User manual
The complete guide to Timline — from creating an account to exporting your sports visuals.
1. Getting started
Creating an account
Go to /register. Enter your email address and a password of at least 8 characters. A confirmation email is sent automatically — click the link to activate your account. Until it's validated, dashboard access is restricted.
Signing in and security
Sign-in uses email and password. Two-factor authentication (2FA) by email is available in your account settings. Recovery codes are generated when you enable 2FA — keep them somewhere safe.
Navigation
On desktop, the left sidebar gives access to every section: dashboard, projects, studio, Club, media library, settings and help. On mobile, a bottom navigation bar shows the 4 main tabs.
2. Projects
Creating a project
From the dashboard, click “New project”. Choose a sport: football, basketball, volleyball, ice hockey, rugby, handball, karting or other. Name your project, add a cover image and set your brand colours. Those colours become a palette in the editor.
Custom sports
Additional sports with bespoke labels and statistics fields can be configured by the platform administrator, and then appear in the selection list.
Organisation
Each project is independent and holds its own sports database, visuals, private templates and media library. On the Free plan, one active project is available. Pro and Team have no limit.
3. Sports database
Teams
Create your teams with a name, a crest (PNG with transparent background recommended), a location and colours. You can add several kits per team — as an image or through the interactive SVG builder — with outfield and goalkeeper variants.
Players
Each player can have: first name, surname, number, position, nationality, date of birth and a photo. The photo can be cut out automatically (see the Cut-out section). Both versions — original and cut-out — are then available in the editor.
Fixtures
A fixture links two teams with a score, a date, a venue, a competition and a status: upcoming, live or finished. You can fill in the match line-ups (starters, substitutes, goalkeeper) and per-player statistics.
Sponsors
Add your sponsors with their logo and a tier: title, gold, silver or partner. The tier determines the display order in the sponsor zones of your visuals.
Age groups
Age groups organise your data by season or competition. A group can be enabled or disabled to filter the entries shown in the editor.
CSV / Excel import
Click “Import” in Club. Choose the data type (players, teams, fixtures or statistics) and upload your .csv, .xls or .xlsx file. Timline analyses the columns automatically and proposes a mapping. You can adjust it, preview the data row by row, then confirm the import. Mappings you've used are remembered for next time.
4. Media library
Contents
Each project's media library gathers background images, graphic assets, team crests and player photos. You can also upload free-standing images for use in the editor.
Uploading
Multiple upload is supported. Accepted formats are PNG, JPG, WEBP and SVG. The maximum size per file depends on your plan. Duplicates are detected automatically by filename.
External images
In the editor you can import an image from an external URL. Timline routes it through an internal proxy to work around CORS restrictions and validate the source's safety.
5. Studio
Templates
The studio gathers every available template: global ones (built by Timline) and your private ones. Filter by category: match announcement, half-time, final result, standings, line-up, player portrait, scoreboard, podium. Templates marked PRO require a paid plan.
Multi-format templates
A template can exist in several linked formats (1:1 post, 9:16 story, 16:9 landscape). When you open a multi-format template, all three artboards open at once in the editor with their zones synchronised.
Line-up presets
Presets are predefined zone configurations (player placement on the pitch, podium layout…). Timline ships several by default; you can also build and save your own.
My visuals
Every visual you've created or saved appears under “My visuals”. You can reopen them in the editor, duplicate them or save them as a new template.
6. Visual editor
Multi-artboard
The editor shows up to 3 artboards side by side on one canvas: landscape (1920×1080), square (1080×1080) and story (1080×1920). You can also set a custom format. On mobile you switch between artboards via tabs — one at a time.
Available tools
Selection, text, rectangle, ellipse, triangle, freehand brush, line, path, polyline, polygon. Each object has its own properties in the right-hand panel: fill colour, border, opacity, rotation, mirror, drop shadow.
Text
Text supports Google Fonts, styles (bold, italic, underline), automatic casing, alignment and colour gradients. Size and line height are freely adjustable.
Images
Import from your media library, your device or a URL. Each image can be cropped to 5 shapes: rectangle, rounded rectangle, circle, triangle or diamond. Filters are available: brightness, contrast, saturation, Gaussian blur, directional blur.
Textures and patterns
18 procedural patterns can be applied to any object (image, shape, stroke): carbon, paper, tear, concrete, wood, brushed metal, fabric, noise, waves, hexagons, diagonal lines, dots, hatching, marble, leather, grid, chevrons, circuits. Each pattern has its own settings: primary colour, secondary colour, opacity, scale, orientation and intensity.
Layers
The layers panel lists every object on the canvas. Reorder them by drag and drop, lock them to prevent accidental edits, hide them, or adjust their opacity individually.
