Playback

Start and stop

1. Focus a video, then press Space, double-click its Grid card or List row, or click Play in the Inspector.
2. While the player is open, Space pauses and resumes.
3. Press ⌥Space to play from the start of the file. That ignores any saved resume position.
4. Press Esc, or click the red traffic-light Stop, to stop. Skagway saves the position you left.

If the cursor is in Search videos or an Inspector field, press Esc once so the next Space plays instead of typing.

Play All (⇧⌘P)

1. Click Play All in the toolbar, or press ⇧⌘P. Skagway plays the current view from the first video that can play, and starts the next when one finishes.
2. Turn on Loop Play All in the toolbar, or Loop Play All under Settings → Video, so the first video starts again after the last one finishes.
3. Stop playback, or play a single video on its own, and the Play All session ends. In an album, the sequence is Album Order when that sort is selected.

Transport controls

1. Hover the scrubber for a frame preview. Click the scrubber to seek. The tooltip reads “Click to seek · Double-click to bookmark at pointer.”
2. Skip back or forward 15 seconds with ⌥← and ⌥→.
3. Playback speed cycles from 0.5× to 2×.

Filmstrip in the player

This strip is part of the player, just above the scrubber. It is not the Inspector filmstrip (⌥⌘T), and it is not the Storyboard layout (⌘3).

1. In Compact, Windowed, and Full screen, a horizontal row of frames sits above the scrubber. It fades with the transport controls. It waits a few seconds while the pointer stays in the player, and hides shortly after the pointer leaves.
2. Click a frame to seek to that time. The playhead highlight follows the current playback time.
3. Show filmstrip in player, under Settings → Video, is on by default. Turn it off to hide the row. Compact uses a thinner strip than Windowed and Full screen.

Click to enlarge

The Inspector filmstrip is a grid preview of the focused clip, before or beside playback. See Play from the filmstrip.

Bookmarks

1. While a video is playing, press ⌥⌘B, or double-click the scrubber, to bookmark the current time. The scrubber tooltip is “Click to seek · Double-click to bookmark at pointer.”
2. Bookmarks show as diamonds on the timeline. The same marks are listed under BOOKMARKS in the Inspector. Before you have any, that section reads “Bookmark a moment while playing (⌥⌘B).”
3. Click a bookmark in the Inspector list to jump there. Delete a bookmark from its row.

Bookmarks are stored in the library file. Their still frames are rebuilt if you move the library.

Play from the filmstrip

The Inspector preview has two modes, Still and Filmstrip, toggled with ⌥⌘T. Filmstrip here is frames sampled across one focused clip. It is not the row above the player scrubber, and it is not Storyboard (⌘3).

1. Focus one clip. Press ⌥⌘T, or click Filmstrip on the preview, to replace the poster with frames from across the video.
2. Click a frame. Playback starts at that frame.
3. Click Still, or press ⌥⌘T again, to return to the poster. Clicking the Still preview starts playback from the beginning, or from the saved resume position if there is one.

Storyboard is the library-wide collage. This filmstrip stays on the focused clip. See Filmstrip in the player.

Three sizes, one player

There is one player. Changing size does not restart the video. The size it opens at is Settings → Video → Player opens at: Compact, Full screen, or Last used size.

1. Compact (⌃⌘C) docks the player into the Inspector preview. The Inspector has to be visible. If it is hidden, show it with ⌘I, then choose Compact again.
2. Windowed (⌃⌘W) is a floating panel. Skagway remembers its size and position.
3. Full screen (⌃⌘F) fills the display. Press Esc to stop playback. Press ⌃⌘F again, or use the traffic lights, to leave full screen and keep playing.

Resume where you left off

1. Open a video you have already started. Playback begins at the saved position.
2. A banner offers Start at beginning. Click it to jump to the start of the file.
3. Grid cards show a thin progress bar for videos you have started.
4. The banner can fade. Fade resume banner after delay, under Settings → Video, controls whether it fades and when.

Live Preview

1. Rest the pointer on a Grid card or a List thumbnail. A silent preview plays through the video. In List, the enlarged preview opens beside the row.
2. The preview pauses while the player is open.
3. Turn it on or off under Settings → Video → Hover preview on Grid and List. Storyboard has no hover preview; use the collage frames there.

Subtitles

1. Put an .srt file in the same folder as the video. Name it to match: movie.mp4 uses movie.srt. A language suffix works too, as in movie.en.srt.
2. Set the Subtitles menu in the Inspector so the card badge and the filters agree with that file.
3. If the .srt arrives after the video is already in the library, choose File → Scan for Subtitles. Skagway re-checks the current view and updates the badges.

External players

Some files play more happily in another app. You can hand the file off without leaving the library’s play history behind.

1. Press ⌘↩, or right-click → Play in External Player, to open the video in the default macOS app for that file.
2. Right-click → Open With, and choose an app. The submenu lists every installed app that can play the file.
3. Either command counts as a play. The count shows in the video’s play history and in the Plays column.

Capture the perfect thumbnail

1. Start playback and pause, or scrub, on the frame you want as the poster.
2. Press ⌥⌘M, Make Thumbnail from Current Frame. That frame becomes the thumbnail everywhere Skagway shows this video.
3. For a still you already have, right-click → Set Poster from Image… and choose the image, or drag the image onto the video’s Grid card.