Add Tab

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1. Add tab
2. Delete tab - if there is only one tab left, it will remove the panel
3. Search tab by name
4. Pick a panel to open it in a new tab

You can also middle click a tab to close it. A highlight shows which tab is about to close.

Relocate Tab

Drag on the tab name to relocate tab

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1. Split panel and put the new panel before the target panel
2. Append tab in the target panel
3. Split panel and put the new panel after the target panel
4. Insert panel before the target panel
5. Insert panel after the target panel

Panel Windows

Panels do not have to stay in the main window. Drag a tab out and it becomes its own floating window. Drag its tab back into any other window to dock it again, with the same split and append controls as inside a panel.

• Move panel to its own window in the Command Palette pops out the focused panel
• Media drags cross windows: pick a file up in one window and drop it on a timeline or Monitor in another
• Floating panel windows are part of the layout. Save one and they come back, see Layouts below

Put the Monitor on a second display, or keep the Media panel and Inspector on their own screen while the timeline fills the main one.

Layouts

The Layout dropdown at the right end of the title bar holds named panel arrangements. A layout stores the whole workspace: every panel, split, and tab, floating panel windows, and the Media panel's columns and sorting.

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1. The dropdown shows the active layout's name, with an asterisk once you change the arrangement
2. + New layout saves the current arrangement under a name
3. Click a layout in the list to apply it
4. f The save button on the active layout's row overwrites it with the current arrangement
5. Delete a layout from its row. Blick asks for confirmation

Layouts belong to the app, not the project. They apply to whatever project is open and are stored as .blick-layout files next to Blick's configuration.

Import Media

There are 4 ways to import media, it could be a video file, an audio file or an image

• Drag from file explorer / Finder and release it in the media panel
• Drag a single file from file explorer / Finder straight onto the timeline. Blick imports it and places the clip where you drop it in one step
• Title bar > File > Import Media
• Keyboard shortcut: Ctrl+I

Media is ready to use as soon as you import it. Video plays and scrubs without waiting for an index, see Instant playback under Playhead.

Add Clip to timeline

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Import clip by dragging from a media panel to the timeline

1. If the media contains multiple video/audio streams, and you only want to add a specific stream to the timeline, you can drag the stream. The streams can be opened by clicking the triangle in the beginning of the media file.
2. Drag the media item from the media panel
3. Drag the media item to the timeline, it will show a preview of where the clip will be placed

Release the drag to place the clip in the timeline.

A file with several streams creates one clip per stream when dropped. Video streams stack on video tracks, audio streams on audio tracks, and the clips land linked together.

The Media Table

Media is listed as a table with Name, Duration, Frame Rate, Clips, Status, Proxy, Type, Date Modified, and Path columns. The table supports sorting, filtering, and selection:

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1. Click a column header to sort by it, click again to flip the direction. Sort several columns at once by clicking more headers, the first one you clicked takes priority
2. Drag a header to reorder columns, drag the divider between headers to resize them
3. Each column has a search field under its header. Type to filter the list to matching entries, combine fields to narrow down further
4. The clear button resets all filters
5. Click to select, right click drag to box select, Ctrl to add single files, Shift for a range, Ctrl+A for everything while the panel is focused. Double click a media item to open it in a Monitor player
6. Each row shows how many clips on the timeline use that media. Hovering a row highlights those clips in the timeline
7. The Status column shows whether a file is Ready, Loading, Not Found on disk, or being removed
8. The Proxy column shows whether a file plays its proxy or its source, see Proxies below
9. The Type column shows the kind of file: Video, Image, Audio, or Font

Blick does not analyze a file until you put it on the timeline. Importing a big batch is instant. Waveforms, Überblick strips, and frame indexes are built the first time a file gets used.

Proxies

A proxy is a lower resolution copy of a media file. While a file uses its proxy, Blick plays, edits, and renders with the proxy instead of the source. Proxies place less load on playback, which helps with high resolution or high bit rate footage. A proxy never changes the source file.

Each media file has a source and, optionally, a linked proxy, and uses one of the two at a time. Blick can generate proxies for you, or you can link a file you made yourself.

Switch between proxy and source

Click a file's Proxy column in the Media table to switch it between its proxy and its source, or drag across several rows to switch them together. Right click a selection and choose Use proxies or Use sources, or run Enable proxies or Disable proxies to switch every file at once. Renders use whichever file is active. Switch back to the sources before a final render: the Render panel shows how many media items will render from proxies.

