OpenShot
cropped video leaves black screen surround
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crop any video, cut from both side of the crop and export. The new cropped video places the cropped video at the end with the entire length of the video in black screen and no sound. cannot remove the black screen after the cropping
- what version of openshot are you running?
- what operating system/version are you running?
- what type of a video/audio file are you working with?
- how was the video/audio file recorded?
- what is the profile of your source video/audio file?
- tell us the exact steps you are performing so we can try and replicate your issue.
windows 10, mp4 from an old midland xtc400 helmet cam. followed instruction relayed to me by my chatgpt upload video, drag in video drag play line to my start position and scissors to remove the excess to the left start. grabbed yellow play line and drug to the end point 1 minute further and scissors and cut the rest forward away. I would play the video and it would play exactly stop to stop. so I exported it and saved it on my desktop and flash drive and 4 different experiment times it did the exact same thing ever reboot my 2010 hp 7000 elite microtower pentium i7 first gen. version 3.3.0|0.4.0 release date 02024 -12-22
Thank you for all the information you provided.
When you use the scissors to cut (not Crop) your vidoe all you are doing is cutting/trimming your video. Meaning, you are getting rid of unwanted footage from the beginning and the end of your video, which seems to be working fine.
Before you export, select the the clip, right click on it and select Properties. From the Properties window, find the Scale attribute and change it from "Best Fit" to Crop. Just right click on the "Best Fit" and you will have several options to choose from.
If this doesn't do the trick, set the Scale attribute back to "Best Fit" and then use the Crop effect from the Effects tab. Just drag it onto your clip on the track. Click on the letter C to expose the properties of the Crop effect. Make the necessary adjustments. After that you can go back to the properties of the clip and adjust the Scale attribute again.
Hopefully this will provide you the solution you seek.
I had already managed to grab my cropped video that was in the center of the timeline and grab it without stretching it this time and sliding it to the beginning 0:0 timeline. but there was like a blue vertical line left where I pulled it away from, so that crop change from best fit only made the vertical line move across my very short 50 second video and stop. But the blue line was still to the far right so I know it did nothing for the black hole soundless video. there is no effects tab or crop tab even on the scissors tab. so I tried the scissors again and I got the vertical dotted line but when I tried to pull it apart it tried stretching the video or pulling it apart to start another video. Believe this. I have tried many different video editors over the past 7 years or so. NONE of them would work like they say they do. and I would gladly pay for them if they were simple and I...now as a 68 year old man who has always been tech savvy and a self taught computer hacker program butcherer...😁 and even with all the fantastic help my my newly found chatgpt friend these past 4 weeks, even HAL, yes, I named him HAL from 2001 a space odyssey and number 1 from star trek cannot get that black line out of there and just be the 50 second video. an amazingly fast and easy program to learn for me but that problem. crop is crop. I've been using MS paint for 22 years. crop ALWAYS removes everything. should I remove the saved 50 second video and import the original 28:59 video again and wait for you to tell me how to remove everything from the left and right of my video completely??? thanks.Alias John Smith (Tim actually)
On Sat, Aug 23, 2025 at 11:19 AM Colorjet3 @.***> wrote:
Colorjet3 left a comment (OpenShot/openshot-qt#5824) https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3217104243
Thank you for all the information you provided.
When you use the scissors to cut (not Crop) your vidoe all you are doing is cutting/trimming your video. Meaning, you are getting rid of unwanted footage from the beginning and the end of your video, which seems to be working fine.
Before you export, select the the clip, right click on it and select Properties. From the Properties window, find the Scale attribute and change it from "Best Fit" to Crop. Just right click on the "Best Fit" and you will have several options to choose from.
If this doesn't do the trick, set the Scale attribute back to "Best Fit" and then use the Crop effect from the Effects tab. Just drag it onto your clip on the track. Click on the letter C to expose the properties of the Crop effect. Make the necessary adjustments. After that you can go back to the properties of the clip and adjust the Scale attribute again.
