# Speaker View

> Render a multicam edit with its speakers on screen, side by side, stacked, in a grid or picture-in-picture, with an emphasis on whoever is talking.

Source: https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/video/speaker-view

The **Speaker View** node renders an edit with its speakers on screen. It can place two hosts side by side, follow whoever is speaking in a vertical clip, show a panel in a grid or use a picture-in-picture, with a crop framed on each speaker. It switches at each speaker change and puts an emphasis on whoever is talking, and the sound is the edit's own, passed through.

- Found in: Video › Cut & Assemble
- API type: `speaker-view`

Speaker View is priced per minute of rendered output. The rate depends on the **Quality** and on how many speakers the render puts on screen at once. See [Credits](#credits).

Speaker View runs on Nodaro Cloud. On a self-hosted install, [connect the install to Nodaro Cloud](https://nodaro.ai/docs/self-hosting/cloud-connect), and the node relays each run to the cloud. A self-hosted install sends each camera file to Nodaro Cloud, so a private camera file over 500 MB is refused before the run. Use a public URL or a smaller file.

## When to use it
- Show both hosts of a podcast side by side, with an emphasis on whoever is talking.
- Make a vertical clip that follows the speaker, with a crop framed on each person.
- Show a panel of up to six speakers in a grid.
- Keep one speaker large and the other in a small inset, with a picture-in-picture.

## Quick start
Speaker View decides **how** the speakers are shown, never **who** is on screen. [Camera Switch](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/video/camera-switch) chooses the camera for each cut, and Speaker View lays the cameras out. A typical chain is **Audio Sync**, then **Transcribe** with speaker labels, **Edit Plan**, **Camera Switch** and **Speaker View**.

### Add the node

Press Tab on the canvas and choose **Video › Cut & Assemble › Speaker View**.

### Connect the edit

Wire the **Switched edit (EDL)** output of Camera Switch into the **EDL** input. For captions, wire the **Transcript (named)** output of Camera Switch into the **Transcript** input.

### Choose the aspect ratio first

Choose the **Aspect ratio**. It decides which layouts are offered.

### Choose the layout, switch and emphasis

Choose a **Layout**, a **Switch** and an **Emphasis**. To crop each camera on a speaker, click **Edit framing…**.

Workflow: Edit Plan writes the edit, Camera Switch chooses the camera for each cut, Speaker View lays out the speakers, and Add Captions captions the result.

- Edit Plan → Camera Switch (EDL)
- Camera Switch → Speaker View (EDL)
- Speaker View → Add Captions (video)

## Inputs
| Input | Required | What to connect |
| --- | --- | --- |
| **EDL** | Yes | One edit on the recording's clock, from [Edit Plan](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/video/edit-plan) or [Camera Switch](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/video/camera-switch). A set of clips runs Speaker View once per clip on the canvas. The media is fetched from the URL of each source in the edit. |
| **Transcript** | When the edit does not name its speakers | The word transcript with speaker labels. Speaker View splits the edit at each speaker's turn and uses the labels when no segment names a speaker. |
| **Face tracks** | No | The **Face tracks** output of [Speaker Frames](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/video/speaker-frames). Only that node connects here. Each speaker's crop then follows their face. See [Face tracking](#face-tracking). |

When the node wired into **EDL** has not run yet, the settings panel says so and offers **Run up to here**. It runs the nodes before Speaker View, but not Speaker View itself.

## Outputs
| Output | What it carries |
| --- | --- |
| **Video** | The rendered edit. |
| **EDL** | The edit as drawn: split at the speakers' turns, with its layouts, switches and emphasis written in. With face tracks, each slot that followed a face names the camera, the track and the motion. It is an EDL, not a transcript, so it never feeds the **Transcript** input of Add Captions. |
| **Transcript** | The wired transcript, remapped through the edit as drawn. Words in removed parts are dropped, and the rest move to where the video plays them. Wire it into the **Transcript** input of [Add Captions](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/video/add-captions). It is empty when no transcript was wired. |

Each take keeps its own EDL and Transcript. When you pick an older take in the results, its own EDL and Transcript come back.

