently only work with OpenFX.

As it always is the case. Not a bug, simple matter of differnt application that happened to share same generator nodes which makes fusion macros possible in the edit page. You should know that. You cannot control fusion unless you are in fusion. Fusion effects and Macros are front end for fusion controls, not the other way around. You don't control fusion form edit page, you expose fusion controls in the edit page to control fusion. And these controls are made by users. They are not replacement for fusion, hence you cannot control keyframes. Completely differnt system.

5) Both keyframe and spline viewers will not show negative time values on Fusion Comps. If you create a Fusion Comp and extend the start of the clip, neither editor allows you to scroll or zoom out to show the new beginning of the clip. Even adding a keyframe at the beginning of the clip in the inspector does not show up in either editor, so you cannot access that keyframe in the editors.

Not sure that its a bug. Its a generator node with special characteristics. Generator nodes are limited in their functions and functions do have then to be specialized and niche. Not a replacement for a media clip. Personally I never tried to animate actual fusion composition instead of animating what is inside of it in fusion. Its main purpose. But in general I would not try to treat generator nodes as ordinary clips. Generators have their special uses. When used as indented they work well.

6) In the upper keyframe editor, using Alt+mouse wheel always zooms in whether scrolling up or down. There is no way to zoom out with the mouse wheel.

I think there is an inconsistency at the moment between floating window and docked window. In the floating one, you can go back and forth and in docked one you move only in one direction.

7) The mini keyframe editor located just underneath the spline editor really messes up the control points when moving a keyframe. The control points are not messed up when moving a keyframe horizontally in the spline view or in the lower timeline keyframe editor, so there is a major problem with this mini keyframe editor.

What is a mini keyframe editor? Do you mean keyframe tray? Its not clear what you mean, when you use names which are not commonly used or offical of a feature.

1) Rotate only one control point. In the Fusion spline editor you can use Ctrl+drag to rotate one control point without moving the other, but this does not work in the Edit page editor. In the image below, I’d like to rotate only the point circled in green without moving the point circled in red. Currently, they are linked and both rotate together.

You are not rotating the control point, you are adjusting left or right handle independent. That is probably what you mean. Point is not rotated.

In spline editor of the edit page, currently you do this by simply placing appropriate handles. Linear and easy in, instead of easy in and out which, as the name suggest two at the same time because that is the nature of it.

[quote="Tekkerue"]2) On the flip side, a modifier for symmetrical editing to change the length of both controls points together. Currently, they are only linked for rotation but not length. There is no way to lengthen or shorten both sides of the control point together for symmetrical editing. There should be modifiers to handle all of these various options. Ideally, allow us to choose which modifiers are used (via Keyboard/Mouse Editor).

For the rest of the points, I personally think you are really pushing it to be essentially fusion replacement, which seems strange considering you have few basic parameters to adjust in a very limited and not very animation friendly layout.

Seems like a serious overkill to me. If you are doing motion graphics or VFX than yes. But we have fusion just a click away for that. If you could build shapes and effects and all that and have 200 + tools to animate with dozens of parameters per each as in fusion than maybe, but that would be serious limitation since its not node based and edit page was never meant to be that in the first place. Edit page is zoom, position, anchor point and pretty much that it. Do you seriously need fusion system on steroids to animate few of the most basic parameters in a system not meant to do much more than basic animations? If fusion never exists I could maybe understand some of the points. But with current set up, I can't.

What prey tell would you be using all these features for in the edit page that has only few parameters to animate in the first place, and by its nature is anything but ideal place for animation because its not part of its DNA. Its the edit page. Editing and final assembly of timeline. And more so, what is it that you are doing that makes current set up not adequate.

The Keyframes not working in Adjustment Clips is a big one.

Props to the author. This is feedback done right. ++10. I agree with the identified bugs, as I, too, have experienced them when using Fusion comps and adjustment clips on the Edit page.