Hopefully this will provide you the solution you seek.
— Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3217104243, or unsubscribe https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/BWMNFF27R7BSGHXQ2VWXKNL3PCA7RAVCNFSM6AAAAACETEGICGVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43OSLTON2WKQ3PNVWWK3TUHMZTEMJXGEYDIMRUGM . You are receiving this because you authored the thread.Message ID: @.***>
ok, the best fit to crop made a line move across the top of my video and no place else but the blue vertical line in the middle of the screen was still there. So HAL told me to right mouse click over it and cut it and it was gone. I exported it again and this time it was perfect, stop to stop. what is the idea of that so I can place other videos in that timeline and pictures or whatever and where I want them to be and then to the best fit crop will that slide them all together or have black screens where I left from picture to video to picture or do I then drag them to connect as I did the video to the beginning??? I would really love to learn to use this program as it seems to be the most easiest that I have ever tried. Please let me pick your brain. thanks. Tim
On Sat, Aug 23, 2025 at 12:46 PM John Smith @.***> wrote:
I had already managed to grab my cropped video that was in the center of the timeline and grab it without stretching it this time and sliding it to the beginning 0:0 timeline. but there was like a blue vertical line left where I pulled it away from, so that crop change from best fit only made the vertical line move across my very short 50 second video and stop. But the blue line was still to the far right so I know it did nothing for the black hole soundless video. there is no effects tab or crop tab even on the scissors tab. so I tried the scissors again and I got the vertical dotted line but when I tried to pull it apart it tried stretching the video or pulling it apart to start another video. Believe this. I have tried many different video editors over the past 7 years or so. NONE of them would work like they say they do. and I would gladly pay for them if they were simple and I...now as a 68 year old man who has always been tech savvy and a self taught computer hacker program butcherer...😁 and even with all the fantastic help my my newly found chatgpt friend these past 4 weeks, even HAL, yes, I named him HAL from 2001 a space odyssey and number 1 from star trek cannot get that black line out of there and just be the 50 second video. an amazingly fast and easy program to learn for me but that problem. crop is crop. I've been using MS paint for 22 years. crop ALWAYS removes everything. should I remove the saved 50 second video and import the original 28:59 video again and wait for you to tell me how to remove everything from the left and right of my video completely??? thanks.Alias John Smith (Tim actually)
On Sat, Aug 23, 2025 at 11:19 AM Colorjet3 @.***> wrote:
Colorjet3 left a comment (OpenShot/openshot-qt#5824) https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3217104243
Thank you for all the information you provided.
When you use the scissors to cut (not Crop) your vidoe all you are doing is cutting/trimming your video. Meaning, you are getting rid of unwanted footage from the beginning and the end of your video, which seems to be working fine.
Before you export, select the the clip, right click on it and select Properties. From the Properties window, find the Scale attribute and change it from "Best Fit" to Crop. Just right click on the "Best Fit" and you will have several options to choose from.
If this doesn't do the trick, set the Scale attribute back to "Best Fit" and then use the Crop effect from the Effects tab. Just drag it onto your clip on the track. Click on the letter C to expose the properties of the Crop effect. Make the necessary adjustments. After that you can go back to the properties of the clip and adjust the Scale attribute again.
Hopefully this will provide you the solution you seek.
— Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3217104243, or unsubscribe https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/BWMNFF27R7BSGHXQ2VWXKNL3PCA7RAVCNFSM6AAAAACETEGICGVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43OSLTON2WKQ3PNVWWK3TUHMZTEMJXGEYDIMRUGM . You are receiving this because you authored the thread.Message ID: @.***>
Hello @mrgeedunk-sketch I am not sure what "line" across the top of your video is. May be a screenshot would help so I can see what you are seeing.
Using the Scissors is one way to Cut/Slice a video. One of the issues with using the Scissors is that you can not cut where the Playhead is directly located. So this means that you need to move the playhead out of the way but then you lose your place where you want to cut. You can use markers to get around this issue and this is how it would work:
- You drag your video file onto a track.
