Kdenlive

Shrimply reads Kdenlive’s saved MLT XML and converts the active timeline to a new Shrimply project. This is a one-way conversion, not a Kdenlive playback engine. Only the features listed as Supported or Approximate below have dedicated conversion logic. Other Kdenlive features are not converted, even if Shrimply has a similar feature.

The importer prefers original media paths over proxy paths. It does not copy media into the Shrimply project, so the source files must remain available at their resolved paths.

Status meanings

Status	Meaning
Supported	Converted to the corresponding Shrimply data without a known loss in the handled fields.
Approximate	Converted, but some Kdenlive behavior or data is simplified or lost.
Not imported	No dedicated conversion exists. The content is omitted or left as a generic media reference that Shrimply may not be able to play.
Import stops	The whole import fails instead of producing an incomplete project.

Project and timeline

Kdenlive feature	Status	Imported result or limitation
Frame rate and canvas size	Supported	Read from the MLT profile.
Pixel/display aspect, scan mode, color metadata, profile name, and audio settings	Not imported	Shrimply uses its defaults beyond frame rate and canvas size.
Project name	Approximate	Taken from the .kdenlive filename, not Kdenlive project metadata.
Video and audio track order	Supported	Black and timeline-preview tracks are discarded.
Track enabled state	Supported	Kdenlive’s audio/video/both hide state becomes the Shrimply track state.
Track names, locks, height, collapse, targeting, and track-level effects	Not imported	Shrimply track defaults are used.
Gaps, clip positions, in/out trims, and source durations	Supported	MLT blank and entry timing is converted at the project frame rate.
Both internal lanes of one Kdenlive track	Approximate	Non-empty lanes become adjacent Shrimply tracks. Their mix/overlap relationship is not recreated.
Nested sequences	Approximate	Reachable sequence tractors become folded sequences with video and audio tracks. Unused bin sequences and nested-sequence captions are not imported.
Mixes, crossfades, wipes, tractor transitions, and track compositions	Not imported	The importer does not read MLT transition elements.
Clip groups, guides, markers, zones, notes, bin folders, thumbnails, and unused bin clips	Not imported	These properties are not read.
Preview guides and editor UI state	Not imported	Shrimply defaults are used.

Media and generators

Kdenlive source	Status	Imported result or limitation
File-backed video and audio	Supported	Imported as a media reference with the selected video/audio stream. Whether it can be decoded still depends on Shrimply’s media support.
JPEG, PNG, WebP, BMP, TIFF, GIF, SVG, and PDF	Supported	Classified as the corresponding Shrimply visual source. PDF size comes from its first page.
Krita and PSD layered images	Supported	Layer paths are imported and nearest-neighbor sampling is selected.
Constant speed changes, reverse playback, and pitch preservation	Supported	Kdenlive warp_speed and warp_pitch are converted, including negative speed and reverse clip trims.
Variable-speed time remapping	Not imported	Kdenlive timeremap links are not converted.
Source dimensions, stream selection, and media autorotation	Supported	Imported when the corresponding producer metadata is present.
Proxies	Approximate	The importer prefers kdenlive:originalurl and does not retain the proxy relationship.
Solid color clips (color or colour)	Supported	0xRRGGBBAA is converted to a Shrimply solid-color background, including alpha.
Color Bars generator (frei0r.test_pat_B)	Approximate	A linked generator .mlt file is inspected and converted to Shrimply’s static Test Pattern. Kdenlive’s eight bar types do not have exact Shrimply equivalents, so the selected type is not preserved.
White Noise generator (noise)	Approximate	A linked generator .mlt file is converted to Shrimply white-noise video and audio generators. The random algorithm, video range/cadence, stereo correlation, and trimmed-generator start are not sample-exact.
Counter generator (count), including its optional beep	Approximate	Direction, all five text styles, drop-frame counting, trims, and the gray background become animated Shrimply text. 2pop and frame0 tones become separate one-frame 1 kHz sine-generator items. Typeface rendering can differ, and the film-leader rings, crosshair, and sweep used by the clock background are omitted.
Other MLT generators and playlists	Not imported	They remain generic media references without native conversion.
Kdenlive title clips and title templates	Not imported	kdenlivetitle content is not parsed into Shrimply text or shapes.
Image sequences and slideshows	Not imported	Their producer-specific sequence behavior is not converted.
Missing-media placeholders	Not imported	_placeholder and _missingsource are not replaced with invented visuals; the importer still follows the saved media path.

