The Timeline toolbar
The toolbar above the timeline offers various settings, tools and functions that apply to the timeline and timeline editing. These are described in order from left to right.
Customizing the toolbarThe timeline toolbar can accommodate numerous buttons to help editing go more smoothly. One set of buttons is available for the Movie Editor and a somewhat larger set for the Disc Editor. The Customize toolbar button 
at the far left of the toolbar lets you choose which subset of the available buttons you wish to display.
at the far left of the toolbar lets you choose which subset of the available buttons you wish to display.Clicking the button brings up a panel upon which all the other toolbar buttons can be individually set as visible or hidden. The gray check marks beside the Timeline settings button and a few others indicate that these buttons are not optional and will be displayed as a matter of course. Check or uncheck the boxes for the optional buttons until the toolbar has been configured to your liking, or check the Select all box to display all of the buttons.
Some of the commands invoked by buttons also have keyboard shortcuts. These work whether the button is displayed or not. (See Appendix C: Keyboard shortcuts for more information.)
Timeline settingsBy default your timeline settings are copied from the first video clip you add to the timeline. If that will give the right result, you won’t have to alter them.
If you do need to change these basic image properties of your project, click the Gear button 
to open the timeline settings panel and configure the four settings provided.
to open the timeline settings panel and configure the four settings provided.Aspect: Choose between a 4x3 and a 16x9 display.
Imaging: Choose between Regular (2D) and Stereoscopic (3D).
Size: Choose amongst the HD and SD pixel resolutions available for the given aspect ratio.
Frame rate: Choose from a selection of frame rates consistent with the other settings.
These settings can be changed at any time during the development of your movie, but you should be aware that a change of the frame rate can cause a slight shifting of clips on the timeline as they adjust to new frame boundaries.
Video material that is not in compliance with the chosen project settings will be converted automatically on being added to the timeline. If you are making a stereoscopic movie, 2D material may be used but it will still look two dimensional, as both the right eye and left eye views will be the same. 3D material can be used on a 2D timeline, but only the left eye channel will be shown.
If you want to choose a video standard for your projects explicitly, rather than relying on inheriting the format from the first clip added, open the Project settings page of the application settings. See Project Settings in the Control Panel.
Disc Editor
You can prepare a project that you want to export to MyDVD by enabling the Open Author toolbar button in the timeline toolbar.For more information about disc editing, see Disc projects.
Audio mixer
This button opens the enhanced audio control area with volume adjustment tools and access to the Panner, a surround panning control. ScoreFitter
ScoreFitter is the integrated music generator of Pinnacle Studio, providing you with custom-composed, royalty-free music exactly adjusted to the duration required for your movie. See ScoreFitter background music. Title
The Title button opens the Title Editor. If none of the many supplied titles answers your need, why not author one of your own? See Titles. 3D Title Editor
The 3D Title Editor lets you edit preset 3D titles and create your own 3D titles. You can also create 3D objects. Voice-over
The voice-over tool lets you record commentary or other audio content live while viewing your movie. See The Voice-over tool. Audio Ducking
Audio Ducking is used to automatically lower the volume of one track so that you can hear another track better. For more information, see Using Audio Ducking to automatically adjust volume. Multi-Camera Editor
The Multi-Camera Editor is a workspace that lets you create professional-looking video compilations from footage of events that have been captured on different cameras, from different angles. For more information, see Multi-Camera Editing. Track Transparency
Track Transparency provides precise transparency control in the Timeline by opening a mode that makes it easy to set keyframes and adjust transparency level by keyframe. For more information, see Track Transparency. Motion Tracking
You can track the motion of elements in your videos and add masks or objects that follow the same motion. For more information, see Motion Tracking. Split Screen
You can easily create a split screen video in Pinnacle Studio to play multiple videos in a preset or customized template. For more information, see Split screen video templates. Mark In, Mark Out, Clear
Mark In lets you set the start point for a trimming action.
Mark Out lets you set the end point for a trimming action.
Clear Mark In/Mark Out lets you remove all trim markers. Razor blade (Split Clips)
To split one or more clips at the playhead position, click the razor blade button. No material is deleted by this operation, but each affected clip becomes two clips that can be handled separately with respect to trimming, moving, adding effects and so on.If there are selected clips at the playhead on any track, only those clips will be split. Both parts of those clips remain selected after the split.
If there are no selected clips at the playhead line, all clips intersected by it will be split and the right-hand parts will be selected to facilitate easy removal in case that is desired.
Locked tracks are exempt from the split operation.
Trashcan
Click the trashcan button to delete all selected items from the timeline. See Deleting clips for details on how other timeline clips may be affected by the deletion. Snapshot
If, while previewing video on the timeline, you see a frame that you would like to capture as a still image, click the Snapshot button. This creates a photo of the image currently being previewed, and puts it in the Snapshot folder under Photos in the Library.Using the Snapshot button on the timeline is a quick way to grab a frame; for more control, use the Snapshot tool in the Video Editor. Please see Snapshot for more about the Snapshot tool.