I couldn't make it work lol, that and with the fact that we can't resize the popup (and now there is no more "spline" directly under the clip)...

For the rest of the points, I personally think you are really pushing it to be essentially fusion replacement...

...Seems like a serious overkill to me. If you are doing motion graphics or VFX than yes. But we have fusion just a click away for that...

...what is it that you are doing that makes current set up not adequate...

Hi Kruno, thanks for the feedback. I’m going to respond a little out of order, but these points have a similar theme so I want to address them together.

I am not pushing for a Fusion replacement, what I’m proposing is a way of animating Fusion effects from the Edit page. This is an enhancement, not a replacement. In my case, I would still use Fusion to build my effects, choose which controls I want to be able to animate (or make custom controls in Fusion that manipulate multiple effects at once), and then publish only those controls for keyframing/spline editing on the Edit page.

I do a lot of effects that are timed to music, so I'd like to have control over the effects in the context of the edit. In Fusion you can only open up individual clips one at a time, you have no context for the rest of the clips when making changes in Fusion. Trying to do any kind of timing like this in isolation is a nightmare. To give an audio mixing analogy (I’m a musician primarily), this is like trying to mix a song when you can only hear one instrument at a time and you have to do all of your EQ, compression, reverb, etc. with every instrument in solo. This is a terrible way to mix. You need context.

The same applies when doing visual effects that are timed to music. Changing the timing/feel of the effects will have an impact on the clips surrounding it, so this kind of adjustment is best done in context with the other clips. I've come up with own hacky method of doing my Fusion effects on Adjustment Clips using AnimCurves which gives me a tiny bit more flexibility on the Edit page, but it's still terrible.

I think Resolve would be able to do this way better now with the addition of the new keyframe/spline editors.

1) The keyframe and spline editors do not work at all with any Fusion effects or macros. They currently only work with OpenFX.

You cannot control fusion unless you are in fusion.

That is not correct. You can indeed keyframe Fusion effects on the Edit page via the Inspector and those keyframes show up in Fusion. However, the functionality is limited as you cannot ease the keyframes on the Edit page.

I totally understand that Blackmagic would need additional development to make Fusion effects and macros fully functional with the new editors. However, basic keyframe access is already there via the Inspector and now it should be extended to work seamlessly with the new editors.

Fusion effects and Macros are front end for fusion controls, not the other way around. You don't control fusion form edit page, you expose fusion controls in the edit page to control fusion. And these controls are made by users.

Right, you make a front end for Fusion by exposing controls of your choice and those controls are then placed on the Edit page where you can adjust and keyframe them. That is exactly what I'm talking about.

This partially works already as you can do very simple keyframing for Fusion effects on the Edit page. My request is to build on this existing functionality so that Fusion effects will work with the new editors as well.

5) Both keyframe and spline viewers will not show negative time values on Fusion Comps. If you create a Fusion Comp and extend the start of the clip, neither editor allows you to scroll or zoom out to show the new beginning of the clip. Even adding a keyframe at the beginning of the clip in the inspector does not show up in either editor, so you cannot access that keyframe in the editors.

Not sure that its a bug. Its a generator node with special characteristics.

The keyframes do show up in the Inspector, but they do not show up in the keyframe editor. The keyframes are still there, you just can't see them in the editor. I call that a bug. If you could simply zoom out and/or scroll backwards in the editor that would likely fix it and allow you to access those keyframes.

7) The mini keyframe editor located just underneath the spline editor really messes up the control points when moving a keyframe. The control points are not messed up when moving a keyframe horizontally in the spline view or in the lower timeline keyframe editor, so there is a major problem with this mini keyframe editor.

What is a mini keyframe editor? Do you mean keyframe tray? Its not clear what you mean, when you use names which are not commonly used or offical of a feature.