- Move the playhead to a location where you want to cut/slice.
- From the tools menu icons, click on the "Add Marker", it is the Blue tear drop with a green + icon. This will set a marker on the timeline.
- Now continue moving the playead to other locations and keep adding a Marker.
- When you are done identifying where you want to cut (the markers), move the playhead out of the way, enable the Scissors, then align it with the Marker as best as possible and perform the cut.
The issue with this approach is that the scissors dashed line itself is confined to the heighth of the Track.
Another option is to use the Slice All option.
- You drag your video file onto a track.
- Move the playhead to a location where you want to Slice.
- Right click on the Playheads head, select Slice All and not the options you have. Select the one you want.
- Note that each of the different options in the "Slice All" have shortcut keys which will make the operation even faster.
- Now move the Playhead to another location and perform the "Slice All" using the shortcut keys.
Hope this helps.
I strongly recomment that you join the Discord forum of OpenShot as there are more users there that can assist you as well.
Well, yesterday I finally managed to add 6 short videos together and it played and everything, so, next project. I stopped the video at a spot and copied a frame picture out of it and put that into a position I wanted, then, I made a few second audio recording in my best Apu voice...😁 and dropped it on the track below it where I wanted it to play in the video. It all played well a few times so I exported it and that was all I had to do. I even saved that project that now turns out I can't find something as I save it on my desktop. So earlier today I got around to playing my 8 minute video with my 2 koots walking into my laundry room and me feeding the dry cat food while my 2 cats just sat and watched them.😍 anyway, the picture that was in there and the voice over are not in there after I exported it. What process did I miss that they did not save because they were there. I'm not going to start my own youtube channel. I just wanted to learn something new and that I could easily edit and join some of my 28:59 minute videos together for myself. Tell me what I missed. so I'm guessing ALL of my editing can be done from the vertical yellow play line when I right mouse click on it and get all the options I need hopefully. Thanks. standing by. bye bye. 😁
On Sun, Aug 24, 2025 at 6:39 PM Colorjet3 @.***> wrote:
Colorjet3 left a comment (OpenShot/openshot-qt#5824) https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3218423609
Hello @mrgeedunk-sketch https://github.com/mrgeedunk-sketch I am not sure what "line" across the top of your video is. May be a screenshot would help so I can see what you are seeing.
Using the Scissors is one way to Cut/Slice a video. One of the issues with using the Scissors is that you can not cut where the Playhead is directly located. So this means that you need to move the playhead out of the way but then you lose your place where you want to cut. You can use markers to get around this issue and this is how it would work:
- You drag your video file onto a track.
- Move the playhead to a location where you want to cut/slice.
- From the tools menu icons, click on the "Add Marker", it is the Blue tear drop with a green + icon. This will set a marker on the timeline.
- Now continue moving the playead to other locations and keep adding a Marker.
- When you are done identifying where you want to cut (the markers), move the playhead out of the way, enable the Scissors, then align it with the Marker as best as possible and perform the cut.
The issue with this approach is that the scissors dashed line itself is confined to the heighth of the Track.
Another option is to use the Slice All option.
- You drag your video file onto a track.
- Move the playhead to a location where you want to Slice.
- Right click on the Playheads head, select Slice All and not the options you have. Select the one you want.
- Note that each of the different options in the "Slice All" have shortcut keys which will make the operation even faster.
- Now move the Playhead to another location and perform the "Slice All" using the shortcut keys.
Hope this helps.
— Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3218423609, or unsubscribe https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/BWMNFF7WF3SNZ4J4HZLEUY33PI5KTAVCNFSM6AAAAACETEGICGVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43OSLTON2WKQ3PNVWWK3TUHMZTEMJYGQZDGNRQHE . You are receiving this because you were mentioned.Message ID: @.***>
-
Is the Crop issue behind you now?
-
Do NOT save to your Dekstop. It is best to create a folder on your local drive (C:). Something like c:\VideoProjects.