Markers
The marker functions available here are identical to those provided in the media editors for video and audio. Please see Markers.Instead of being attached to a particular clip, however, timeline markers are considered to belong to the video composite at the marked point. Only if there is a clip selection embracing all tracks at the marked point, and only if no track is locked, will the markers change positions during timeline editing.
Selection tool
This default tool lets you select clips in the Timeline. It is one of five tools that let you adjust clips in the Timeline. Slip tool
Lets you drag in the Timeline to change what frames you see (content) without affecting the “window” (duration) for the clip, essentially moving the trim markers for the source clip. For more information, see Using Slip, Slide, Roll, or Stretch tools on the Timeline. Slide tool
Lets you move the clip “window” along the timeline without changing duration, essentially moving the trim markers in the Timeline to reveal different content. For more information, see Using Slip, Slide, Roll, or Stretch tools on the Timeline. Roll tool
Lets you adjust the size of the clip “window”, affecting the duration of the selected clip and the adjacent clip.For more information, see Using Slip, Slide, Roll, or Stretch tools on the Timeline. Stretch tool
Lets you adjust the size of the clip “window”, thus changing the duration on the Timeline, expanding or contracting the content (adjusting the speed) in order to fit the new duration without changing which frames are shown. For more information, see Using Slip, Slide, Roll, or Stretch tools on the Timeline. Trim mode
To open a trim point, place the timeline scrubber near the cut to be trimmed and click the trim mode button. Click it again to close trim mode. Please see Trimming video for more details. Dynamic length transitions
Ordinarily when a transition is added to the timeline, it is given the default length you have configured in the Pinnacle Studio Control Panel. Click this button if you would like to override the default length. When the button is highlighted, the transition durations can be set by dragging the mouse to the right or left while placing the transition onto a clip. For more about transitions, please see Transitions. Magnetic snapping
Magnet mode simplifies the insertion of clips during dragging. While the mode is active, clips are ‘magnetically’ drawn to other items on the timeline when they approach within a critical distance. This makes it easy to avoid the unnecessary – though often indiscernibly small – gaps between items that are otherwise apt to arise during editing. If you want to deliberately create such a gap, however, simply turn off the mode to allow the preferred placement. Audio scrubbing
By default, the audio portion of a project can be heard only during playback in the preview. The audio scrubbing button on the timeline toolbar provides an audio preview even while just ‘scrubbing’ through your movie by dragging the timeline scrubber control.The shuttle wheel of the Player also provides audio scrubbing.
Editing modeThe editing mode selector at the right-hand end of the timeline toolbar determines the behavior of other clips when editing changes are made.
Five choices of editing mode are available: Smart Editing, Insert and Overwrite, 3-4 Point Edit, Replace. The default is Smart Editing, in which Pinnacle Studio selects from insert, overwrite and sometimes more complex strategies in the context of each editing operation.
Smart Editing Mode is designed to maintain synchronization between timeline tracks as far as possible. In a multitrack editing situation, clips typically have vertical as well as horizontal relationships. When you have carefully placed your cuts to coincide with the beats of a music track, for example, you don’t want to disrupt everything when you make additional edits.
Insert Mode is always non-destructive: it moves other clips on the track out of the way before inserting new material. It will also automatically close gaps created by removing material. Only the target track is affected. Any prior synchronization with other tracks from the edit point rightwards is lost.
Insert Mode is most useful in the early stages of a project, when you are collecting and arranging clips on the timeline. It ensures that no material will be lost, and makes it very easy to reorder clips and sequences of clips.
In the later stages, when the structure of your project is approaching its final state and you have started carefully synchronizing material on different tracks, insert mode is less helpful. The very properties that favor its use for the early stages (the ‘ripple’ behavior) count against it when finalizing. This is where overwrite comes into play.
Overwrite Mode directly affects only the clips you select. Changing the length or position of a clip in overwrite mode will overwrite neighboring clips (if you lengthen) or leave gaps (if you shorten). It will never affect the synchronization between tracks.
3-4 Point Edit Mode offers a quick and precise way to add clips to a sequence on the Timeline. You can use 3-4 Point Edit Mode for any project, but it works particularly well for projects where you want align clips precisely, such as matching illustrative clips to narration or matching the clips to specific parts of a soundtrack. For more information, see 3-point and 4-point editing.
Replace Mode lets you replace one clip by another while retaining its duration, effects and other properties. It is particularly useful when working with templates. See Replacing a clip for details.
Using the Alt key to override the editing modeTo change insert to overwrite behavior, or overwrite to insert, hold down the Alt key while carrying out your edit as usual. You can press (or release) Alt as you please while setting up the edit: what counts is the state of the key at the instant the operation is finally enacted, such as when you drop dragged items onto the timeline.