I didn’t know that section had a specific name, so I described what it was (mini keyframe editor) and where it was located (just below the spline editor) to indicate what I was talking about. This is the part I’m talking about inside of the white rectangle:

Edit Page Mini Spline Editor.png (19.78 KiB) Viewed 3063 times

1) Rotate only one control point. In the Fusion spline editor you can use Ctrl+drag to rotate one control point without moving the other, but this does not work in the Edit page editor. In the image below, I’d like to rotate only the point circled in green without moving the point circled in red. Currently, they are linked and both rotate together.

You are not rotating the control point, you are adjusting left or right handle independent. That is probably what you mean. Point is not rotated.

What I mean is that the control point rotates in relation to the keyframe. If it helps, think of the line connecting the control point to the keyframe, that line rotates. So in this case, I do mean rotation. When you move one control point the other control point rotates around on the other side of the keyframe. The length of the other control point (ie, distance from the keyframe) does not change, just the rotation. If this still isn’t clear, I can make a GIF to demonstrate what I mean.

In spline editor of the edit page, currently you do this by simply placing appropriate handles. Linear and easy in, instead of easy in and out which, as the name suggest two at the same time because that is the nature of it.

I don’t want the other curve to be linear though. I want asymmetrical easing curves on both sides. You can do this in Fusion if you hold Ctrl+drag a control point. The other control point stays where it is, but the easing doesn’t have to be linear. That’s the behavior I want on the Edit page too.

I couldn't make it work lol

Yeah, there are definitely some kinks that need to be worked out. But it is still beta V1 and they may have had to release it early to time up with the NAB Show. So I'll cut them slack for it not being fully ready for prime time just yet. I'm still quite excited this is getting attention from Blackmagic and I hope they stick with it to develop it to its full potential.

and now there is no more "spline" directly under the clip

Honestly, that old curve editor was awful, so I'm glad to see it go. My solution to that is in request #23 "An option to toggle to the spline editor inside of the lower timeline editor".

Since the lower timeline keyframe editor is synced to the timeline, the splines would also be synced to the clips and you'd have the same functionality as before, but way better. The new spline editor is already much better than the old curve editor, it doesn't take up space in between tracks on the timeline, there is no annoying button on the clip that you keep accidentally clicking and bringing up that curve editor, you only have to open/close one editor instead of multiple editors for every single clip, etc. Having the new spline editor underneath and synced to the clips would be a perfect solution.

Plus, having the single spline editor opens up the possibility of editing effects and retiming multiple clips at the same time in a single editor. Currently you cannot open up multiple clips in the editors, but I really hope they do this. That would be incredible!

6) From the Fusion spline editor, press S to smooth curves and F to flatten curves.

+1000! Currently, you can't make it precisely flat if it wasn't flat to start with

Yeah, the fusion spline stuff could be just updated a bit and be used on the edit page.
The core concepts of it

I really hope we're not going to end up with another situation where we have two different ways to do basically the same thing of the edit page and fusion page.

I do like the design of the new spline editor better than the one in Fusion, but it certainly still has a lot of kinks to work out.

My hope is that once the new editors are polished, Blackmagic will also replace both the keyframe and the spline editors in Fusion with the new ones. The new keyframe editor is already way better than the Fusion keyframe editor, so the Fusion keyframe editor could be replaced at any time. The new spline editor is currently a mixed bag where some things are better and somethings are worse than the Fusion spline editor. But hopefully the new spline editor will surpass the Fusion editor in every way, then it can replace the Fusion editor.

I would love to have just one editor on the Edit page and in Fusion. Not only would this be much more consistent for users to have the same functionality in both places, but it would also be easier on the developers as they would have just one code base to update and any changes changes they make would apply in both places. Trying to maintain multiple chunks of code for the same task only makes things more difficult than it needs to be.

In the same way that the different pages reference the same timeline, the same could apply to the keyframe/spline editors as well by having the Fusion and Edit pages share the same editors. This would also be the best way to publish Fusion controls to the Edit page and be able to edit their keyframes and splines on the Edit page. This kind of direct linking between Fusion and the Edit page would be a dream come true!

