The playback window offers the ability to play and pause, rewind and fast forward and step back and forward by a single frame. You can also jump to the beginning or end of a movie with the Home and End keys.

The current timecode position is displayed to the left of the timeline bar. If the movie does not have an embedded timecode track the start position defaults to 00:00:00:00. The total length of the video is located to the right of the timeline.

Timecode overlay

A draggable timecode overlay can be added to the video display by going to View > Overlays > Timecode.

Timecode window

A draggable timecode window can be displayed by going to Window > Timecode. This allows you to move the timecode display to another screen so it doesn't obscure playback.

Safe area overlays

Title and action safe areas can be added to the video display by going to View > Overlays and switching on 4:3 Safe Areas and/or 16:9 Safe Areas.

Mattes (Blanking)

Video can be matted to various aspect ratios by going to View > Matte.

Markers

At the bottom right of the player window are controls for adding, editing and navigating between markers.

Click the Add Marker button to create a new marker at the current playhead position. If a marker already exists at this position a popup window will appear for editing the existing marker. Enter the name of the marker and choose a color if desired, then press Enter or click away from the marker popup to save it.

To delete a marker, position the playhead above it (you may find it easier to use the previous / next marker buttons to ensure you're directly above it) and click the X button in the edit popover that appears.

Markers are not saved to the file so they only exist on your computer, however you can export markers to various text-based marker formats from the File menu. Chapters stored in the movie file itself cannot be edited or deleted.

All markers stored in the current movie can be viewed at once in the Markers window, which can be accessed by going to Window > Markers. This makes viewing or editing multiple markers at once much easier.

Annotations

You can add context to your comments by drawing over a video frame. To do this, click on a marker to open the marker edit box if it is not already showing, then click the pencil icon to the right of the text box.

You can then drag the mouse to draw over the video. To change the color of the pen, click the marker again and change the marker color.

To finish, either click Discard or Save in the top bar.

Note: annotations must always have a comment attached - the text box cannot be empty.

Cloud Comments

Comments on Kollaborate videos are shown as markers in the timeline. You can edit your own comments but cannot edit or delete those created by others unless your are an admin of the project.

Comments are live so anyone else viewing the file at the same time will be alerted to your comments as you make them. If anyone makes a new comment while you are viewing a file, you will be alerted with a Notification Center alert.

When used with a video stored on Kollaborate, all markers are synced to the cloud and project users are notified when you create a new note via Dashboard and email alerts.

Exporting Markers

Ganging is an advanced feature that allows you to sync two or more files together for playback at the same time. This is useful if you want to compare two different versions of a shot side-by-side.

To use Ganging, open the files you would like to link together and then go to Playback > Gang Playheads > All Windows.

As you play back and drag the playhead in one window, all open windows will sync to the same position.

Whichever file has focus will be the leading file that controls the playback of the others, as well as being the only file that will play audio by default. To switch to a different file for playback and audio, click on its window.

There is no limit on the number of files that can be synced in this way, nor in the type of files, so you can freely mix and match video and audio together.

An alternative use of this feature would be to play back audio and video together if they exist in different files. By default the audio will be muted in the background so you should select the audio clip to use it as the leading file (or you can manually unmute it or disable frontmost audio in Preferences).

Playlists

CinePlay has basic support for M3U playlists. To create a new playlist, go to File > New Playlist and drag media files into the window that appears.

Select a file to launch the player and begin playback. If you find that the playlist window obscures playback, click on the player and the playlist window will move to the background. Do not close the playlist window as this will close both the playlist and player.

When the player window is open, use the Skip Previous / Next buttons on the player to switch between files in the playlist. If you accidentally close the player, click on the file in the playlist again to reopen.

Use File > Save Playlist and File > Save Playlist As to save as .m3u playlist files that can be played on a variety of devices including iPads and iPhones, provided those devices have access to the original media files.

Kollaborate Cloud Video

Click Cloud > Browse Kollaborate Files to open the Kollaborate browser. This allows you to switch between projects and browse through the video files you have access to. Double-click a video to open it.

If you have multiple versions of a file uploaded, you can switch between them by clicking the Revisions dropdown in the top right corner.

Tip: To open a revision in a new window, Cmd-click it.

Kollaborate Synced Sessions

CinePlay can host and join Synced Sessions. This allows you or another team-member on your project to sync playback on your system with those of other team members.

To begin, go to Cloud > Synced Sessions and click the + button to create a synced session. Invite members of your team to take part in the session. Note that team members must already be listed on the Team page of the Kollaborate site in order to appear in this list.

Both a player and the Kollaborate Browser will appear. The player will be blank until you first select a video to play from the Kollaborate Browser. You can reopen the browser later on to switch the session to a different video.

Scrub and play as usual and users will be able to see the same frames on their system. You should bear in mind that other users may be on slower connections so may take longer to buffer. These users can go to Cloud > Cache Current File to download the file onto their computer to speed up Synced Session performance.

To end the session for all users, close the playback window.

Timecode Sync

CinePlay can output timecode with the Mackie protocol.

