Blackmagic Forum

Currently, it seems one cannot change the frame rate of a timeline in Davinci Resolve if there's any footage on the timeline. What you have to do is create a new timeline, then copy the footage from the old one to the new one. Since that works, there is no reason from a technical perspective it can't be done in a single step, unless there's something I'm missing?

InfiniteLove wrote:Currently, it seems one cannot change the frame rate of a timeline in Davinci Resolve if there's any footage on the timeline. What you have to do is create a new timeline, then copy the footage from the old one to the new one. Since that works, there is no reason from a technical perspective it can't be done in a single step, unless there's something I'm missing?

+10000


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YES!!++++

that would also make no sense at all

Mark Foster wrote:that would also make no sense at all

Can you elaborate on that?

-1

Forcing people to make a new timeline ensures people have a backup before they completely mess up their edit, which is what changing the frame rate does. It also means you can't mess up your edit by accident in this way, thinking it will all be fine but at a different rate when it won't be.

Though there's nothing stopping you from selecting you entire timeline, cutting the clips, changing the frame rate then paste them again.

InfiniteLove wrote:

Mark Foster wrote:that would also make no sense at all

Can you elaborate on that?

the interaction between source clip and timeline is defined by timecode and frame number.

if you would now change a 30 frame long clip, which now has a length of 30 frames in a 30fps timeline (and the timeline has a 30 frame timecode) into a timeline with only 24 frames,
what should resolve do then?
cut the clip after 24 frames?
and in the opposite case create a hole?
the timecode of the timeline determines the length of the inserted source clip.

your cut would look very funny and then everyone screams again ; -)


.

I'm with Mark on this.

Mark Foster wrote:what should resolve do then?

Exactly what it does when you insert a clip with a frame rate that does not match the timeline frame rate. Frame interpolation to maintain the timing and the cuts.

This is a solved problem in other apps. I get the purity of matching your clips' and timelines' frame rates, but reality can get messy. Flexibility is good.

eikonoklastes wrote:

Mark Foster wrote:what should resolve do then?

Exactly what it does when you insert a clip with a frame rate that does not match the timeline frame rate. Frame interpolation to maintain the timing and the cuts.

This ^

Timeline editing is already dictated by timecode, not direct frame numbers, so all the problems are already solved, otherwise it would be impossible to edit different frame rate clips together without stuff being too fast or too slow.

Hendrik Proosa wrote:

eikonoklastes wrote:

Mark Foster wrote:what should resolve do then?

Exactly what it does when you insert a clip with a frame rate that does not match the timeline frame rate. Frame interpolation to maintain the timing and the cuts.

This ^

Timeline editing is already dictated by timecode, not direct frame numbers, so all the problems are already solved, otherwise it would be impossible to edit different frame rate clips together without stuff being too fast or too slow.

None of this would work if you had your mismatched frame rate set to either Final Cut Pro X or None.

Nothing works as expected when presumptions are not fulfilled.

What should Davinci Resolve do when the framerate is changed with clips on the timeline?
It should do what it already does already. I don't understand the problem here. - And going against InfiniteLove is bad karma! (just a little joke )

Forcing people to make a new timeline ensures people have a backup before they completely mess up their edit, which is what changing the frame rate does. It also means you can't mess up your edit by accident in this way, thinking it will all be fine but at a different rate when it won't be.

? This is a weird argument. We should lock the media pool until someone restart Resolve and assets can only be added, not removed, because someone could delete something. Come on :/

What's going on with all these illogical arguments against this simple feature?

It adds flexibility and takes nothing away. The less friction for simple things like this, the better editing experience we have.

I had this feature request : viewtopic.php?f=33&t=158405 - Having the ability to copy/paste FX on audio tracks on the edit page (or between pages) - I still want it of course, but if this one was here, I would just duplicate my timelines and change the framerate to keep the structure of my audio tracks with all the effects.

It's a big +1 for me.

Weren't we limited to the project's framerate before? And now we can create different timelines with different framerates from the media pool.

Maxwellx wrote:? This is a weird argument. We should lock the media pool until someone restart Resolve and assets can only be added, not removed, because someone could delete something. Come on :/

What's going on with all these illogical arguments against this simple feature?

It adds flexibility and takes nothing away. The less friction for simple things like this, the better editing experience we have.

...

Weren't we limited to the project's framerate before? And now we can create different timelines with different framerates from the media pool.

It's not a weird argument, but your exaggeration of what I have said is certainly illogical and not along the lines of what I am implying at all*. My arguments are purely logical, and this feature is not simple, unless perhaps you totally ignore everyone who uses Mixed Frame Rate set to either Final Cut Pro X or None.

Being limited to the project frame rate before has nothing to do with this either. Totally different.

*if you delete something, you know it's going to be deleted. But editors think they can just change timeline frame rates with the same material and everything will magically be ok. Most of them (in my years of experience) can't even see the mess they are making, and people like me are left to rescue the edit.

Hendrik Proosa wrote:Nothing works as expected when presumptions are not fulfilled.

