Editors' Guide: Video-FCP

Editing with Final Cut Pro 4

Workspace


Prepare:

  1. Shoot video on your camera. You should have a .MOV or .MP4 file on your flash card. (If not, see your instructor to convert it). Copy it your desktop. 
  2. Launch Final Cut Express & create a New Project (under the File menu) and save it.

Edit Clips:

  1. Click the File Browser window in the upper left. Go under the File menu to Import and bring in MOV or MP4 files
  2. Double-click on a file in the File Browser to show it in the Viewer
  3. Play the file and mark the ins and outs of the clip you want to use, using the Mark buttons
    Shift key + "\" will play the clip with the in and outs you've specified.
  4. Advance the playhead to these edit marks be pressing either of these buttons Mark Jump
  5. Click the Mono tab of the Viewer window to change the audio volume by raising or lowering the purple slider.
  6. Go back to the Video tab in the Viewer & drag the whole video image down to the timeline to place the clip
  7. Add a caption by clicking Add text
    Select: Text -> Lower third
  8. Click the Controls tab of the Viewer window to change the text attributes
  9. At minimum ...
    • Enter text for Text 2 and set the Font Color to White
    • Set the Background to "Solid"
    • The Opacity to 50%
    • The Color to Black

      In the Video tab of the Viewer, drag this text and place it above clip in the Timeline
  10. Repeat and set clips beside each other in the timeline

Transitions

  1. To make a dissolve, click the border between two clips to get a highlight bar. Select Effects menu-> Default-Cross Dissolve

Render & Preview

  1. Render the timeline in order to preview: Choose Sequence menu->Render All-> Both
  2. When done, preview your clip in the Canvas (upper right)
  3. Note: if you ever need to re-edit a clip in the Viewer, simply double-click the clip in the File Browser

Export

  • When you're done choose File menu->Export->Using Quicktime Conversion ...
  • Choose Format->Quicktime Movie
    Use: Broadband - High

    Save as a .mov file
  • Use this file for uploading to a video service such as (YouTube)

 

Upload

Decide which hosting service you want to use. More people are likely to view/comment on your video on YouTube. But Blip.tv generally offers larger files and better quality.

  1. Get a screenshot of one frame of your video to use as a still image preview. Advance your edited video to a frame you want. On your keyboard hit Apple key+Shift+4. Draw a box and release the mouse button. A file called "Picture 1" will appear on your Desktop. Open this file in Fireworks & export it as a JPG (about 400 pixels wide).
  2. Get the password from Manual passwords page and Log in to the service you want:
  3. Upload:
    1. On YouTube.com:
      • Hit the "Upload" link in the top right-hand corner.
      • Browse and upload your video. Fill in fields for the title and description.
      • When your video uploads you will see a form field with some embed code. It should start with "<object width=......" Copy this entire code. If you don't see it, go to "unews08" at the top right of the page, to the left of "Accounts" and choose "My Videos". Find your video, click on it and get the embed code at the right side of the page.
      • ** Ensure you post a link to our U-News story in the YouTube description field, so viewers can find the full story.
    2. On Blip.tv:
      • Click "Upload"
      • Fill in the Title & Description fields
      • Browse and upload your video. Browse and upload your JPG still image. Skip any "licence" fields.
      • Blip will upload your Quicktime .mov video, then, after five minutes or so convert it to a .flv flash file (like YouTube). Wait for both steps!
      • After it's done (or if you're unsure) click "Dashboard" and find your video. It should say it's a .flv.
      • Click the Share Share button button. Click the Embed button at the bottom of the pop-up box. Copy the Embed code.
      • ** Ensure you post a link to our U-News story in the BlipTV description field, so viewers can find the full story. 
  4. Enter the info into the UNews CMS:
    1. Head back into the UNews CMS
      • Paste this embed code into the "Video" field
      • Browse and upload the JPG still into the "Video Preview" field.
      • Type some text in "Video Description" field