Gradients
Linear and radial multi-stop gradients are available for shape fills and text. Set the number of stops, the colours and the angle from the properties panel.
History
Full undo / redo history is kept for the session. Use Ctrl+Z / Ctrl+Shift+Z or the dedicated buttons in the toolbar.
Keyboard shortcuts
The main shortcuts: Ctrl+Z (undo), Ctrl+Y (redo), Ctrl+C / Ctrl+V (copy/paste), Del (delete), Ctrl+G (group), Ctrl+D (duplicate), Space+drag (pan), scroll wheel (zoom). The full list is in the editor's help menu.
7. Dynamic zones and data
How it works
Dynamic zones are canvas objects bound to an entry in your database. When the data changes (an updated score, a newly assigned player…), the visual updates automatically. Zones are synchronised across the artboards of a single visual through a logical identifier.
Zone types
Player zone, team zone, sponsor zone, score zone, team name zone, match text zone. Each type exposes the matching data in the binding panel.
Player display modes
For a player zone, you can choose how the player is represented: original photo, cut-out photo, outfield kit, goalkeeper kit, helmet, goalkeeper helmet, goalkeeper gloves. The mode is set zone by zone.
Sport-specific fields
Depending on the project's sport, extra fields are available in match text zones: football (matchday, competition), basketball (quarter, competition), ice hockey (period), rugby and handball (half), karting (circuit name).
8. Cut-out
Automatic cut-out (player photos)
In Club, after uploading a player's photo, click “Cut out”. Processing happens entirely in your browser (no data sent to an external server). The status moves from pending to done. Both versions — original and cut-out — are then available in the editor.
Cut-out in the editor
Select an image on the canvas. In the properties panel, click “Remove background”. The image is processed and replaces the original on the canvas, keeping its position and transformations.
Advanced cut-out modes
The refinement dialog offers 4 modes: automatic (smart edge detection), interactive (placing include/exclude points), brush (manually painting areas to include or exclude), magic wand (selection by colour tolerance). An undo history is available, along with an option to invert the mask (foreground ↔ background).
Preview
The refinement dialog shows a live preview against 4 different backgrounds: checkerboard (transparency), white, black and grey. That lets you judge edge quality before applying the cut-out.
9. Generating visuals
How it works
The Generate tab automatically produces a series of visuals from a template and your data. It's useful for producing, in one click, every line-up for a team, every portrait from a list of players, or the visuals for several fixtures.
Steps
1. Pick a source visual or template. 2. Timline detects the usable zones automatically (players, teams, sponsors). 3. Assign your data to the zones. 4. Select the artboards to generate (post, story, landscape). 5. Preview the output. 6. Export in bulk, or open each visual in the editor to retouch it.
Availability
Assisted generation is available on the Pro and Team plans. The Free plan lets you try it out but limits the number of generations.
10. Reusable blocks
What is a block?
Blocks are complex, ready-made graphic components you can insert into any visual in one click: three-place podium, top-5 standings, race results table (Pos · Driver · Time · Gap), football pitch formation, 5-a-side basketball line-up.
Using them
In the editor, open the Blocks panel (puzzle icon). Choose a category: podiums, timing/racing, standings, line-ups. Click a block to insert it on the canvas, then adjust position, colours and bound data.
11. Export
Formats
Export is available as PNG (with or without transparency) and JPG. The native resolution is the artboard's: 1920×1080 px for landscape, 1080×1080 px for square, 1080×1920 px for story.
Transparent background
PNG export with a transparent background is available on the Pro and Team plans. It's useful for layering the visual over other content or using it in editing software.
Mobile export
On mobile, the “Export” button in the editor header opens your device's native share sheet directly (Web Share API), letting you send the visual to any installed app.
12. Settings and account
Profile
Change your name, email and avatar from Settings → Profile. The avatar is cropped to a circle automatically.
Security
Change your password or enable two-factor authentication (2FA) by email from Settings → Security. If you lose 2FA access, use one of the recovery codes generated when you enabled it.
Subscription
Manage your plan from Settings → Subscription. The Stripe portal opens for paid plans, where you can view invoices, change the payment method or cancel.
Data export
You can request a full export of your personal data (structured JSON) from Settings → Privacy. GDPR-compliant.
Deleting your account
Account deletion starts from Settings → Privacy. A confirmation email is sent; click the link to confirm. Deletion is permanent and cascades to all your projects, visuals and data.
Language and theme
Timline is available in French, English and Spanish. Light or dark theme is stored in your local preferences and applies to both the editor and the dashboard.
A question this doesn't cover? Open the in-app help from your dashboard, or write to us at support@timline.fr.