## Settings
| Setting | Default | What it does |
| --- | --- | --- |
| **Aspect ratio** | The edit's own, or else 16:9 | 16:9, 9:16, 1:1 or 4:5. A final is 1920×1080, 1080×1920, 1080×1080 or 1080×1350. A preview has a short side of 720 pixels. |
| **Quality** | **Final — no review step** | Or **Preview first — review, then Render final**, a private 720p render to review before a final is made. |
| **Layout** | **Auto** | **Auto**, **Single**, **Side by side**, **Stacked**, **Grid** or **Picture in picture**. **Auto** follows the layout hints of Camera Switch, or else uses **Single**. |
| **Switch** | **Cut** | What happens at a speaker change: **Cut**, **Pan**, **Zoom**, or a **Crossfade** chosen from a list of transitions. On a single camera, the default is **Pan**. |
| **Switch duration (ms)** | 600 | The length of a **Pan** or **Zoom**, from 0 to 5,000 ms in steps of 50 ms. |
| **Emphasis** | **Scale** | **Scale**, **Border** and **Dim**, alone or together. All off means no emphasis. |
| **Emphasis ease (ms)** | 300 | From 0 to 5,000 ms in steps of 50 ms. |
| **Border colour** | White | The colour of the **Border** emphasis, under **Advanced**. |
| **Framing** | Full frame | A crop of each camera per speaker, set with **Edit framing…**. The panel says how many crops are set. |
| **Split the camera by speaker** | Off | Under **Framing**. With no framing saved, the speakers who share one camera each get a default third of it: the same boxes that **Edit framing…** starts from. See [Framing](#framing). |
| **Motion** | **Glide**, once face tracks are wired | Under **Face tracking**. **Glide** moves the crop with the face. **Static** frames each segment once from the face. The setting is greyed until something is wired into **Face tracks**. |

The settings panel greys out a choice that the aspect ratio or the number of speakers rules out, and says why when you hover it or move the keyboard focus onto it. The reasons are also listed under the group, for touch screens.

### Which choices apply where

| Layout | At a speaker change | Switch | Emphasis |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| **Single** | The one slot re-frames to the new speaker. | **Cut**, **Pan** between two crops of one camera, **Zoom**, **Crossfade** | Not used, because Single shows one speaker. |
| **Picture in picture** | The main picture and the inset swap. | **Cut**, **Zoom**, **Crossfade**, and **Pan** when both are on one camera | **Border** and **Dim**. The swap is the scale. |
| **Side by side**, **Stacked**, **Grid** | The slots stay, and the active one is marked. | Only where the layout itself changes: **Cut** or **Crossfade** | **Scale**, **Border**, **Dim**, and combinations |

- **Side by side** is drawn for 16:9 and 1:1, and **Stacked** for 9:16, 4:5 and 1:1. **Grid**, **Single** and **Picture in picture** are drawn for every aspect ratio.
- **Side by side**, **Stacked** and **Picture in picture** take exactly two speakers. **Grid** takes two to six. The slots are the speakers in the order they first appear.
- A layout that the aspect ratio or the number of speakers rules out renders as its twin (Side by side and Stacked), or else as Grid if the number of speakers fits, or else as Single.
- **Pan** sweeps inside one camera. At a speaker change between two cameras, it cuts. Under the **Switch** choices, the panel counts how many speaker changes each switch reaches.
- **Crossfade** is used only where the edit jumps in time, because a stretch of the recording was cut out between the two speakers. It is never used over continuous speech.

## Framing

**Edit framing…** opens the framing editor over the whole window. It needs the edit's cameras and speakers, so run Edit Plan, and Camera Switch, first. When no camera has a speaker to frame yet, because no transcript with speaker labels and no Edit Plan names them, the editor says so instead of showing a frame with nothing to draw. Connect Transcribe or an Edit Plan so that Speaker View knows who is talking. Until then, **Reset to thirds** and **Save framing** stay off. The editor does not open on a workflow that is shared with you for viewing only.

- **Cameras and speakers.** The editor lists each camera of the edit, and under it the speakers it shows. A camera that shows one speaker, such as a close-up, is shown full frame until you click **Draw a box**. A camera shared by several speakers, such as a wide shot, starts with one box per speaker. **Reset to thirds** brings those boxes back.
- **The frame.** The camera's own video plays under the boxes, with a scrubber in the edit's master time. **Jump to** a speaker seeks to their first turn longer than 3 seconds on that camera.
- **The crop.** A box is a free rectangle. The renderer crops it to the shape of the layout's slot around its centre, so one box serves every layout and aspect ratio. Choose a layout under **Show as** to see its crop as a dashed rectangle. A label states the size of the crop and how much it is enlarged, and it turns amber above 1.5×, where the picture starts to soften.
- **Keys.** The arrow keys move the box by one camera pixel, or ten with Shift. Tab moves through the boxes, and F shows the selected speaker full frame. **Swap** trades the boxes of a camera's two speakers.
- **Saving.** **Save framing** stores every box shown. Nothing is stored until you save, and closing with unsaved changes asks first. A node whose framing was never saved renders every camera full frame.
- **Faces.** With face tracks wired, the editor draws the faces that Speaker Frames tracked as dotted boxes, labelled with the track and its speaker. See [Face tracking](#face-tracking).