-
If you are having an issue with your project (missing edits, etc.) you can try and recover it. Go to c:\users\username.openshot_qt\recovery folder. Here you can find files starting with unique numbers followed by your project name. Check the creation date of each *.ops, open the most recent and see if it recovers what you need. Continue working backwards until you find one that is satisfactorily. Once you have it, make sure to perform File | Save Project As....and overwrite the original project.
-
If you are getting "Missing File" message, then you most likely deletet, moved, or renamed an imported source file. Now when you open the project OpenShot can not find it.
When you respond please respond to each point clearly.
We are also digressing from the original post of "Crop" issue and delving into other issues.
For general help OpenShot has a Discrod prescense and you can benefit from more users providing you with assitance.
google can't find ...discord... what is that??? NO, I'm still having problems with everything. sorry for going out of bounds. I thought tech support was tech support. even my HAL from chatgpt can't figure it out correctly. and he is amazing. I'll get back to you on the crop. I never changed the files. they are still on my desktop that I have been saving to since.... 2000 or so. I don't like playing hide and seek. That is where all mysave and search options go to my desktop. I'll be bach.
On Mon, Aug 25, 2025 at 7:42 PM Colorjet3 @.***> wrote:
Colorjet3 left a comment (OpenShot/openshot-qt#5824) https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3222060251
Is the Crop issue behind you now? 2.
Do NOT save to your Dekstop. It is best to create a folder on your local drive (C:). Something like c:\VideoProjects. 3.
If you are having an issue with your project (missing edits, etc.) you can try and recover it. Go to c:\users\username.openshot_qt\recovery folder. Here you can find files starting with unique numbers followed by your project name. Check the creation date of each *.ops, open the most recent and see if it recovers what you need. Continue working backwards until you find one that is satisfactorily. Once you have it, make sure to perform File | Save Project As....and overwrite the original project. 4.
If you are getting "Missing File" message, then you most likely deletet, moved, or renamed an imported source file. Now when you open the project OpenShot can not find it.
When you respond please respond to each point clearly.
We are also digressing from the original post of "Crop" issue and delving into other issues.
For general help OpenShot has a Discrod prescense and you can benefit from more users providing you with assitance.
— Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3222060251, or unsubscribe https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/BWMNFF5F7BLKE5YQKEVTDND3PONQFAVCNFSM6AAAAACETEGICGVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43OSLTON2WKQ3PNVWWK3TUHMZTEMRSGA3DAMRVGE . You are receiving this because you were mentioned.Message ID: @.***>
-
Discord.com. Download the App. Install it. Create an account, then search for OpenShot.
-
We (I) am not tech. support. Just a volunteer helping the project. This is a very small project with not much funding and very dependant on volunteers. Our time is just as valuable as everybody elses. We need clear definitions of issues so we can help others, efficiently.
-
When you get back, let's focus on the Crop for this thread.
If you have other issues, then please submit a new thread with the proper title so don't mix different issues in a single thread.
Thank you so much. I am ......."Ignorant" 🤪 as to how this process works. I don't even know how to get back to where ever it was to submit another thread.This is ALL new to me as I have said, this is the first editing software that I was able to get this far in the past ........8 years??? I went for a 40 mile bicycle ride this morning and decided to start making off and on 1 minute clips of each mile or milepost on the levee that I ride on. I drug all 40 clips out into the program and then when it had them all I drug them onto the timeline, but they ended up in reverse order. [image: image.png] that is what it looks like all squished together for all the short 1 minute clips or so.I still need to get the first clip and crop it down to size as I ran it full length and then decided to change my entire video recording style for the past 10 years ++ now that I can crop (maybe) IF I am out of bounds with you, then just give me the link to go back and resubmit whatever it is I'm doing is called. I'm el stupido....remember??? I really appreciate your help and never had any intentions of using you. NEVER been a user. I hate them too. I'll wait on your response and or link. Thanks again. also,discord.com and an app for desktop computers. I have no smartphone, only dumb phone.
