Cannot load images

[izikeros]

Not sure if using the app in proper way but after launching app.py I cannot load images. Dialog for file selection opens but Open button is inactive.
Observed under MacOS Monterey 12.2.1 (21D62) with package versions as in requirements.txt. I was using my fork with fixed bug with filenames variable.

[michalfapso]

@izikeros, could you please try to follow the tutorial which is now in the README.md of this project? Do you still have the same issue?

[izikeros]

@michalfapso I will do it definitely after Easter - I will try to do it next week.

[izikeros]

Hi @michalfapso. I was able to generate first slideshow synced to the beat and with Ken-Burns effect!

I needed to introduce small manual edit in the project file to have OpenTimelineIO working. Hint from
related issue: AcademySoftwareFoundation/OpenTimelineIO#1159 (comment)
That has corresponding pull request.
I needed to add missing global_feed="1" in the last "tractor" tag in the kdenlive project file.

Regarding the instruction - is super detailed now, thank you very much :)
Minor things I found:

• by default I don't have three tracks but four (two for video and two for audio). Managing tracks took me some time (renaming the track that don't have any name is not intuitive in Kdenlive). Perhaps instruction on organising tracks could be extended in the future.
• instructions for using virtualenv are for Unix type of system, perhaps Windows users in PowerShell needs specific guidance.
• going to project directory and launching the program from the project dir is not a common practice but I understand it is a convenience hack to have project file directly in front of your eyes instead of navigating through the filesystem. Long story short - I have read this step as required but in fact it seems to be optional.

BTW: superb outdoor activities in the video! :)

[michalfapso]

I'm really glad to hear that you were able to generate the slideshow, @izikeros!

The bug: I'm using an older version of Kdenlive 21.04.3 and maybe the latest version removed the global_feed="1" parameter from the <tractor> tag, while my OpenTimelineIO fork still seems to require it. It would be nice to make a merge request to the official OpenTimelineIO repository, so that the changes I made to its Kdenlive adapter are merged upstream and then we would get fixes like the one you mentioned above. There are some things I would need to discuss with the OpenTimelineIO team to keep it consistent with other adapters. I'll try to put some effort to making the merge request.

Tracks: First I thought I'll make two video and two audio tracks to be able to make fade transitions between clips. But then I realized that having the Ken-Burns effect, the fade transition is not much needed and it's much more difficult to edit such project in Kdenlive afterwards. So I ended up with just a single video and audio track plus the separate music track.

Virtualenv: I found it really simple to use on Linux, but when I tried to run it the same way on my Windows + MSYS2, there were many errors and I gave up after a while :)

Project directory: Launching the editor from the project dir is simpler because all paths to picture and video clips referenced in the Kdenlive project file are relative to the project path. So this way all referenced paths work correctly. But to be able to run the editor from any dir, the project path could be just automatically prepended to all paths referenced in the project during import, and then during export all paths would have to be transformed back to relative paths.

You're right that this slideshow editor is a bit rough to use. I just wanted to create slideshows of our family trips. We usually bring a bunch of photos and short videos and we like to put them together in a slideshow. So this editor is more like just a helping tool and the final product is actually the rendered slideshow. So I didn't put too much effort to enhancing the user experience aspect as it was only me using it :)

Thanks, we like to spend time in forests, so I put them in the testing video :)