Right click the empty space under the files for the commands that work on the whole project:

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1. Link proxies by name: match imported media to proxy files by file name in one pass
2. Use proxies: every file plays its proxy
3. Use sources: every file plays its source

Fonts as Media

Font files are project media too. Import a .ttf, .otf, or .ttc by dropping it onto the Media panel, dragging it in from your file explorer, or hitting Import Font in a text clip's Text Content effect. Imported fonts sit in the Media panel alongside your video and audio, with collection files listing their faces underneath. They save with the project.

• Imported fonts appear in the font picker of every text clip alongside your system fonts
• Drag a font from the Media panel, or straight from your file explorer, onto the timeline to create a text clip in that font
• Select a font to see its file, face count, and face index in the Inspector panel

Right click a font for its context menu Context Menu:

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1. Relocate media: point the font at a different file on disk
2. Remove font: take the font out of the project
3. Remove font and clips: take the font out of the project and delete the text clips that use it

Context Menu

Right click on a media or media stream. Grey entries do not apply to the selection.

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Navigating the Timeline

The timeline uses one small set of mouse rules, plus a few modes you turn on by holding a key.

The selected track

The timeline keeps one selected track in the video section and one in the audio section, and highlights the current one. Click a track to select it, or move the selection with Up/Down. The selection crosses between the video and audio sections when it reaches the boundary, and Tab jumps it straight to the other section.

The selected track is the reference point for track work:

• Left/Right jump the playhead between clip edges on the selected track
• Alt+L, Alt+M, and Alt+S toggle lock, mute (hide on video tracks), and solo on the selected track
• Ctrl+Shift+Left/Ctrl+Shift+Right select every clip before or after the playhead on the selected track, add Alt to do it across all tracks
• Pasted clips land relative to the selected tracks, see Select clips
• Insert a new track next to the selected one with Ctrl+Shift+N: above it in the video section, below it in the audio section
• Move the selected track, with everything on it, up or down with Ctrl+Shift+Up/Ctrl+Shift+Down
• Click a track's name in its header to rename it
• Delete a track from its right click menu. The confirmation dialog states how many clips will be deleted with it.

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1. Delete Track: delete the track and the clips on it. It is grey when the track is the last one of its kind

Timeline Context Menu

Right click empty space on a track. The playhead moves to that point and the track under the cursor becomes the selected track, so a paste lands there. Right click a gap between two clips and the gap menu opens instead, see Deleting gaps.

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1. Paste clip(s): paste the copied clips at the playhead. It is grey when nothing is copied
2. Add color clip: place a color clip at the playhead, see Create Color Clip

Playhead

Move the playhead by clicking or scrubing on the empty spaces in the timeline (the area that has no tracks) or on the timeline ruler, Blick will highlight the ruler to indicate the the area that you can interact with.

Playhead in Blick always line up with the frame rate of the project (Can be modified in Render Panel > Sequence frame rate). You can move the playhead 1 frame forwards by ., and backwards by ,

The video shows a user viewing a 4k video frame by frame

More Actions

• Play/Pause video by hitting Space
• Jump one second forward/backward by hitting Shift+./Shift+,
• Jump to start/end of timeline by hitting Ctrl+Left/Ctrl+Right
• Zoom the timeline in or out around the playhead by hitting =/-
• Jump to the previous/next clip edge on the selected track by hitting Left/Right
• Move the track selection up/down by hitting Up/Down

The transport controls sit at the top left of the panel. Narrow timelines hide some of them, drag the divider between the track headers and the clips to show them all.

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1. The playhead time
2. The playback speed and direction, see Shuttle. It is grey at 1x
3. Record audio onto the selected audio track, see Recording Audio
4. Jump to the start of the timeline
5. Play or pause
6. Jump to the end of the timeline
7. c What happens at the end of playback: stop there, or stop and return to where playback started

Select clips

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1. Click to select a clip

Ctrl+C copies the selected clip. Ctrl+V pastes the clip at the playhead. The playhead is moved to the end of the clip after pasting.

• Select every clip with Ctrl+A. Clear the selection with Esc or by clicking empty timeline space
• Press V or Shift+V to select the clip under the playhead on the selected track, hold Shift to add it to the selection instead
• Select every clip before or after the playhead on the selected track with Ctrl+Shift+Left/Ctrl+Shift+Right. Add Alt to cover all tracks. Use it to shift everything downstream of an insert

Selecting multiple clips with right click drag

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1. Right click drag to box select multiple clips

Copy and paste works too! The playhead is moved to the end of the selected group after pasting.

