Rounds & Length

Overview

When you put several songs in Audio Input, they play one after another and crossfade. Rounds let you give each song its own settings, so a long video can build, rest and change gear: a warm-up, a faster round, a slow finish.

Length sets how long the video runs. Shorter than your songs, it ends on a bar line before the time you pick. Longer, it plays your songs (or rounds) again, in order, until the video is that long.

Both need Core or above.

Setting up rounds

1. Pick your songs in Audio Input (several at once, or one after another).
2. Click Rounds… under it. Each song is one round, in play order.
3. For each round, choose:
   • Pace - how often it cuts, compared with the edit’s own Pacing: As the edit, Faster, Slower or Much slower.
   • Beats - what the rhythm bar shows in this round: Bar’s setting, Every beat, Half-time, Double-time, Downbeats only, or Rest for no cues. The click track follows the same beats.
   • Break after - silence before the next round instead of a crossfade, from 5 to 60 seconds. One calm shot plays through it, and a 3-2-1 countdown leads into the next round.
   • Card - a short title shown as the round starts (during the break, when there is one). Leave it empty for no card.
4. Use the arrows to reorder rounds, ⧉ to repeat a round, and ✕ to remove it. + Add a song… adds another.
5. Click Save. Next to the button you’ll see how many rounds there are.

Then Generate as usual. Cuts land exactly where each round and each break starts.

With the rhythm bar on, a short label above its target warns a moment before its beats change (for example Double-time), so viewers aren’t caught out.

Use as one playlist clears the round settings and goes back to a plain crossfaded playlist. If you change the songs in Audio Input afterwards, the rounds no longer apply - reopen Rounds… to set them up for the new songs.

Length

Pick a running time in the Length list next to Rounds…:

• Match the music (the default) - the video is as long as your songs.
• 1 min to 60 min - the video runs that long, give or take a bar.

When your songs are longer, the video ends on the last bar line before that time, so it never stops mid-phrase. When they are shorter, the songs - or your rounds, breaks included - repeat in order until the video is long enough.

A long video needs plenty of footage. With a small library, clips come back sooner; pick a slower Pacing to use fewer of them.

In an NLE

Premiere / Resolve export puts a marker on the first clip of each round (Round 1, Round 2…) and on each break, so the structure is there when you finish the edit elsewhere.