Key Frames
I fully agree with Tekkerue regarding the requests not being an attempt to merge fusion with the edit page.
Being able to adjust key frames for Fx parameters on the edit-age would be extremely helpful is such as the new font + effect. It is great but not good that I have to go into fusion to see and adjust the key frames such as point size position etc. This is basic stuff here I shouldn't have to go into fusion to do this.

. Their keyframe tray on the timeline is not available when in stacked timeline where most people work.
Please fix as this is a major issue.

. I for one do not need to see 2 keyframe for zoom x zoom position x position y can we have a unified keyframe as was in. 19 with the option of adjusting the x and y independently id need be as in most compositors

. Can you please provide proper masking tools on the edit page as is in fusion without having to go to either color or fusion to do a decent mask and a tracker for it. Premiere and avid do this why are you not?




.

I fully agree with Tekkerue regarding the requests not being an attempt to merge fusion with the edit page.

Exactly! Compositing and automating are two different things. The keyframing/spline editing features on the Edit page should be just as powerful as what is in Fusion. This is why I think they should share the same editors as well. That would make things better for us users and for the developers as well since they wouldn't have to maintain/update different chunks of code in different areas that do exactly the same task.

I for one do not need to see 2 keyframe for zoom x zoom position x position y can we have a unified keyframe as was in. 19 with the option of adjusting the x and y independently id need be as in most compositors

I think for every parameter that has X/Y (or width/height) values, a simple "Group" and "Ungroup" option would be awesome. Group the X/Y into a single keyframe so you can treat them as a unit or ungroup them to animate each one individually. Both have their uses and it should be easy to switch between either one.

Can you please provide proper masking tools on the edit page as is in fusion without having to go to either color or fusion to do a decent mask and a tracker for it. Premiere and avid do this why are you not?

+1

I believe you can export macros for masking/tracking, but yes, I agree these should be available right out of the box with zero hassle. And the Fusion macros wouldn't work with the new keyframe/spline editors either, which would be a problem for animating the mask.

I really hope Blackmagic is working to make the new editors be compatible with Fusion effects/macros. I had initially planned to keep updating this thread with each beta version, (I have a few more things from Beta 2 but never put them into coherent sentences to post to the forum)... now as of Beta 3 they still don't work with Fusion effects/macros and there has been no word from Blackmagic if this is even something they are working on. I use Fusion effects almost exclusively and I really don't want to keep screwing around with these editors if they will never do what I need them to do. So for now, I'm only testing if they work with Fusion effects/macros and when they do (or I see something from Blackmagic that they are working on this) then I'll worry about testing out other functions.

Not sure if these have been mentioned above... Right click the Zoom and/or Position keyframes in the Inspector Transform and set to Ease In/Out - this applies and Ease but it shows as linear in the Keyframe spline editor.

Also, putting it back to linear in the Inspector keyframes and applying a default Ease in/out in the spline editor has a drastically different result and the result is unusably bad.

I'm just testing this with a still and a 7 second zoom and position move, wishing it would work the same as doing it in the Fusion Transform node with smooth splines.

Not sure if these have been mentioned above... Right click the Zoom and/or Position keyframes in the Inspector Transform and set to Ease In/Out - this applies and Ease but it shows as linear in the Keyframe spline editor.

It's not quite linear, but it is very different.

Inspector & Spline Editor Easing Bug.png (26.24 KiB) Viewed 2453 times

Ideally, we would have multiple curve shapes which would allow us to adjust the steepness/shape of the easing curve in this way, but they should be exactly the same in the Inspector, Keyframe Editor and Spline Editor.

Also, putting it back to linear in the Inspector keyframes and applying a default Ease in/out in the spline editor has a drastically different result and the result is unusably bad.

I can't replicate this one. I tried multiple combinations of setting the easing and linear using the Inspector and the Spline Editor. I always get the two curves I showed above when using the Inspector or the Spline Editor to set the easing.