Selecting multiple clips with Shift+Click/Shift+Drag

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1. Previously selected group of clips
2. Hold Shift while clicking or box selecting to add more clips to the selection

Link clips

Link clips to select and move a group of clips at once. When you add a video file that contains an audio stream and video stream to the timeline, Blick will automatically link both the video and audio clips.

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1. [ The link icon on the clips denotes that they are linked.
2. When you select one of the linked clips, all clips in the linked group are highlighted.

Link selected clips together with Context Menu > Link clips, or unlink them with Context Menu > Unlink clips, so the selected linked group is destroyed.

How to select one clip that is inside a linked group?

Normally, selecting one clip in a linked group results in selecting every clip in the group.

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1. Unlink Mode - Hold Alt+Click/Alt+Drag to select only the clip(s) that you want, even if it belongs to a linked group. This action does not remove the clip from the linked group. You can confirm that you are in Unlink Mode by checking the keyboard mode indicators in the bottom-left of the timeline panel.
2. [ The Unlink chip lights up while the mode is active.

Move clips

Drag a clip to move it. Drag up or down to place it on another track, and drop it above the top track to create a new track for it. When several clips are selected, they move together and keep their relative positions.

• Clips always land on output video frames, which keeps cuts frame accurate
• While dragging, clip edges snap to the edges of other clips and to the playhead. Set the snap distance in Title bar > Settings Menu > Timeline > Snapping threshold, 0 turns snapping off
• Hold Shift when you start dragging to duplicate the selected clips instead of moving them. The originals stay in place and the copies follow your cursor, links included
• Locked tracks do not accept clips

Edit clips

Hold Ctrl and drag across the timeline to select a time range instead of whole clips. The selection clings to clip content, add Alt to select across empty space as well, and add Shift to keep previous ranges while selecting more. Delete a range to cut that span out of the clips underneath it, or copy it with Ctrl+C and paste it at the playhead with Ctrl+V.

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1. The selected range covers part of the clips under it
2. The Range chip lights up while you hold Ctrl

Right click a range for its menu:

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Hold S to enter Knife mode, then click a clip to split it in two at the cursor. The cut lands on a project frame. You can also press B to split the selected clips at the playhead. Hold Shift as well to cut through every track at once.

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1. The line shows where the click splits the clip
2. The Knife chip lights up while you hold S

Drag the left or right edge of a clip to trim it. Video and audio clips stop at the bounds of their source media. Image and text clips extend as far as you want. Trimmed edges snap the same way moved clips do, and a ghost of the clip's previous extent stays visible while you drag. Hovering a trim handle also shows the matching handles on the linked clips that trim with it.

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1. Trim clips by dragging the beginning or end of a clip

Trim the clip under the playhead to the playhead without dragging. Press Shift+Q to trim its start to the playhead, and Shift+E to trim its end. These leave a gap where the trimmed part was. The ripple versions, Q and E, close the gap instead, see Ripple Editing.

Clip Context Menu

Right click a clip for its menu. Grey entries do not apply to the clip.

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Ripple Editing

A ripple edit trims or deletes content and shifts every clip after the edit point to the left, on all unlocked tracks. No gap is left at the edit point.

Ripple trim

Hold A and drag the edge of a clip. The clip trims as usual, and everything after the edit follows the moving edge. Press or release A while dragging to switch the trim between rippling and leaving a gap.

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1. Drag the edge to trim the clip
2. The clips after the edit follow the moving edge
3. The Ripple chip lights up while the mode is active

Deleting gaps

Right click the empty space between two clips on a track. Blick selects the gap as a range and opens its menu. Choose Ripple delete range(s) and the gap closes. You can also place the playhead over a gap on the selected track and press Shift+W.

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1. The gap, selected as a range
2. Ripple delete range(s) closes the gap

Slip clips

Hold D and drag horizontally inside a clip to slide the source material under it. The clip keeps its position and duration on the timeline, only the part of the source you see changes. Slipping needs spare material beyond the clip bounds, so it only works on clips trimmed shorter than their source.

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1. Drag inside the clip to slide its source material
2. The Slip chip lights up while you hold D

Rate Stretch

Hold R and drag the left or right edge of a clip to change its speed. Instead of trimming, the clip keeps all of its source material and plays it faster or slower to fit the new length: drag the edge outward and the clip slows down, drag it inward and it speeds up. Audio clips stretch too, with pitch preserved.