What do you mean?

Tom Early wrote:

Maxwellx wrote:? This is a weird argument. We should lock the media pool until someone restart Resolve and assets can only be added, not removed, because someone could delete something. Come on :/

What's going on with all these illogical arguments against this simple feature?

It adds flexibility and takes nothing away. The less friction for simple things like this, the better editing experience we have.

...

Weren't we limited to the project's framerate before? And now we can create different timelines with different framerates from the media pool.

It's not a weird argument, but your exaggeration of what I have said is certainly illogical and not along the lines of what I am implying at all. My arguments are purely logical, and this feature is not simple, unless perhaps you totally ignore everyone who uses Mixed Frame Rate set to either Final Cut Pro X or None..

It was just an strong analogy.

What it meant was that people are (and should be) in control of what they do. "Artificially" limiting their ability to destroy their project is not a good argument against to the requested feature.

We can mess up our edits/projects at any time anyway

This is just my opinion of course, but I think it's based on logic and common sense. Anyone can already activate/deactivate/change settings that will mess with timelines/edits/colors/export/etc.

Being limited to the project frame rate before has nothing to do with this either. Totally different

It's exactly the same... because everything I said is about "flexibility". I didn't do a 1 to 1 comparison with something else.

Anyway, we can create timelines with different framerates. We can copy and past any footage on any timelines with any framerates.

All the mechanisms to make it work properly are already implemented, This feature request is just another step to more flexibility. It's just a matter of time/ressource/envy to implement it (from the BMD side).

Tom Early wrote:None of this would work if you had your mismatched frame rate set to either Final Cut Pro X or None.

What are these settings, Tom?

Tom Early wrote:

Hendrik Proosa wrote:Nothing works as expected when presumptions are not fulfilled.

What do you mean?

I mean that one can say about anything that if I don't do X then Y doesn't work. It is up to user to make sure one does X if one wants Y to work. If I have no timecode in my clips and names are all messed up importing EDL/XML doesn't work. This doesn't mean that ability to import them is useless, it means user must make sure stuff is done as needed for it to work and live with consequences if it isn't. I don't like this steadily creeping stupid-user paradigm one bit where software assumes that people pushing buttons are mentally challenged and must be protected from all sides all the time.

eikonoklastes wrote:

Tom Early wrote:None of this would work if you had your mismatched frame rate set to either Final Cut Pro X or None.

What are these settings, Tom?

They are in Conform Options, and must be set before importing any footage (though you can always select everything in your project, Cut it, adjust settings, then paste).


Info in the Resolve 18 Beta manual p1002, or search for "Mixed frame rate format". The description is a bit confusing though. Basically, 4 options: Final Cut Pro 7, Resolve (default), Final Cut Pro X, and None.

The main difference is that FCP7 or Resolve will handle things like most other editors, so if you have a 24fps clip and put it into a 25fps timeline, there will be 1 repeated frame every second so that the source clip takes up the same amount of time in the timeline. You can also change the fps for the source clip in Clip Attributes.

FCPX or None, on the other hand, do not allow you to change the source clip frame rate in Clip Attributes, and will instead conform themselves frame for frame into any timeline you put them in. So you can have a 23.98fps timeline and a 25fps timeline, and use the same source clip for both, whereas with the other settings you'd have to duplicate the source. This means though that if you put a 24fps clip into a 25fps timeline, it will become shorter over time (i.e. play back faster) because 1 second of the source is 24fps which at 25fps is less than 1 second.

There are pros and cons of each depending on your workflow, and the manual doesn't go into how it affects audio when using either setting, or if you use 'Resolve' but then change the frame rate. And there is the odd quirk such as with None, if you Replace-edit it into a timeline of a different frame rate, it will probably not line up how you had it in the source so you'll need to slip the footage after the Replace.

With regards to changing the timeline frame rate afterwards, then if you use FCPX/None, select all/cut/change/paste will make things look the same in terms of clip layout, but in fact the clips will have slipped, and if there isn't enough source frames then the last one will be repeated, and if you then move the edit it will suddenly snap to the last source frame and leave a gap in your timeline. Assuming this is fixed, you'd still be left with gaps in your timeline that you'd have to fill either with new footage or retiming; or worse still would be if Resolve would retime all clips automatically and you'd end up having to reset everything. There is a situation where you would want to retime things like this, such as when converting a 23.98 edit to 25fps while still having full control over what gets retimed and what doesn't, but even then you'd retain the original timeline, and create the new one with new individual clips rendered from the original source (otherwise optical flow would get funky at cut points), so there wouldn't really be an advantage to being able to change the frame rate with footage already in it.

Tom Early wrote:They are in Conform Options, and must be set before importing any footage (though you can always select everything in your project, Cut it, adjust settings, then paste).

Thanks for that.

I guess if your conform settings would break your timeline, then either Resolve puts up a flashy warning about that, or just disables the ability to alter the timeline's frame rate, like how it is now.

The default settings will not break your timeline when you change its frame rate, so I'm still in favour of having that option.