...I can't replicate this one. I tried multiple combinations of setting the easing and linear using the Inspector and the Spline Editor. I always get the two curves I showed above when using the Inspector or the Spline Editor to set the easing.

All I did was reset the keyframes to how they were in the Inspector, then used the equivalent 'Ease' button in the Spline Editor. It gave me very long Bezier handles and a very curved looking graph and a really bad Zoom and Position move as a result

All I did was reset the keyframes to how they were in the Inspector, then used the equivalent 'Ease' button in the Spline Editor. It gave me very long Bezier handles and a very curved looking graph and a really bad Zoom and Position move as a result

The Spline Editor creates longer handles, which are exactly at the midway point of your clip. You don't have to set it to linear in the Inspector before hand, this is always what the Spline Editor easing does and you will get the same result every time.

I just compared the keyframe easing using a 30 second clip and a 3 minute clip and the handles for different clip lengths are always in the same position. However, when I compared the easing between the Inspector, the Spline Editor on the Edit page and the Spline Editor in Fusion... to no surprise, you get three different results.

Inspector Edit Fusion Easing.png (81.18 KiB) Viewed 2362 times

That is ridiculous! You should get the exact same result no matter if you set the easing in the Inspector, the Spline Editor, or in Fusion. However, all three of them are different. This is yet another example (just another drop in the ocean) of the total lack of consistency in Resolve, which makes for a terrible user experience overall.

It's like every individual programmer at Blackmagic adds new features in an isolated bubble. Do they not have a project manager overseeing this stuff and giving clear specifications for new features so that they align with the rest of the application? How hard is it to specify that keyframe easing handles always have a value of 20% (or whatever) to maintain consistency across the entire application?

I would love to have a list for multiple easing curve shapes, but somehow I have a feeling that every list would be completely different from each other. Including the easing options from AnimCurves in Fusion, then we'd probably have four completely different sets of easing parameters because no one bothers to set a single standard that everyone else must follow. Resolve continuously face plants on the most basic and rudimentary tasks and I do not understand it.

To summarise, in a Fusion Transform node you can keyframe a Size and Centre (position) move to, for example, zoom in to the bottom right of an image, then go to the spline editor and set all the keyframes to Smooth. It works perfectly and this is how all the other modes should work but they don't!

To summarise, in a Fusion Transform node you can keyframe a Size and Centre (position) move to, for example, zoom in to the bottom right of an image, then go to the spline editor and set all the keyframes to Smooth. It works perfectly and this is how all the other modes should work but they don't!

Yes, you can also set the keyframes to ease on the Edit page as well, but the easing shapes are different. The graphs I showed are setting the easing using the Inspector, Spline Editor on the Edit page and the Spline Editor in Fusion and all three have very different shapes which will give different results.

It sounds like you don't like the movement of the Spline Editor on the Edit page and it's probably because that one is the most aggressive. The control points are pulled into the middle of the clip which creates a much sharper curve. The Inspector is the most subtle and Fusion is in between the two. So that gives three different results depending on where you do the easing. If you want a more subtle curve, then you probably want to use the Inspector or Fusion, or you can pull the curve handles back yourself.... but that creates a lot more work to adjust them by hand if you just want to apply a quick easing curve.

Having multiple options for easing so you can set the strength of the easing would be ideal, but if they add a list of multiple easing curves it must be consistent throughout the application.

This appears to be fixed in Version 20!? Was I doing something wrong before? Or are the development team geniuses? Or both?
My test just now seems to be perfect!
Thanks you!

This appears to be fixed in Version 20!?

No, this has not been fixed. I just checked again with a fresh project created in V20 (there are bugs with the spline editor when opening up projects from older versions, so I eliminated that as a possible cause)... setting keyframe easing in the Inspector and in the Spline Editor on the Edit page do not match. It's still exactly the same result as I posted before.

Just trying out a few things now that it's out of beta, and I've been screaming for keyframe editor on the edit page for a few years...

