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[exodus1977]

In Adobe Lightroom, there is a neat feature wherein you can create a "virtual copy" of a photograph and edit it. It's basically "non destructive" editing.
I have wanted a similar function in Media Center (if it doesn't already exist).  For example, if I just want to watch a certain fight scene or chase scene in a movie, and wanted it to be part of a playlist, I'd like to be able to create a "virtual copy" of the video file.   I could then limit the playback range of the virtual copy to the scene I want, but of course, wouldn't be wasting hard drive space by creating additional files--as media center would just be playing from the original file.

Is this currently possible?

[Sandy B Ridge]

You could try 'particles':

http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Particles

this will probably achieve what you want.

SBR

[glynor]

Particles are good for playback ranges for videos.  For a similar feature for photos, you want Stacks.  There's a few ways to handle this, depending on your needs.  However, an often convenient one is:

Right Click > Send To > External

When you define an external program, you can select to send the new file as a Stack.  This sends the file as a "copy" to the external application and then "stacks" this copy with the original source file in MC's database.  It isn't quite the same thing as Lightroom's non-destructive editing (as MC isn't the "editor" and so it can't do what Lightroom and iPhoto do in these cases).  However, it does allow you to create edits and track them in the database as one "object".

You can use both Stacks and Particles for any media type in your Library (well, Particles don't apply to Images, I suppose, since there's no playback ranges), as the situation requires.

[exodus1977]

Absolutely perfect--thanks guys! I'm surprised I haven't noticed this feature before. Very useful.

Here is a related question:

If I want to make a custom library field called "Particle Duration" which displays the time duration of a video clip, how would I do that?  I can't seem to figure out the correct expression.