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1. Drag a clip edge to change its speed
2. Stretched clips are marked on the timeline with their speed. Right click a clip and choose Reset clip speed to return it to 1x Context Menu
3. A reversed clip shows a negative speed, see Reverse clips below
4. The Rate stretch chip lights up while you hold R

• Linked clips and multi-selections stretch together, keeping video and its audio in sync. Hold Alt to stretch one clip out of a linked group
• While dragging, the edge snaps to other clips and to the point where speed is exactly 1x

Rate Stretch changes the clip and is baked into the render. To preview at another speed without touching your clips, use the shuttle controls.

Delete clips

Delete the selected clips by pressing Del or Backspace or X, or with Click on clip > Context Menu > Delete clip(s). Deleting a range selection removes just that span from the clips underneath it.

Scroll

The timeline scrolls and zooms with the mouse wheel plus modifier keys. The defaults are listed below, and you can swap which modifier does what in Title bar > Settings Menu > Keybindings > Timeline scroll wheel.

• Scroll vertically Scroll
• Scroll horizontally Alt+Scroll
• Pan horizontally Middle Scroll
• Zoom vertically Shift+Scroll
• Zoom horizontally Ctrl+Scroll

Clip transitions

Transitions blend a clip in or out over a set duration. Video, image, and text clips take Fade In and Fade Out, a linear opacity ramp. Audio clips take Ramp In and Ramp Out, a linear volume ramp.

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1. A Fade In at the start of a video clip
2. A Ramp Out at the end of an audio clip
3. Drag the inner edge of a transition to change its duration

• Add a transition: right click a clip and choose Add Fade In or Add Fade Out (Add Ramp In and Add Ramp Out on audio clips) Context Menu
• With several clips selected, adding a transition applies it to every selected clip at once

New transitions start at 1.5 seconds. A transition can cover at most the whole clip.

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1. Remove a transition: right click the transition and choose Delete Transition

Keyframe Editor

Keyframes change the value of an effect parameter over time. Each keyframe is a point on a curve, and Blick reads the value along the curve between points. The keyframe editor expands below the selected clip and shows one lane for every keyframe enabled channel of its effects. Enable keyframes on a channel from the Effect panel, see Keyframe Controls.

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1. The selected clip. The editor shows the keyframes of the selected clips
2. Click the diamond to open the keyframe editor

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1. The view of the editor: Dope, Both, or Graph
2. The clip that the lanes below belong to
3. One card for each effect with keyframes
4. N A keyframe. Its shape shows its preset
5. Close the keyframe editor

Drag the divider above the editor or below it to give the editor more height.

Each lane starts with a header:

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1. The effect that the lanes belong to
2. One lane for each field with keyframes. Click a lane to show its curve in the curve editor. Right click it for the lane menu
3. The value of the field at the playhead
4. Jump to the previous keyframe of the lane
5. Add a keyframe at the playhead, or remove the keyframe that is at the playhead
6. Jump to the next keyframe of the lane
7. The smoothing knob, see Keyframe Controls in the Effect panel
8. N The keyframes of the lane

A narrow sidebar hides the arrows and the knob. Drag the divider between the lane headers and the lanes to show them.

Views: Dope sheet, Curve editor, Both

The three way toggle at the top of the editor sets the view.

• Dope: the dope sheet, a lane of keyframe points laid out in time.
• Graph: the curve editor, where each channel draws as an editable curve of value over time.
• Both: the dope sheet on top and the curve editor below.

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1. N The dope sheet
2. The curve editor. It shows the curve of the selected lane
3. Drag the divider to share the height between the two views

Presets

A preset sets the shape of the curve at a keyframe. Right click a keyframe and pick one. Each preset has its own keyframe shape:

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1. Linear: the value changes at a constant rate to the next keyframe
2. Hold: the value stays fixed until the next keyframe, then jumps
3. F Ease in: the value starts slow and speeds up
4. J Ease out: the value starts fast and slows down
5. N Easy ease: the value eases at both ends
6. X Swish: the value overshoots and settles back

Editing a keyframe's handles by hand sets its preset to Custom. A Custom keyframe has the shape of Easy ease.

Keyframe Context Menu

Right click a keyframe for its menu.

