Adjustment Layers (Adjustment Clips)

An Adjustment Clip is a transparent piece of media that applies its visual effects to all tracks physically underneath it on the timeline. While Adjustment Clips are placed on the Edit Timeline, their true power is unlocked when you open them in the Compositor Workspace.

How Adjustment Clips Work

Imagine you have a complex sequence with 5 video tracks:

  • V1 is the background.
  • V2 is the actor.
  • V3 is a text title.
  • V4 is a lens flare.

You decide you want to apply a VHS distortion effect to the entire scene, so that the text, the actor, and the background all warp together. Applying the effect 4 separate times to 4 separate clips is inefficient and mathematically incorrect (the blur on the text wouldn't interact with the blur on the background).

Instead, you use an Adjustment Clip on V5.

Creating an Adjustment Clip

  1. Open the Effects Library panel.
  2. Navigate to the Effects category.
  3. Drag an Adjustment Clip onto a blank track at the very top of your timeline stack.
  4. Drag the edges of the Adjustment Clip to cover the entire duration of the scene.

Compositing inside an Adjustment Clip

  1. Park your playhead over the Adjustment Clip on the timeline.
  2. Switch to the Compositor Workspace.
  3. You will see a MediaIn1 node connected to a MediaOut1 node.
    • Crucial Concept: In an Adjustment Clip, MediaIn1 represents a completely flattened, flattened composite of everything beneath it on the timeline.

You can now insert nodes between MediaIn1 and MediaOut1.

  • Add a LensDistortion node.
  • Add a FilmGrain node.

When you switch back to the Edit Workspace, the distortion and grain will be uniformly applied to V1, V2, V3, and V4.

Limiting Adjustment Clips

By default, an Adjustment Clip affects everything below it. If you only want it to affect V1 and V2, but leave V3 and V4 untouched, you must physically reorganize your timeline. Place the Adjustment Clip on V3, and move the text and lens flares to V4 and V5 (above the Adjustment Clip). Oraphim's top-down rendering engine ensures layers above the Adjustment Clip remain unaffected.