> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.openrecorder.xyz/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Style video and screenshot backgrounds in Open Recorder

> Apply gradient, solid color, wallpaper, or transparent backgrounds to your recordings and screenshots in Open Recorder before export.

Open Recorder lets you wrap your recording in a styled canvas — choose a gradient, solid color, wallpaper image, or keep it transparent. The recording is placed inside the canvas with configurable padding, corner rounding, shadow, and an optional inset offset. Background styling is applied at export time and does not modify the original recording file. You can change the background and re-export as many times as you like without re-recording.

## Background style options

Open the **Appearance** tab in the right-hand inspector to access background controls. Use the four style buttons (Gradient, Color, Wallpaper, None) to switch between modes.

<Tabs>
  <Tab title="Gradient">
    Gradients are available in two forms: **linear** (color flows along a straight angle) and **radial** (color radiates outward from a center point). Named presets include:

    * **studio-blue** — dark navy linear gradient at 135°
    * **studio-purple** — dark indigo linear gradient at 135°
    * **studio-green** — dark forest linear gradient at 135°
    * **studio-amber** — dark warm-brown linear gradient at 135°
    * **sunrise** — sky blue through coral to golden yellow
    * **fresh-grass** — lime green to soft green
    * **magenta-burst** — radial deep violet to magenta
    * **ocean-sand** — deep teal through seafoam to warm amber
    * **deep-teal** — radial midnight blue to bright cyan
    * **midnight-cyan** — near-black to electric teal
    * **northern-lights** — multi-stop pink, orange, red, violet, blue spectrum
    * **raspberry-lemon** — coral pink to bright yellow

    The full gradient library contains over 25 named presets. Click any swatch in the grid to apply it.
  </Tab>

  <Tab title="Solid color">
    Choose from a palette of 22 preset color swatches, ranging from near-black and off-white to vibrant primaries and muted neutrals. The preset palette includes colors such as pure red, gold, green, blue, orange, purple, pink, cyan, lime, amber, and several dark neutrals.

    Click any circle in the color grid to apply that color immediately.
  </Tab>

  <Tab title="Wallpaper">
    Built-in photographic wallpapers provide a realistic scene behind your recording. The library ships with the following named photos:

    * **Cityscape** (`cityscape`)
    * **Farm Valley** (`farmvalley`)
    * **Mountain Trees** (`mountaintrees`)
    * **Luis Del Rio** (`luisdelrio`)
    * **Levels** (`levels`)

    In addition to these five named wallpapers, 18 more wallpapers labeled **Wallpaper 1** through **Wallpaper 18** are included, for a total of 23 wallpapers.

    Click any thumbnail in the wallpaper grid to apply it. The selected wallpaper fills the entire canvas and is scaled to cover the frame.
  </Tab>

  <Tab title="Transparent">
    When you select **None**, no background canvas is rendered. The recording fills the full output frame without any padding or canvas layer. Exports keep the alpha channel, so the output file retains transparency where the canvas would have appeared.

    This mode is useful when you want to composite the recording into another tool downstream, or when you are exporting a screenshot with a transparent surround.
  </Tab>
</Tabs>

## Padding and border radius

These controls are in the **Frame** group of the Appearance inspector.

* **Shadow** — controls how much drop shadow appears beneath the recording frame. The slider runs from 0% (no shadow) to 100% (full shadow intensity).
* **Roundness** — rounds the corners of the recording frame. Measured in pixels (0–25 px).
* **Padding** — adds space between the recording frame and the canvas edge. Measured as a percentage of the frame (0–100%). Internally this maps to up to 20% of the shortest output dimension, so a padding value of 50% adds roughly 10% of the frame dimension as a margin on each side.

## Backdrop and inset

The **Backdrop** group in the Appearance inspector provides two additional controls:

* **Inset** — shifts the recording frame into a sub-area of the canvas. Higher values move the recording upward and to one side, creating a picture-in-picture-style composition within the canvas. Set it to 0 to place the recording at the center.
* **Background Blur** — applies a blur to the background behind the recording frame (0–8 px).

When Inset is greater than 0, an **Inset Styling** group appears with additional options:

* **Inset color** — choose a fill color for the inset area behind the recording.
* **Inset Opacity** — controls how opaque the inset fill is (0–1).
* **Inset Balance** — a two-axis drag pad that lets you control the horizontal and vertical position of the recording within the inset area. Drag the knob toward a corner to shift the recording in that direction. Use the **Reset Balance** button to return to centered.

## Applying backgrounds to screenshots

The same background styling controls are available in the screenshot editor. Select a background style, adjust padding and roundness, and the changes appear live in the screenshot preview. Background styling is applied when you export the screenshot — the original image file is unchanged.

<Tip>
  Background styling is non-destructive. You can switch between a wallpaper, a gradient, and transparent mode at any point and re-export without re-recording.
</Tip>