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#	Entry	Description
1	Value	The value of the keyframe. Drag or type to change it. It shows when one keyframe of a number field is selected.
2	Linear	Set the preset of the selected keyframes, see Presets.
3	Hold
4	Ease in
5	Ease out
6	Easy ease
7	Swish
8	Delete	Delete the selected keyframes.
9	Copy	Copy the selected keyframes, see Copying and pasting.

Handles

In the curve editor each keyframe has two tangent handles that shape the curve into and out of the point. The two handles mirror each other by default. Hold Alt while dragging a handle to break the pair so each handle moves on its own.

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1. Mirror: couple the two handles of the keyframe again
2. Remove: delete this handle

Components

A field with more than one component, such as Position or Scale, keeps a separate curve for each axis in one lane, keyed at the same times. Right click a lane and choose Decouple to key each component on its own, or Couple to join them again. A color channel eases as one and draws as a gradient strip.

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1. Decouple: key each component of the field on its own

Editing in the curve editor

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1. The selected lane. The curve editor shows its curves, one color for each component
2. The value ruler. Double click it to fit the curves into the view
3. N A keyframe. Drag it to move it in time and value
4. A tangent handle. Drag it to shape the curve

• Seek: left click or drag on empty graph space.
• Add a point: hold Shift and click a curve, or double click a curve.
• Remove a point: hold Alt and click a keyframe.
• Move a point: drag it. Dragging in time moves the whole selection; dragging in value moves the active channel.
• Move a handle: drag its dot.
• Pan and zoom: the mouse wheel pans the value axis, Shift+Wheel zooms it, Alt+Wheel pans time, and Ctrl+Wheel zooms time. The bindings are remappable under Settings > Keybindings > Timeline scroll wheel.

Right drag on empty graph space to box select keyframes. A transform box appears around the selection.

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1. Drag the edges and corners of the box to scale the keyframes in time and value. Hold Ctrl to scale about the center

Right click empty graph space for the curve editor menu.

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1. Fit view: fit the curves of the selected lane into the view. The menu also shows Paste keyframe(s) when you have copied keyframes

Create Text Clip

Hold T and click a video track to place a text clip there. You can also right click inside the Monitor panel and choose Add text clip.

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1. The ghost shows where the text clip lands. Click to place it
2. The Text chip lights up while you hold T

Select the text clip and open the Effect panel to type your text and set its font, size, and color under Text Content. Everywhere else, text clips behave like any visual clip: trim them to any length, move them, and apply effects and keyframes.

A new text clip takes the font, size, and color of the last text clip you selected. While you hold T, a ghost of the clip in those settings follows your cursor over the timeline.

Create Color Clip

A color clip is a generated clip filled with a solid color or a gradient. It uses no media.

• Hold C and click a video track to place a color clip there
• Or right click empty timeline space and choose Add color clip, see Timeline Context Menu

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1. The ghost shows where the color clip lands. Click to place it
2. The Color chip lights up while you hold C

Select the color clip and open the Effect panel to set its fill under Color Clip Intrinsics. Choose Solid or Gradient, set the gradient shape to horizontal, vertical, or radial, and set the colors and size. A color clip behaves like any visual clip: trim it, move it, and add effects and keyframes. See Color Clip Effects in the Effect panel.

Recording Audio

Blick records audio from an input device onto the timeline. The take is written to disk and placed on the timeline as an audio clip.

Keyframe Controls

Channels with a checkbox in front are keyframeable. Tick it to open the keyframe controls.

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1. Keyframes are on for this field. Click to turn them off
2. Jump to the previous keyframe
3. Add a keyframe at the playhead, or remove the keyframe that is there
4. Jump to the next keyframe
5. The smoothing knob
6. Keyframes are off for this field. Click to turn them on

Ticking the checkbox turns the parameter into an animated channel and adds a keyframe at the playhead holding the current value. The diamond between the arrows adds a keyframe at the playhead, or removes the one already there. The two arrows jump the playhead to the previous or next keyframe of the channel.

While keyframes are enabled, the value field is driven by them and its number turns yellow: it shows the value at the playhead as it moves, and editing the value writes a keyframe at the playhead. Move the playhead and type or drag the value you want at that point. Before the first keyframe and after the last one, the channel holds that keyframe's value.

Each blendable channel also has a smoothing knob. Turn it up to soften the curve so the value eases through each keyframe. Smoothing sits on top of the keyframes and does not change their stored values.

Unticking the checkbox pauses the animation and the parameter goes back to a static value. The keyframes are kept and return when you tick it again.

The Effect panel supports keyboard navigation while it is focused.