What I'm missing most on the first quick look:
1. Keyboards shortcuts from fusion F, S for easing (like OP)
2. The whole functionality of the T keyboard shortcut from fusion - which basically allows you to select multiple parameters keyframes and set the same easing handle duration percentage across them with one slide. Currently if you animate position, rotation, and zoom, and you want to change from the default ease, you really need to go do it one by one, and there's no way you can get those to be exactly the same. Or am I missing something here?
3. Change the default easing values to the same as the ones in Fusion OR allow the user to dial in the Defaults (30% smooth, 50, 75...)

For me personally the best option would be if they would've kept the clip based keyframes view from v19 and older (could be with or without the splines), and "just add" Fusion's Spline panel on the edit page. I know I say "just" but in the end that would probably take more work and they had to go build it from the ground up... but then why not just recreate the interface they own and keep things coherent within the program... *facepalm*

It seems super odd to me that they'd go about creating basically another new interface, and just like the OP says in his feedback, create yet another set of default values, ways to learn the program within the program and workarounds. For Resolve being a all-in-one solution a lot of times it really doesn't feel like that.

Or am I missing something here?

Nope, you're not missing anything. All of the features you mentioned are not available.

For me personally the best option would be if they would've kept the clip based keyframes view from v19 and older (could be with or without the splines), and "just add" Fusion's Spline panel on the edit page.

Personally, I hated the old clip based keyframe viewer and IF Blackmagic had finished developing the new editors I think they could have accomplished all of the same tasks of the old curve editor, but way better. Unfortunately, that didn't happen though.

but then why not just recreate the interface they own and keep things coherent within the program... *facepalm*

I like the "look" of the new editors better than the ones in Fusion. If Blackmagic had finished developing these new editors, I would have loved to have them replace the editors in Fusion. Basically, have one piece of code that is shared between Fusion and the Edit page. That would have been awesome!

Not only would the visuals and functions be consistent, but it would have also allowed Fusion and the Edit page to communicate together. Currently, there is no communication between the Edit page and Fusion. You can't set keyframe easing (Ease In/Ease Out) for Fusion effects via the Inspector on the Edit page. Blackmagic bought Fusion over 10 years ago (2014) and in all this time, they've never made even basic keyframe easing work. If they shared the code for the editors between Fusion and the Edit page then there would be no need to convert from one system to another when linking them together. Both pages would simply provide access to the same editor.

For Resolve being a all-in-one solution a lot of times it really doesn't feel like that.

I couldn't agree more!

On that point, I am planning to leave Resolve and over the past few days I've been demoing Autograph by Left Angle for compositing/motion effects as a replacement for Fusion. Autograph actually has one of the big features I've been asking for, which is an "Expose Parameter" feature that puts controls from Autograph into the Inspector on the Edit page in Resolve. I have been begging get this option in Fusion for quite a while (including this thread with the "Publish To Edit Page").

The Expose Parameter part starts at 3:55.

That is exactly what I have been asking for! And Autograph has done it, but not Resolve. It's ironic that Autograph works better on the Edit page in Resolve than Fusion does. This is what happens when you actually put thought into your application. Autograph is a very new editor (looks like their first release was only 2 years ago), so it's certainly not perfect. But the company is very responsive and in just the few days I've been looking at it I've already gotten a better response from them (both in the youtube comments and on their forum) than I have from Blackmagic after my 3 1/2 years here of making requests and begging for changes.

When I first tried V20 Beta 1, I was super excited about these new editors and I fully intended to keep updating this thread to cross off items as they were addressed and add new ones as I found new bugs, thought up new feature requests, etc. But while I was testing Beta 2, I saw very little had changed and then I found more problems, both of these were discouraging... but then I realized that these new editors were going to be useless to me if they don't work with Fusion effects (I use Fusion effects almost exclusively). So I wanted to get some assurance that these editors were going to work with Fusion effects before I continued spending any more time testing them, but Blackmagic never answered... so I stopped testing the editors and never updated my post. It turns out I made the right call because I was only wasting my time here. The editors STILL do not work with Fusion effects as of the "official" release. This is the one and only thing I care about now.

