Repeat a clip to fill a longer slot: a background loop for a stream, a product spin that runs for a minute, or a short action that needs to play several times in a row in one file.
Set the section
With no section set, the whole video loops. Drag the handles on the timeline to loop part of it, or play to a frame and press Start at playhead or End at playhead. The preview repeats the section while it plays, so the seam you hear and see is the seam the export will have.
Plays or length
- Times sets how many times the section plays, the first play included.
3turns a 10 second clip into 30 seconds. - Length takes a target in seconds and computes the passes, rounding up to whole passes. The Output panel shows the pass count and the final length.
Copy vs re-encode
Compressed video stores a complete picture only at key frames, with the frames between stored as changes. Looping works differently in the two modes because of that.
- Copy repeats the encoded packets, shifting each pass’s timestamps one pass later. Nothing is decoded, so a long loop exports in seconds with no quality loss. A section’s start and end move out to the nearest key frames.
- Re-encode decodes the section, cuts it on the exact frames, and encodes every pass. Use it when the loop has to start on a specific frame, or when the source codec cannot be copied into its own container.
A clean seam
A loop looks continuous when the last frame of the section flows into the first. Clips that start and end on the same camera position loop best. A visible jump usually means the section ends a few frames too late; nudge the end handle back and play the preview again.
Audio
The soundtrack loops with the picture. In copy mode its packets are repeated as well; in re-encode mode it is decoded, cut to the section, and padded with silence if it is shorter than the picture, so each pass starts in sync.