auto-editor-transitions

Transitions

--transition KIND:DURATION[:MIN-CUT] puts a transition at each cut auto-editor makes, and at the start and end of the timeline. The video and audio transitions are linked: they cover the same span.

auto-editor video.mp4 --transition dissolve:1sec        # cross-dissolves, fades at the ends
auto-editor video.mp4 --transition push:0.5sec          # a Premiere Pro transition
auto-editor video.mp4 --transition clock-wipe:1sec:0    # at every cut, however short
auto-editor video.mp4 --transition constant-power:1sec  # audio crossfade kind; video dissolves

• DURATION: how long each transition lasts (0.5sec, or a bare frame count).
• MIN-CUT (default 1sec): skip cuts whose removed source is shorter than this, so trimming a short pause stays a hard cut instead of a stutter. 0 transitions at every cut.

A transition draws on the footage that was cut out (its handles), so:

• it may be shortened, or skipped, when a clip or the removed stretch is too short to support it;
• whatever was in the removed stretch shows mid-transition. If that's filler you don't want seen, keep transitions short or raise MIN-CUT.

Kinds

Every transition Premiere Pro has, under its Premiere name in lowercase with dashes. Those in its Legacy folder that share a name with a newer one end in -legacy. They play at Premiere's default settings.

Group	Kinds
Dissolve	dissolve, additive-dissolve, blur-dissolve, burn-alpha, dip-to-black, dip-to-color, dip-to-white, film-dissolve, luma-fade, morph-cut, mosaic
Animation	block-motion, flip-motion, fold-motion, pop-motion, pull-motion, spin-motion, spring-motion, travel-motion
Grunge & Distort	chaos, earthquake, flicker, glass, glitch, grunge, kaleidoscope, liquid-distortion, tv-power, vhs-damage
Lights & Blurs	burn-chroma, chroma-leak, cross-zoom, directional-blur, flare, flash, glow, lens-blur, light-leak, light-sweep, phosphor, radial-blur, ray, solarize, stripe, zoom-blur
Slide	3d-roll, film-roll, push, roll, slide, split, stretch, whip
Smart Tools	motion-camera, motion-tween, shape-dissolve, shape-flow
Text	text-animator, typewriter
Transformers	3d-spin, 3d-spinback, frame, louver, mirror, page-peel, slice, wave
Wipe	clock-wipe, linear-wipe, neon-wipe, panel-wipe, plateau-wipe, radial-wipe, soft-wipe, star-wipe, stretch-wipe
Immersive Video	vr-chroma-leaks, vr-gradient-wipe, vr-iris-wipe, vr-light-leaks, vr-light-rays, vr-mobius-zoom, vr-random-blocks, vr-spherical-blur
Legacy	additive-dissolve-legacy, barn-doors, center-split, clock-wipe-legacy, cross-dissolve-legacy, cross-zoom-legacy, dip-to-black-legacy, dip-to-white-legacy, film-dissolve-legacy, inset, iris-box, iris-cross, iris-diamond, iris-round, non-additive-dissolve, push-legacy, radial-wipe-legacy, slide-legacy, split-legacy, whip-legacy, wipe
Obsolete (no longer listed in Premiere)	band-slide, checker-wipe, cube-spin, flip-over, gradient-wipe, page-peel-obsolete, page-turn, venetian-blinds

dip-to-color dips to the timeline's background color (-bg).

Audio. A video kind gives the audio a plain crossfade. Audio has three kinds of its own: dissolve (Premiere's Constant Gain; constant-gain is accepted too), constant-power and exponential-fade. Naming one of those keeps the video a cross-dissolve.

How close to Premiere. auto-editor renders every kind itself. Compared frame by frame with Premiere's own renders, push, clock-wipe and barn-doors match to within encoding noise and page-peel is close; the others haven't been measured. Expect simple dissolves and wipes to be near, and effects like glitch or light-leak, which draw their own noise and colors, to differ. For Premiere's exact look, export with premiere-otio and let Premiere render them.

Per-transition control: v3 timelines

--transition uses one kind everywhere. For a different kind or length at each cut, export a v3 timeline, edit its transitions key, and render it:

auto-editor video.mp4 --transition dissolve:0.5sec --export v3 -o edit.v3
# edit edit.v3, then:
auto-editor edit.v3 -o out.mp4

"transitions": {
  "v": [[{"kind": "push", "at": 300, "dur": 15, "alignment": "center"}]],
  "a": [[{"kind": "constant-power", "at": 300, "dur": 15, "alignment": "center"}]]
}

at is the edit point in timeline frames, dur the length in frames, and alignment is start (a fade in from a clip's start), center (across a cut between adjacent clips) or end (a fade out at a clip's end). Video tracks take video kinds; audio tracks take dissolve, constant-power or exponential-fade. See https://auto-editor.com/docs/v3.

In editor exports

Export	What arrives
premiere-otio	Every kind, as Premiere's own transitions. Of the obsolete kinds, Premiere still reads page-turn and page-peel-obsolete; the others are sent as a dissolve, since Premiere would drop them and leave a cut.
premiere, resolve-fcp7 (FCP7 XML)	Cross Dissolve; the dips (as Dip to Color Dissolve, which Premiere reads as its Dip to Black or White); wipe (as Edge Wipe); Cross Fade (0dB) or (+3dB) for audio. Every other kind becomes a dissolve.
final-cut-pro, resolve (FCPXML)	Cross Dissolve spine transitions.
shotcut, kdenlive	Same-track dissolves and crossfades, fade filters at the ends.
v3	Every kind, unchanged.

To bring the kinds into Premiere, use premiere-otio. v1, v2 and clip-sequence exports drop transitions; a clip sequence's files are separate, so a transition between them has no meaning.

Importing

FCP7 XML and FCPXML imports read the transitions those formats name: Cross Dissolve, Additive Dissolve, Dip to Color Dissolve (black or white by its color), Edge Wipe, the Irises, Page Curl, Star, Cross Fade (0dB/+3dB), and Premiere's names generally. A name it doesn't know plays as a dissolve.

Recipes

auto-editor talk.mp4 --transition dissolve:0.3sec           # soft cuts in a talking-head video
auto-editor vlog.mp4 --transition whip:0.4sec:2sec          # whips, only where 2s+ was removed
auto-editor podcast.mp3 --transition constant-power:0.2sec  # audio-only: smooth crossfades
auto-editor video.mp4 --transition push:0.5sec --export premiere-otio   # finish in Premiere

For cutting itself (edit methods, margins, pace), see the auto-editor skill. For editor exports in general, see the auto-editor-export skill.