Cut Notes sync

Cut Notes is an iPad app for taking timecoded notes. To sync timecode from CinePlay to Cut Notes, please perform the following steps:

1. Launch Cut Notes, then select a project and cut to launch the note-taking UI.

2. Tap the Sync button and select MIDI.

3. On your Mac, launch Audio MIDI Setup in /Applications/Utilities. If the MIDI Studio window is not showing, go to Window > Show MIDI Window.

4. Double-click Network to launch the MIDI Network Setup window.

5. Under My Sessions create a new session called Cut Notes.

6. Your iPad should be showing in the Directory pane. Select it and click Connect.

7. In CinePlay, click View > Timecode Output > Mackie.

8. Drag the playhead and the timecode should update in Cut Notes. The playback buttons in the Cut Notes UI should remotely control the movie.

Note: Comments made in Cut Notes will not automatically appear in CinePlay unless you are viewing a Kollaborate movie.

Exporting

Trimming

CinePlay can trim a video to reduce its length without requiring the video or audio to be transcoded. To do this, use the I and O keys on the timeline to set in and out points, then go to File > Trim.

Transcoding

To transcode a video to another codec, go to File > Export > Movie. Before doing so you may optionally set in and out points with the I and O keys to limit the length of the exported movie clip.

In the dialog that appears, choose a video and/or audio codec to transcode to. Settings can be adjusted by clicking the Settings button next to the video and audio dropdowns.

Note: Export codecs are limited to H.264, ProRes 422, ProRes 4444 and JPEG.

Preferences

General

At startup - Choose what to do when the application launches. You can either display an Open dialog allowing the user to select a file, launch the Kollaborate file browser or do nothing.

Play media files automatically - Automatically begin playing video and audio files as soon as they have loaded.

Save playback position when reopening a file - Begin playback where you left off last time the file was viewed

Alert me when someone comments on a Kollaborate video I'm viewing - Displays a Notification Center alert when someone else comments on a cloud video you're currently watching. This only occurs when the file in question is open and you will not be alerted when CinePlay is not running. For more customization options, go to the Notification Center section of System Preferences and customize the entry for CinePlay.

Only play audio from the frontmost player - Mutes players when they move to the background. This is useful when ganging as it prevents the audio of each video from playing over each other.

Always show playback controls in full screen - Playback controls are not hidden after a period of inactivity when playing back video full screen.

Play audio while scrubbing - This will play the audio sample immediately under the playhead when dragging the playhead or moving it with the arrow keys.

Show thumbnail preview when hovering over the timeline - Shows a preview of the video frame directly under the cursor when hovering over the timeline.

Restore window size when reopening movies - Restores the window size to the last size set when reopening a movie.

Marker popups will automatically display when you add a new marker, press M to edit an existing marker or click a marker to edit it. This pane allows you to control extra instances in which you may prefer the marker popups to appear.

When moving to next / previous marker while playback is stopped - Shows a popup with the marker's textual content if you use the Next / Previous Marker buttons or the Up / Down Arrow keyboard shortcuts to switch between markers while playback is stopped.

When moving to next / previous marker while playing - Shows a popup with the marker's textual content if you use the Next / Previous Marker buttons or the Up / Down Arrow keyboard shortcuts to switch between markers during playback.

When hovering over a marker - Shows a popup with the marker's textual content if you hover over the marker's icon.

Pause when encountering a marker during playback - Automatically pauses playback at each marker. After reviewing the marker, press Play or Space to continue to the next one.

Default marker color - The default marker color to use when adding a new marker.

Safe Areas

Title and action safe areas can be customized to meet broadcast requirements. Use the text fields to set the required distance from the edge of frame as a percentage in both horizontal and vertical dimensions.

The defaults are 10% each for title safe and 5% each for action safe.

Registration

There are two options for registering CinePlay, which can be accessed from the Help > Register menu. Kollaborate integration is free in CinePlay, so you can unlock cloud functionality permanently without needing to create an account on our site. In this mode, however, CinePlay will only open Kollaborate videos and cannot be used to open files stored locally on your computer.

Q. Which codecs are supported?

A. We support all codecs allowed by AV Foundation, including ProRes and H.264. Legacy formats like MPEG-1 and third-party codecs like DNxHD or CineForm are not supported.

Q. Can CinePlay play videos from YouTube, Vimeo or other video-sharing websites?

A. No.

Q. Can CinePlay play copy-protected videos, such as commercial movies I have purchased from the iTunes Store?

A. No.

Q. If I send a movie to someone else will my markers show up?

A. Markers are stored on your system and not within the file. However, if you want to send the markers to someone else you can export them as a marker list or use Kollaborate.

Q. How do I import markers into my NLE?

A. Locator lists can be imported into Avid but for all other formats you will need the free Marker Import tool.

Q. Why does timecode start at 00:00:00:00 for my remote file even though the video has a timecode track?

A. CinePlay may be unable to read the timecode tracks of certain video files that are not stored locally on your computer. To resolve this, download the files or use Kollaborate, which does not have this limitation.

Support

Bug reports and feature requests can be submitted using the links in the Help menu.

When emailing customer support, it is helpful to include log files from the relevant application, if available. To access the logs, go to Help > Troubleshooting > Gather Logs. Note, however, that not all applications have this menu.