carrdon

VP will create a "duplicate clip" that you can reverse. I am using no third party software to do this. In the timeline, just right click on the clip and select "duplicate clip." Then, for the duplicate clip, you add effect "speed" and click the "reverse" option. When you save this as a movie, and play it with Windows Media Player with the repeat option "on," there are black frames when it repeats (not in between the forward and reverse clips as I had stated previously) If you just save clip 1 (forward) as a movie (say avi format), then play that avi movie with Windows Media Player, there are black frames at the end. But if you re-import that avi movie back into VP, then do as I say above creating the duplicate reversed clip 2, there are no black frames in between clip 1 (forward) and clip 2 (reversed), but just black frames at the end of the new movie once it's saved. So it only seems to insert the black frames at the end of a movie, and VP somehow knows not to play the black frame(s) in between the two clips. When you create a movie like this (clip 1 forward and clip 2 reverse of clip 1) and play it in a player such as Windows Media Player with the repeat option set, the movie should just play over and over without a big blank in between the repeat. When I create a forward/reverse sequence like this with Adobe Premiere, then play it in Windows Media Player, I don't get a black frame when it repeats. So the answer to your question of "However, my question still stands...What do you want to see on the screen after the last frame? It has to be something" is as I stated before. The last frame of the actual data embedded in the movie that VP writes should be the last frame that the author specifically puts there. If a video player wants to show a black screen after the movie ends, then the player can do that. I've seen some that do, some that leave the last frame on the screen, and some that go to their logo, or whatever they want - that's fine. But the video authoring software itself should not add frames automatically.

I see this same issue. It is a problem when you want to make a small clip, duplicate it, and play the 2nd one backwards. In this case, what you end up with is two black frames in the middle of your video. Video editor software shouldn't automatically insert a black frame at the end of a sequence. The movie should end up with the last frame that the user puts in the sequence. If I want a black frame at the end of a sequence, I will put it there myself.