• Next item Tab
• Previous item Shift+Tab
• Activate button / dropdown Enter
• Exit button / dropdown Esc

The Effect panel edits the value at the playhead. To shape the animation over time, its curves, handles, and presets, open the keyframe editor in the Timeline panel, see Keyframe Editor. Both views work on the same channels and stay in sync.

Effect Target

Effects apply to the current selected clip in the timeline.

If you have selected multiple clips, the effect applies to the last selected one. It has a thicker highlight in the timeline clip selection.

Default Visual Effects (Video / Image / Text Clips)

* = keyframeable

Text Intrinsics (Text Clips)

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1. Content: Text shows the typed text, Timer shows a running time, see Timer
2. The text. It can span several lines
3. The text size
4. The text color, see Color controls
5. The width where lines wrap. 0 wraps only at line breaks
6. Line spacing, word spacing, and character spacing
7. The outline width and color. An outline width of 0 is off, the maximum is 32
8. Alignment: start, center, end, or justify
9. Vertical alignment: top, middle, or bottom
10. Text direction: automatic, left to right, or right to left
11. Text box: Wrap width or Fixed box, see Text box
12. The font, from the fonts installed on your system and the imported fonts. Hovering a font in the list previews it live
13. Import a font file (.ttf, .otf, .ttc). The font becomes project media and is applied to the current clip, see Fonts as Media in the Media panel section

Changing the font, size, or color here also sets the defaults for the next text clip you create.

The size, color, the box width and height, the line, word, and character spacing, and the outline are keyframeable.

Timer

Set Content to Timer to show a running time instead of typed text.

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1. Content: Timer
2. Start: the time the timer shows at the start of the clip, in hours, minutes, and seconds
3. Direction: count up or count down
4. Units: the largest unit shown, H:M:S, M:S, or S
5. Millisecond decimals: none, or one, two, or three digits

Transform

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1. * Base Zoom %: a punch-in on top of the base scale
2. * Base Zoom Target %: the point the zoom moves toward
3. (Video/Image clips) Base scale: Source / Fit / Fill / Stretch
4. * Position: the anchor position on screen. (0, 0) is the center of the screen
5. (Video/Image clips) * Scale % from the anchor
6. * Anchor %: the anchor position in the clip. (0, 0) is the top left of the clip
7. * Opacity
8. * Rotation
9. [ The link pairs the X and Y values

Base scale sets how the clip fits the canvas before any manual scaling: Source keeps the native pixel size, Fit letterboxes the clip inside the frame, Fill covers the frame and crops the overflow, Stretch ignores the aspect ratio. The link toggles next to Position, Scale, and Anchor pair the two axes. Edit one value and the other follows.

Base Zoom magnifies into the clip without moving it, like a punch-in. 100% is off. Base Zoom Target picks the point it zooms toward, as a percentage of the frame, where 50 / 50 is the center. Both values can be keyframed.

Additional Visual Effect List

Add these from the Add Effect button at the bottom of the Effect panel. The list shows only the effects that the clip type can take and does not have yet.

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1. Click an effect to add it to the clip

Each effect can be added once per clip, and effects always run in a fixed pipeline order, shown by their order in the panel, no matter when you add them. Right click a parameter to reset it to its default value, middle click does the same on sliders. Drag a slider to change its value from where it is: the full slider width spans the whole range, and Ctrl gives finer control. To set a slider by position, drag the edge at the end of its fill. Number fields without a slider change as you drag across them: hold Ctrl for finer control and Shift to move in whole steps. Scroll over a focused value to change it by one step, and double click a value to type a new one. Sliders cover the common range of each parameter. Type a value to go past the ends.

Color Space and Tone Mapping work together for camera log footage: Color Space tells Blick which curve and gamut the footage was recorded with so it can be converted into the project color space, and Tone Mapping compresses the extra highlight range down for standard output.

Audio Effects (Audio Clips)

Every audio clip carries an Intrinsics effect that cannot be removed. It holds the clip's volume and how its audio behaves when the clip is rate stretched.

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1. * Amplitude: the clip volume. 1 is the source level, 0 mutes the clip, values above 1 boost it up to 4x. You can also drag the volume line directly on the clip in the timeline
2. VariSpeed: when the clip is rate stretched, the pitch rises and falls with the speed, like tape. This is off by default

Color Clip Effects (Color Clips)

Every color clip carries a Color Clip Intrinsics effect that cannot be removed. It sets the fill the clip draws.