**Split the camera by speaker** frames a wide shot without drawing anything. With the switch on and no framing saved on the node, each speaker on the one camera gets the default third: full height, the output's shape, centred on that speaker's share of the frame. Speakers are dealt the thirds in the order they first appear.

- **When it applies.** One edit with one camera and 2 to 6 speakers on screen, at an output other than 16:9. One speaker, more than six, several cameras or a run over several clips stay full frame. A 16:9 output stays full frame too, because each box would be the whole frame.
- **What wins.** The boxes assume a 16:9 camera. Framing you saved always wins. With face tracks wired, a speaker that a track names follows their face, and the default thirds frame only the other speakers.

## Face tracking

With face tracking, each speaker's crop follows their face instead of a fixed box. Wire the **Face tracks** output of [Speaker Frames](https://nodaro.ai/docs/nodes/video/speaker-frames) into the **Face tracks** input. Or click **Add face tracking** in the settings panel. It adds a Speaker Frames node that reads the same edit and the same transcript as Speaker View, and connects its tracks, as one undo step.

Speaker Frames has no credit price at the moment, so it cannot run yet. A Speaker View with face tracks wired is refused until Speaker Frames has a result.

- **Same transcript.** Speaker Frames must read the same transcript as Speaker View, the **Transcript (named)** output of Camera Switch. The tracks then carry the speaker names the edit uses.
- **What follows a face.** Each slot that shows a speaker on a camera follows that speaker's face track. Where the track has a gap of more than 2 seconds, the crop is placed from where the face is elsewhere in the clip, or else from your **Edit framing…** crop. A camera you unticked in Speaker Frames always uses your framing.
- **Motion.** **Glide** moves the crop smoothly with the face and holds still while the face stays near the middle. **Static** frames each segment once from the face. With either choice, the size of the crop does not change during a speaker's turn.
- **Who a track is.** A track takes the speaker name that Speaker Frames gave it, renamed through Camera Switch. A correction on the Speaker Frames node comes next. A track that is still unnamed takes the name of a box you drew in **Edit framing…**, when the middle of the face is inside exactly one box. A box the editor drew for you never names a track.
- **Correct a track.** In **Edit framing…**, click the label of a face, or use the list under the frame. Choose a speaker, **Nobody**, or **As detected** to remove a correction. **Save framing** stores the corrections on the Speaker Frames node. Nothing runs again.
- **Coverage.** The badge notes a speaker whose time on a camera is less than 60% covered by tracks. The render uses your framing for the rest of that time.
- **Render final and Update preview** use the saved tracks. They never run Speaker Frames again, so the preview and the final use the same tracks.

## Credits
Speaker View is priced per minute of rendered output, rounded up to whole minutes, with a minimum of 1 minute. The rate depends on the **Quality** of the render and on its tier. A preview has a lower rate than a final. The node shows the exact price before it runs.

| Tier | When it applies |
| --- | --- |
| Lower rate | At most two pictures on screen in every segment, and no zoom. For example, **Single**, **Side by side**, **Stacked** or **Picture in picture** with two speakers, or a **Grid** of two. |
| Higher rate | Three to six pictures on screen in any segment, for example a **Grid** of three or more. Any zoom also uses this rate: the **Zoom** switch where one picture is re-framed, or a zoom that the edit itself carries. |

- **One tier for the whole render.** A single segment with three speakers on screen puts the whole render at the higher rate.
- **The tier follows the layout as drawn.** **Side by side**, **Stacked** or **Picture in picture** over three or more speakers is drawn as a **Grid**, so it uses the higher rate. A **Zoom** switch under **Side by side** or **Grid** draws nothing and adds nothing.
- **Pan, Cut, the crossfades and the emphasis** do not change the tier.
- **Reserved on the edit, charged on the render.** Credits are reserved from the length of the edit when the render starts. Crossfades can make the finished cut shorter. You are charged for the minutes of the rendered cut, never more than was reserved, and the rest is released.
- **Previews and finals are separate renders.** Each one is charged at its own rate. A clip pack renders and charges each clip on its own, at that clip's length and tier.