At this point, I'm pretty well done with Resolve. I've barely opened up Resolve at all recently and I'm spending all my time with Autograph now to get a feel for it. Given how great they are about listening to users and how fast they are improving, I expect I'll be a lot happier with Autograph than I have been with Resolve.

+ 1

I do not understand why bmd keeps adding more and more inconsistencies across pages. I find the inconsistencies that already exist to be too many, but they keep piling on more with new features too.

I was very excited when I first heard of the edit page spline rework. But now that I've played around with it I am utterly disappointed, it is still way behind the fusion spline editor (Which in itself I have many complaints about).

Simple things like F and S to flatten and smooth - How do you design an entirely new editor without easy access to these commands? The 'Flat handle mode' is the most nonsensical feature I've seen. This is a SOLVED problem, and your OWN software fusion already implements them well. Why do you see any need to change this paradigm?

This, and the hundreds of other small issues -- like not being able to zoom vertically?? I'm genuinely curious if anyone that has worked on the new spline editor has ever animated anything in their life. This is not meant to be an insult, and i apologize if it comes across that way. The only reason I put it that way is because as an animator, so much about the new editor makes absolutely zero sense.

....I'm genuinely curious if anyone that has worked on the new spline editor has ever animated anything in their life. This is not meant to be an insult, and i apologize if it comes across that way. The only reason I put it that way is because as an animator, so much about the new editor makes absolutely zero sense.

I agree 100% with everything you said! And I will say you are not the first person to have these same concerns about the Resolve developers. It honestly feels like they are not using their own software nor are they in close communication with anyone who is. It feels like is the programmers are mindlessly working off a checklist of features doing the bare minimum to get it done, cross it off the list and then move on. If the new feature doesn't function well or integrate well with the rest of the program, who cares? Half-assed is good enough, just move on. I do not understand by Blackmagic thinks this is ok, it's not.

I really don't want to start over with a new piece of software, but if Blackmagic refuses to listen and engage with us, then I probably shouldn't be wasting my time here. I had more that I was going to add to this thread about the new keyframe editors, but during Beta 2 I simply gave up and have barely touched any of this since then... clearly that was the right call. If I'm going to put this kind of effort into thoroughly testing and thinking through how best to integrate new features, I'd rather do that with a company that actually listens to their users and engages with them. Blackmagic has made it perfectly clear it won't happen with them.

Personally, I hated the old clip based keyframe viewer and IF Blackmagic had finished developing the new editors I think they could have accomplished all of the same tasks of the old curve editor, but way better. Unfortunately, that didn't happen though.

Yeah so did I at first, but now with BM Cloud + proxy workflow I can do a lot of editing on my macbook when on the way, and for screen real estate saving and quick access it was really well positioned actually. Also I like the Fusion spline and keyframe design, I got used to it and it's really straight forward. Its biggest quirk for me is that when you press T for handles numerical values you can only change them by "sliding" the number, rather than with the actual numerical input.

Also good for you that you found an alternative for some of your needs!

Man... I totally second this whole thread. Thanks for putting in the effort.
I was so hyped about a new improved speed ramping workflow but even after it is not a beta anymore, I can't even accomplish what I did all the time with the old software. It just got even more clunky because definitely no one in the resolve development team does contemporary video content editing at all. The just don't know what people do with their software and they don't use this forum to extract it. I said it years ago and it very very unfortunately remained the same.

Yup. Feel the same way about the new Avid-like source in timeline thing. Just edited a short and wanted to use it but quickly gave up and went back to my old way. Maybe if I’m very careful and study the way they want me to use it I can make it work. But why is it this hard and inflexible? Because they want us to adapt to their way rather tan looking at how we work and making tools that come to us. Sigh.

Also good for you that you found an alternative for some of your needs!

