Advanced Editing Techniques in Final Cut Pro

with Don Schechter

Transcript: Advanced Editing Techniques in Final Cut Pro

Hi, I'm Don Schechter for About.com Computing. Today I'll show you some advanced editing features in Final Cut Pro.

Set In and Out Points in Final Cut Pro

Once you've captured clips, you can edit them in the viewer window by double clicking them. You may already know that you can set in and out points by clicking these icons. You can then drag down the clip into your timeline or press the insert or overwrite buttons. The insert button will put the clip down where the playhead is in the timeline. It will move any clip past that point over. The overwrite button will put the clip down and then delete any clip or clips that are in the new clips way.

Insert and Overwrite in Final Cut Pro

You can also take the clip and click and drag it into the canvas window. A list of options will appear. You can insert or overwrite by letting go of the mouse in the corresponding area. A great little trick is that you can also insert or overwrite and add a transition as well. The default transition is a cross fade. If you drop a clip in one of the with transition boxes, it'll drop the clip in and add both a video and audio dissolve.

If you drop a clip in the replace box, the clip will replace whatever clip is currently under the playhead in the timeline. Just make sure to set in and out points of the new clip that are shorter to or equal in duration to the clip you are replacing.

Fit to Fill in Final Cut Pro

You also have an option to fit to fill. To use this, set in and outpoints on your timeline by pressing the letters 'I' and 'O' or by pressing mark in and mark out in the canvas. If you then drag the clip on fit to fill, Final Cut will either speed up or slow down the clip you have in order to make it the exact length you specified with your in and out points. Here my clip is sped up to fit the space. If I make my clip's in and out points closer together and then drop it in fit to fill, you'll see the clip has been slowed down.

Superimpose

Finally, there is the superimpose option. This is an easy way to put a clip on top of another clip in the timeline. If you do it once, you ll see the new clip placed above the clip in the timeline and the audio placed on an audio track below it. If I take another clip and drop it in superimpose again, it ll add a third video track with my clip placed at the playhead. Keep in mind that whatever video clip is on top takes precedence but that editing programs mix the audio from all of the clips.

These are just some of the more advanced features in final cut that will help make editing your movies faster and easier. Thanks for watching. For more information, visit us online at computing.about.com.

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