Color Bars, White Noise, and Counter clips created through Kdenlive’s generator dialog are normally stored in separate .mlt files. Those files must be readable while the project is imported. After a recognized generator is converted, the Shrimply item no longer depends on that generator file.

Video effects

Only enabled filters stored on a timeline clip entry are considered. Producer, bin, track, and sequence effects are not imported.

Kdenlive effect	Status	Imported result or limitation
Transform (qtblend)	Approximate	Position, scale, non-uniform distortion, rotation, anchor, opacity, and their handled keyframes are converted. Stacked transforms are matrix composed; resulting shear and intermediate clipping can be approximate.
Normal and Screen clip blend modes	Supported	Other Kdenlive blend modes become Normal.
Crop (qtcrop)	Approximate	Animated rectangular crop is converted. Rounded, circular, or colored padding is reduced to a rectangle; crop after rotation/shear can become source-aligned.
Gaussian Blur (avfilter.gblur)	Approximate	RGB-only and alpha-only selections are preserved. Other partial plane selections are applied to all RGBA channels.
Chroma Key (chroma)	Approximate	Key color and animated variance/similarity are converted. Other Shrimply settings use defaults, and an animated key color is not kept as a color animation.
Saturation (frei0r.saturat0r)	Supported	Converted to animated Shrimply color correction.
Hue Shift (frei0r.hueshift0r)	Supported	Converted to animated Shrimply color correction.
Lift/Gamma/Gain (lift_gamma_gain)	Approximate	Red-channel values become Shrimply brightness, gamma, and value. Per-channel differences are lost.
Fade from/to black	Supported	Converted to Shrimply clip intro/outro transitions.
Selective Color Correction (avfilter.colorcorrect)	Not imported	Explicitly skipped.
Every other video effect	Not imported	The importer uses the allowlist above and skips other identified entry filters.

Effect masks

Kdenlive Alpha Shapes masks are Approximate. Rectangle and ellipse shapes with the handled alpha operations can mask Crop, Gaussian Blur, Chroma Key, Saturation, Hue Shift, and Lift/Gamma/Gain. A group containing several effects is represented by applying the same Shrimply mask to each modifier.

Other mask types, unsupported shapes or alpha operations, nested or malformed mask groups, and groups containing any other effect are not imported.

Audio effects

Kdenlive audio feature	Status	Imported result or limitation
Clip fade in/out	Supported	Converted to Shrimply audio intro/outro transitions.
Constant Gain (gain)	Supported	Linear gain is converted to decibels.
Animated Volume (volume)	Supported	Kdenlive level keyframes are converted to a Shrimply Gain modifier.
Every other audio effect	Not imported	Other identified entry filters are skipped.
Track-level audio filters and mixing	Not imported	Only filters attached directly to clip entries are considered.

Captions

Kdenlive caption feature	Status	Imported result or limitation
Active-sequence ASS subtitle files	Approximate	Dialogue timing, text, explicit line breaks, and hard spaces are imported into caption tracks.
Subtitle enabled/hidden state	Supported	A global hidden or disabled ASS/subtitles filter disables imported caption tracks.
ASS fonts, outlines, positioning, and other styling	Approximate	Replaced with one centered-bottom Shrimply caption style.
Nested-sequence captions and other subtitle representations	Not imported	Only the active sequence’s subtitle-file list is read.

When import stops

The importer deliberately fails instead of saving a partly parsed project when required structure or handled data is invalid. This includes malformed XML; missing or invalid profile values, active-sequence UUIDs, tracks, producers, or timing; malformed values in a supported effect; and unreadable or malformed PDF, layered-image, subtitle, or recognized external generator files.

An ordinary missing media file is not opened during conversion, so it may be reported only when Shrimply later tries to use that media.