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1. Type: Solid or Gradient
2. Gradient: the gradient shape, Horizontal, Vertical, or Radial. It shows when Type is Gradient
3. * Size: the size of the filled area, in pixels
4. * Color: the solid color, or the start color of the gradient
5. * End Color: the end color of the gradient. It shows when Type is Gradient

A color clip also takes the Transform effect and the effects in the Additional Visual Effect List. Values marked * can be keyframed. See Create Color Clip in the Timeline panel for placing one.

Encoder Settings

Blick polls the machine for available encoders at startup, hardware and software, for H.264, AV1, and ProRes. The Preset dropdown picks the speed and quality trade-off: Fast, Balanced, High, or Max.

Advanced encoding settings expands below it for manual control. Picking a preset resets these to that preset's defaults, and the rows on offer depend on what the selected encoder supports:

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Other encoders show other rows. The Bit depth row offers 10-bit only on encoders that support it: 8-bit output plays everywhere, and 10-bit output keeps gradients and fades free of banding and keeps the precision of 10-bit sources. ProRes always outputs 10-bit and adds a ProRes profile row: 422 Proxy, 422 LT, 422, or 422 HQ, from smallest file to highest quality. Bitrate based methods add Target bitrate and Max bitrate fields, some encoders add Two-pass for a more accurate file size, and some add Weighted prediction, which helps fades.

The rate control method sets how bits are spent. The methods on offer depend on the encoder.

Encoder settings are locked while a render is running.

Rendering and Rewinding

More controls appear when you click the render button. The rest of the app stays usable while it encodes. At render start Blick checks the free disk space against the estimated file size and warns you when it looks tight.

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1. Pause or resume the encoder
2. Cancel the render and delete its output
3. Rewind to playhead: if you spot a mistake mid-render, move the playhead to the right spot and press it. The render carries on from there
4. The stage of the render: video, audio, or muxing, or Paused
5. The frames done, of all frames in the render range
6. The time since the render started
7. An estimate of the time left, covering all three stages
8. The encoder in use, hardware or software

While a render runs, the timeline shows its progress.

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1. The begin frame of the render
2. The part of the render range that is encoded
3. The same information as in the Render panel
4. The end frame of the render

The video encodes first. The audio encodes after the video finished encoding, then Blick muxes the two into the file.

When the render finishes, the panel shows a summary.

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1. Open the exported file in the default player
2. Show the exported file in the file explorer
3. The time each stage took, the speed relative to real time, and the file name, size, encoder, and preset

Actions

Click a clip in the monitor to select it, then drag to reposition it. All these controls edit the clip's Transform effect, and every change here can be keyframed like any other Transform value.

• Reposition the clip by dragging it
• Scale the clip with the edges. The scale keeps the aspect ratio, hold Shift to scale only the dragged axis
• Move the anchor point by dragging it

While you drag, the clip's center snaps to the middle of the canvas, with guide lines showing the snap. Hold Alt to drag without snapping. Hold Shift to lock the drag to one axis, picked from the direction you move in. Dragging the anchor point snaps the same way.

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1. The clip center snaps to the vertical middle of the canvas
2. The clip center snaps to the horizontal middle of the canvas

Right click a clip in the Monitor for its menu:

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Right click an empty spot in the monitor for the same View and Add entries:

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1. Reset zoom
2. Add text clip: create a text clip at the playhead on the topmost video track
3. Add color clip: create a color clip at the playhead

• Fullscreen the monitor F, and leave it with F or Esc
• Screenshot the current monitor frame to an image file Ctrl+Shift+E

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1. The frame fills the whole window

Editing text on the canvas

Double click a text clip in the Monitor to edit its text in place. The usual text keys work: arrows, Home, End, Shift to select, and the clipboard keys. Press Esc to stop editing.

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1. The text box. The selection shows over the text

Zoom & Pan

Scroll in the Monitor to zoom toward the cursor, up to 16x. Once zoomed in, Shift+Scroll pans horizontally, Alt+Scroll pans vertically, and dragging with the middle mouse button pans freely.

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1. Scrollbars show where you are in the frame. Drag them to pan
2. The horizontal scrollbar

Zooming changes the view only. The project resolution and the render are untouched, and zooming back out to 1x fits the frame to the panel again. Reset the zoom from the monitor right click menu, or with the Reset monitor zoom action. Set how fast scrolling and zooming react under Title bar > Settings Menu > Monitor.

