Blog Archives

General Errors in Final Cut Pro 7 (and earlier) are often caused by either bad clips or bad render files. This article explains how to fix them.

Although Adobe Audition and Premiere Pro are designed to work smoothly together, that doesn’t mean you are limited to only using Premiere Pro with Audition. In fact, there is a very nice, very fast way to move projects between Final Cut Pro 7 and Audition, which I want to show you here.

Is it possible to carry custom Final Cut Pro keyboard shortcuts in a pen drive and install it on another machine? Here’s a technique to help you.

Valentine’s Day is coming up, so I thought I would use it as the example for one of my favorite effects – putting video inside a shape. This effect is also called a “traveling matte.”

In FCP 7 and all earlier versions, this technique shows you how to move the playhead, a clip or group of clips, or an edit point using the keyboard.

In FCP 7 and all earlier versions, this technique shows you how to use the Track Selection tools as a fast way to select multiple clips in one or more tracks.

By default, the audio output of Final Cut Pro is stereo. You can get it to output split tracks, but you’ll need to do the mix in Soundtrack Pro or ProTools. This tutorial explains how.

In the Log & Transfer window of FCP 7, how do I empty the Log & Transfer window?

Changing the color of a gradient in Final Cut Pro X requires opening it in Motion and making changes. This article describes how.

What happened to Background Sound in Final Cut Pro X?

Alex Gollner has posted a new, FREE, effect for Final Cut Pro X — it’s an eight-point mask.

One of the limitations of FCP X is that all Events and Projects must be open at all times. This product is a stand-alone utility that makes file management much easier in FCP X.

The latest version of OS X — Lion — is now shipping. While many people are excited, I recommend taking a cautious approach to upgrading any systems that you depend upon for editing.

One of the limitations of FCP X is that it only allows one sequence per project. Here is a simple workaround you can create that may do the trick.

Cheryl Foster sent me an email recently asking about archiving.

Mark Whalen sent me his thoughts on Final Cut Pro X that I wanted to share with you.

Final Cut Pro X was released just over 30 days ago — seems longer than that somehow…

David Scott was having a problem creating a DVD using a Compressor Template. Until he solved it. Here’s what he did.

Apple rewrote both the Constant and Variable Speed change interface for FCP 7. In this technique learn how to create speed changes using FCP 7.

One of our subscribers discovered one of the big differences between capturing in tape-mode, where you can combine multiple shots into one long clip, and tapeless, where each shot is stand-alone. In this article we examine how to avoid that problem.

Creating markers for H.264 is exactly the same as creating markers for a DVD. In this article we examine the technique to do just that.

In this article we give a quick examination of how to upsize an original 4:3 sequence into a 16:9 timeline.

Larry weighs in on the issue of selecting between the Animation codec and ProRes 4444, following a subscriber’s question regarding importing files into Final Cut.

When using Media Manager to archive media the key point to remember is that you need to select what you want to manage BEFORE selecting it from the menu. And, I always select what I want to Media Manage in the Browser, not the Timeline.

The number one interface rule for Final Cut is “select something, then do something to it.” Well, I’ve discovered that virtually no editor knows what these selection tools can do. Which is a shame, because once you understand how these work, they can make a real difference in speeding up your work. This article explains how.