Choose what an effect covers by changing its row

A new effect treats more than the footage. Titles, shapes and stickers on the rows below the effect take the treatment too. That is useful when you want a title to blur or zoom with the picture, and it gets in the way when you want the title left alone. The row order on the timeline decides which it is.

How the rows work

Titles, shapes, stickers and effects share the element rows above your clips. The top row is the top of the stack. An effect treats the footage and every element on the rows below its own row. Elements on rows above it land on top of the treated picture and stay untouched.

Two defaults set the starting order:

• The first effect opens a row at the top of the element rows, and later effects join that row.
• The first title, shape or sticker takes a row below it, and later ones join that row.

So everything you add starts out under the effect. Moving a bar up or down changes that.

Captions from the Subtitles tab sit above every row and every effect, so they never take a treatment. A color grade from a clip's Color tab belongs to that clip's picture alone, so titles are never touched by it.

Keep a title sharp under a Blur

1. Select the clip. Open Effects in the left panel, choose Filters, and drag Blur onto the clip. A teal bar covers the clip.
2. Select the bar and drag Amount in the right panel until the background is as soft as you want it.
3. Press T to add a title at the playhead. Change its words in the right panel's Text tab, or double-click the title in the preview.
4. Play the clip. The title is blurred along with the footage, since its bar sits on a row below the Blur.
5. Drag the title's bar upward, past the top edge of the element rows. A new row opens above the Blur row. Release the bar there.
6. Play the clip again. The footage is soft and the title is crisp.

You can also move the Blur bar down below the title's row, which gives the same result.

Let a title travel with the picture

Zoom and Shake move the picture, and they move every element on the rows below them as well. A title below a Zoom pushes in with the footage, which can look natural for a label attached to something in the shot. A title above the Zoom row holds its size and place while the picture moves behind it.

Choose by purpose:

• Use a row above the effect for a name card, a headline or any text that needs to stay put.
• Use a row below the effect for a sticker or a label that points at something in the shot and should follow it.

Check the order

The timeline shows the order directly. Read the rows from top to bottom as front to back. After any drag, click in the ruler to park the playhead inside the effect's bar and look at the preview. Click the small eye button on the effect bar, whose tooltip reads Disable clip, to see the picture with and without the treatment.

Order between effects

When two effects overlap in time on different rows, the one lower down treats the picture first. The one above then treats the result, along with everything below it. A Vignette on the upper row therefore darkens the corners of footage that already wears a look from a lower row.

Test the order

Open DepCut, put a Blur on a clip with a title, and drag the title above the Blur row, and see how much clearer the message reads.