Media Players

A Monitor panel can act as a media player. Drop a file onto it from the Media panel or the file explorer, and the panel switches from the timeline to that file. Double clicking a media item in the Media panel opens it in a player as well. Video, audio, and image files are accepted; an image displays as a still frame. Each Monitor panel holds its own player, and several can be open at once.

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1. The name of the file in the player
2. Close the player and show the timeline again
3. Rewind to the start
4. Play or pause
5. Skip to the end
6. The current time
7. Drag to scrub through the file
8. The duration of the file
9. g Mute this player
10. c What happens at the end: stop there, or return to the start

The player shows the file as it is: its own frame rate and resolution instead of the project's, with the file's color space and rotation metadata applied. Drop a single stream from the Media panel, for example one audio track of a multi-stream file, and only that stream plays. Player audio mixes into the output, and up to two players can run at once. Starting a player pauses the timeline, and starting the timeline pauses every player. The Pause all monitor players command stops them all.

Players last for the session only and are not saved in the project.

Selecting multiple clips

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1. The main selected clip has a thicker border. It is always the last selected clip
2. The other selected clips
3. The Inspector shows the number of selected clips and the name of the main selected clip

If you have selected multiple clips, the panel shows clip info on the last selected one.

Media Info

Clip Info

Editing keybindings (Windows only)

On Windows, Blick draws the menus itself. Every entry shows its keybinding, and clicking that keybinding edits it in place. Grey entries are not available at the moment, for example the render entries when no render runs.

File Menu

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Edit Menu

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View Menu

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1. Command Palette Ctrl+Shift+P or F1

Help Menu

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Actions

• Windows Edit keybindings inside the menus

Settings Menu

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1. Search the settings by name
2. Close the Settings menu
3. The settings are grouped in sections
4. UI scale: move the slider or type a value, then press Apply
5. A choice opens a list
6. A checkbox turns a setting on or off
7. Color scheme

Type in the search field to show only the matching settings:

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1. The search text
2. Only the matching settings show

Every setting can also be found and changed from the command palette, see Command Palette.

Keybindings

The Keybindings section is at the end of the Settings menu.

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1. The modifier for each of the 4 kinds of scroll in the Timeline Panel: none, Ctrl, Shift, or Alt
2. Restore the default scroll keybindings
3. Fuzzy search by action name
4. Search by keybinding: press the keys and the list shows the actions that use them
5. The primary keybinding of an action. Click it to change it
6. Each action takes up to 3 keybindings: Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary
7. Click the plus button to add a keybinding

You can map Ctrl, Shift, and Alt as modifiers for scrolling in the Timeline Panel, giving you personalised scroll keybindings without conflicting with other actions.

Every action in Blick can be rebound. Your changes are saved to blick.json in the local config folder: %LOCALAPPDATA%\blick on Windows, ~/Library/Application Support/blick on macOS.

Command Palette

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1. The search text
2. A setting shows its control in the row, so you change it there
3. A command. Press Enter or click it to run it
4. The keybinding of the command

• Open Command Palette Ctrl+Shift+P or F1
• Navigate results with Ctrl+UpArrow/Ctrl+DownArrow, PageUp/PageDown, Home/End

Search all commands and settings in Blick from the keyboard. Picking a command runs it. A setting shows its control in the result row, so you change its value there without opening the Settings menu.

Commands act on the current selection and the focused panel, and the palette only lists the commands that can run now. Some commands need a choice, such as Add transition and the keyframe presets. Choose the command and the palette opens a second page to pick the choice.

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1. The command that waits for a choice
2. Pick a choice to run the command

You can edit the keybindings of each command directly inside the command palette: click a keybinding to change it, or the plus button of a command without one to add it.

Manage License

Choose Help > Enter license key and enter your license key after purchase. Keys start with "BLICK-". The dialog shows your activation state and the end date of your update period, which runs for two years from the purchase date.

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1. Type or paste your license key
2. Submit License activates the key
3. Purchase license opens the pricing page
4. Close the dialog

The license permanently activates every version of Blick released on or before the end date. Versions released after the end date require a new license.

Example: a license purchased on March 10, 2026 has an update period ending March 10, 2028. It activates every version released before that date. It does not activate a version released in April 2028. The last covered version remains usable; a later version requires a new license.

Without an active license you can try Blick freely, but opening saved projects is locked, and so are the extra color themes. The title bar shows an UNLICENSED badge in that state. Remove License clears the key from this installation.