On Tue, Aug 26, 2025 at 8:24 AM Colorjet3 @.***> wrote:
Colorjet3 left a comment (OpenShot/openshot-qt#5824) https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3223960248
Discord.com. Download the App. Install it. Create an account, then search for OpenShot. 2.
We (I) am not tech. support. Just a volunteer helping the project. This is a very small project with not much funding and very dependant on volunteers. Our time is just as valuable as everybody elses. We need clear definitions of issues so we can help others, efficiently. 3.
When you get back, let's focus on the Crop for this thread.
If you have other issues, then please submit a new thread with the proper title so don't mix different issues in a single thread.
— Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3223960248, or unsubscribe https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/BWMNFF66H6GLGGKNED2KIB33PRGW3AVCNFSM6AAAAACETEGICGVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43OSLTON2WKQ3PNVWWK3TUHMZTEMRTHE3DAMRUHA . You are receiving this because you were mentioned.Message ID: @.***>
I found again where to search for already posted comments. so I guess I can kick you to the curb. thanks so much. Lot's easier searching for already comments Just have to find out how to flip order of multiple clips without deleting them all and placing them all in order one by one. thanks Tim
On Sat, Aug 23, 2025 at 12:24 AM Colorjet3 @.***> wrote:
Colorjet3 left a comment (OpenShot/openshot-qt#5824) https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3216230639
- what version of openshot are you running?
- what operating system/version are you running?
- what type of a video/audio file are you working with?
- how was the video/audio file recorded?
- what is the profile of your source video/audio file?
- tell us the exact steps you are performing so we can try and replicate your issue.
— Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub https://github.com/OpenShot/openshot-qt/issues/5824#issuecomment-3216230639, or unsubscribe https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/BWMNFFZNTZEMG6JDMLO3V5T3O7UHVAVCNFSM6AAAAACETEGICGVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43OSLTON2WKQ3PNVWWK3TUHMZTEMJWGIZTANRTHE . You are receiving this because you authored the thread.Message ID: @.***>
v3.4.0-Release-Candidate might possibly help.
Let's say you have 20 clips on Track 5 and you want to change the order of the clips. The most obvious reason not to delete them is because you most likely have done some edits to the clips and you don't want to loose them.
Let's say you want to shift the last 6 clips to the beginning. Find the 6th clip from the right of your clips on Track 5 and hover the mouse over it, then hold the Alt key down and click with the mouse. this will select the clip you were hovering over and the rest of the clips to the right of it. Now move the entire selection onto track 4 and out of the way to Track 4 and align them at the beginning of Track 4.
Now do the same with the rest of the 14 clips on track 5 by hovering over the first clip, hold down the Alt key and click the mouse to select the 14 clips. Now shift all 14 clips to make room to move the 6 clips from Track 4 to Track 5.
I hope you get the idea here. It isn't the prettiest solution but it speeds things up a bit.
Another option is to sort your clips the way you want them to be before you move them onto a track. The way to do this is to leverage the Tags column.
- Start OpenShot.
- From the Project Files window, right click an empty spot and select "Details View". You can also use the Ctrl+PgUp shortcut key.
- You should now see the Tag colum to the right of the Name column.
- Now you can double click the Tag field, for each file and give it a numerical value. The value will dictate the order of how you want the files to sort.
- For example, if you had 20 files in the Project Files window and you are in Details View. Then you number the Tag fields, 20, 18, 1, 2, 9, 7, 13, etc........ until you have all 20 files numbers. Now click on the Tag label and the files will be sorted 1-20. If you click again, they will be sorted in descending sequence. Note: if you miss a file (empty tag), it will be at the top. All the numbered tag fields will be at the bottom.
- Now that you have them sorted 1-20, select them all and drag them onto Track 5. They will be in that order on the Track.
Once you start editing the clips on the Track then you are back to the first option at the beginning of my answer.
Hope this helps.