Before a run, the node, the **Run** button and the **Render final** and **Update preview** buttons show an estimate. When the number of speakers is not known yet, only **Single** without the **Zoom** switch is quoted at the lower rate. Every other layout is quoted at the higher rate, so the estimate can be higher than the charge, but never lower.

## Tips
- **Run Camera Switch first** on a multicam shoot. Speaker View never picks a camera, and it refuses a multicam edit that names no speaker.
- **Follow the overlaps.** Turn on **Layout hints** in Camera Switch and set the **Layout** of Speaker View to **Auto**, to show a side-by-side layout when two people talk at once. Apply EDL refuses an edit with layout hints.
- **Switch back to Apply EDL.** **Back to Apply EDL** in the settings panel replaces this node with an Apply EDL node in place, as one undo step. Apply EDL offers the reverse, **Replace with Speaker View**.
- **Choose the aspect ratio first.** It decides which layouts are offered.

## Troubleshooting
| Message or problem | Cause and fix |
| --- | --- |
| "Edit Plan hasn't run yet. Layout and framing need its speakers." | An EDL is wired, but the node that feeds it has no result yet. Run it first. |
| The transcript's speakers do not match the edit's. | Camera Switch renames the speakers. Wire the **Transcript (named)** output of Camera Switch, not the transcript of Transcribe. |
| "This edit has several cameras but no speaker on any segment" | Wire Camera Switch between Edit Plan and Speaker View. |
| A layout renders differently from the one you chose. | The aspect ratio or the number of speakers rules it out, so it renders as its closest match, for example Stacked instead of Side by side at 9:16. |
| "Face tracks are wired, but Speaker Frames has no output yet — run Speaker Frames first, or remove the wire to render without face tracking." | The **Face tracks** input is connected, but Speaker Frames has no result. Remove the connection to render with your framing. |
| "Face tracks don't cover "Wide" — re-run Speaker Frames on this edit." | Speaker Frames never sampled a camera that the render follows. Run Speaker Frames again on this edit. |
| The edit is refused. | The edit is not one edit on the recording's clock, a source has no URL, a crop is too small or outside the frame, or the output is longer than 180 minutes. |

## From the API
`POST /v1/speaker-view` takes `edl`, one EDL as an object or a JSON string, with optional `transcript`, `quality`, `targetAspect`, `layout`, `switch`, `emphasis`, `accentColor`, `speakerRegions`, `tracks` and `motion`. `layout` is one of `auto`, `single`, `side-by-side`, `stacked`, `grid` or `pip`. `switch.type` is `cut`, `pan`, `zoom` or `xfade:<transition>`, and `emphasis.style` is a `+`-joined set of `scale`, `border` and `dim`, or `none`.

`tracks` is the **Face tracks** output of Speaker Frames, and `motion` is `static` or `glide`. `motion` defaults to `glide` and is ignored without `tracks`. A refused request answers `400` with `invalid_edl`, `unsupported_setting`, `too_long` or `invalid_tracks`. The render reserves and charges as described in [Credits](#credits).

The finished job's `output_data` has `videoUrl`, `thumbnailUrl`, `json` (the EDL as drawn) and `transcript` (the wired transcript remapped through that EDL). See [Run a single node](https://nodaro.ai/docs/developers/api/nodes) and [Jobs](https://nodaro.ai/docs/developers/api/jobs).

## Frequently asked questions

### What is the difference between Speaker View and Apply EDL?

Apply EDL shows one camera full frame for each cut. Speaker View can show several speakers at once, in a side-by-side, stacked, grid or picture-in-picture layout, and marks whoever is talking.

### How is Speaker View priced?

Speaker View is priced per minute of rendered output, rounded up to whole minutes, with a minimum of 1 minute. The rate depends on the Quality and on how many speakers are on screen at once. A preview costs less than a final, and the node shows the price before it runs.

### Does Speaker View choose which camera to show?

No. Speaker View decides how the speakers are shown, never who is on screen. Camera Switch chooses the camera for each cut. On a multicam shoot, wire Camera Switch between Edit Plan and Speaker View.

### Which layouts work for a vertical video?

At 9:16 and 4:5, you can use Single, Stacked, Grid and Picture in picture. Side by side is drawn only for 16:9 and 1:1. A layout that does not fit the aspect ratio renders as its closest match.

### Can I caption a Speaker View render?

Yes. Wire a transcript into the Transcript input. The Transcript output is that transcript remapped through the edit as drawn, and you can wire it into the Transcript input of Add Captions.