Well about that...
https://www.maxon.net/en/article/autograph-acquisition

I can't even open Autograph anymore because the server side check for the free version is shut down.

So first was my disappointment with Resolve 20 and now the alternative I was really loving vanishes into thin air. I can't even!

Man... I totally second this whole thread. Thanks for putting in the effort.

Thank you!

I would have liked to put more effort into it and continue updating this thread, but I've asked probably half a dozen times if the new editors will work with Fusion effects and I cannot get an answer on it. Without Fusion effects, these editors pretty much don't exist for me. Fusion is essentially all of the effects that I use.

I saw Casey Faris post on his youtube channel that he may have an ear with Blackmagic soon, so I've asked Casey to ask Blackmagic about this since I can't get a direct answer here. Luckily the top comment is also asking about the keyframe editors working with fusion effects and text effects. So that's good! Hopefully Casey can get an answer.

I was so hyped about a new improved speed ramping workflow but even after it is not a beta anymore, I can't even accomplish what I did all the time with the old software.

Same here! I started out this thread with lots of excitement and hype over these new editors, but that has certainly faded now.

It just got even more clunky because definitely no one in the resolve development team does contemporary video content editing at all. The just don't know what people do with their software and they don't use this forum to extract it. I said it years ago and it very very unfortunately remained the same.

100% agree! It definitely feels that way.

But why is it this hard and inflexible? Because they want us to adapt to their way rather tan looking at how we work and making tools that come to us. Sigh.

That perfectly sums up my feelings about Resolve. It's very clear that I do not see eye to eye with Blackmagic on virtually anything, which is why Resolve feels so backwards and upside down to me. Not everyone wants to work the way they think we do and I wish they would give us the flexibility so we can make our own choices. I've said it before and I'll say it again, Reaper is a perfect example of how to do this extremely well. Be like Reaper!

Yup. Feel the same way about the new Avid-like source in timeline thing. Just edited a short and wanted to use it but quickly gave up and went back to my old way. Maybe if I’m very careful and study the way they want me to use it I can make it work. But why is it this hard and inflexible? Because they want us to adapt to their way rather tan looking at how we work and making tools that come to us. Sigh.

Actually, for me the introduction of source/record editing from Avid is one of the best innovations in DaVinci Resolve 20. It works even better than in Avid. Of course, it's not useful in every case - it works great when editing large documentaries or reality shows, basically any projects where you have tons of video material. It's less useful for short-form content.
I think BM maintains a really brilliant balance trying to satisfy both professional editors working in film and TV as well as content creators making videos for platforms like YouTube.

Getting back to the main topic, I think the Keyframe Editor in the Edit page is a great addition, but it's far from perfect. I'm also wondering why they didn't just adapt the existing, excellent curve editor from Fusion for the Edit page.

I’m generally a feature editor and was totally psyched about the source timeline feature. I imagine I’ll get it to work well as you have. It’s just more fiddly than I think it needs to be and thus a bit harder to pick up in a pinch. But yeah it’ll be great once I wrap my mind around their particular restrictions/intended workflow.

Back to keyframes!

I think the Keyframe Editor in the Edit page is a great addition, but it's far from perfect.

I think the new editors could have been great. I was very excited when I first saw them in Beta 1 because Blackmagic was finally addressing one of the major sources of headaches I have in Resolve. There was still a long way to go, but it was a nice first step in the right direction and it was the start of the beta process so there was plenty of time to finish them. Unfortunately, this still hasn't happened.

I'm also wondering why they didn't just adapt the existing, excellent curve editor from Fusion for the Edit page.

I like the design of the new editors better, but it seems like giving a facelift to the editors from Fusion would have been better. The functionality of these new editors don't even match what they already have in Fusion. I cannot understand why Blackmagic didn't at the very least bring these new editors up to the level of features that have already existed, both on the Edit page and in Fusion before the official release. They also removed features that used to exist on the Edit page without having the new editors be able to replace them. I just don't get it.