Final Cut Pro Essential Training

Use Final Cut Pro to create professional-looking video projects. Learn essential video and audio editing techniques including color correction and media management.

Introduction

• Final Cut Pro
• What you should know

1. Editing a Trailer: Getting Up to Speed with Final Cut Fast

• Touring the interface and import
• Creating a project
• Adding additional edits to the timeline
• Removing unwanted dialogue: Part one
• Removing unwanted dialogue: Part two
• Adding B-roll clips at markers
• Adding more cutaways with markers
• Adding final shots
• Stabilizing clips and matching color
• Adding titles
• Exporting a project

2. Getting to Know and Setting Up Your Editing Environment

• The fundamentals of video editing
• Under the hood: Understanding the FCP X file structure
• Looking deeper at the FCP interface
• Using and customizing workspaces
• Customizing a keyboard
• New features in 10.6.2

3. Ingesting Assets

• Creating libraries and events
• Organizing files: Keeping it clean on your OS
• Importing assets: Copying vs. leaving files in place
• Importing assets: Transcoding footage
• Importing assets: Fixing common problems
• Importing assets from a file-based camera
• Sending projects from iMovie iOS to FCP

4. Organizing Assets

• Organizing footage with keywords
• Applying keywords to part of a clip
• Using keyboard shortcuts to apply keywords
• Rating and filtering clips
• Performing searches
• Working with and creating Smart Collections
• Deeper organization with list view and custom columns
• Organizing video and audio into roles
• Working with the Info inspector and metadata views

5. Basic Editing: Laying the Foundation

• Navigating and marking footage
• Creating a project and using the append edit
• Using the insert edit
• Using the connect edit
• Using the overwrite and replace edit
• Moving and trimming clips in the timeline
• Creating secondary storylines for connected clips
• Removing clips in the timeline
• Adjusting your project's audio levels
• Changing timeline appearance and navigation
• Using the timeline index

6. Refining the Edit Using the Trim Tools

• Trimming with the edit point in mind
• Markers
• Ripple and top and tail trimming
• Roll trim
• Slip and slide trimming
• Fine tuned editing via the precision editor

7. Working with Speed and Transforming Clips

• Adjusting scale, position, and rotation
• Using different cropping methods
• Using Distort
• Creating a video fade in and fade out
• Making constant speed changes
• Working with slow motion shot in camera
• Using speed presets
• Creating speed ramping effects
• Working with stills and Ken Burns

8. Basic Audio Editing

• Audio post-production basics
• Looking at different audio types in FCP
• Monitoring audio
• Adjusting levels in the browser and project
• Fading, cross fading, and ducking audio
• Fixing audio automatically
• Recording voice-over and narration
• Syncing audio and video
• Working with audio roles and lanes for final mix
• Audio isolation

9. Multicam Editing and 360° Video

• Syncing a multicam clip
• Performing a multicam edit
• Refining a multicam edit
• Viewing 360° clips
• Creating a 360° project and cloning out a tripod

10. Working with Effects

• Adding and adjusting transitions
• Adding and adjusting video effects
• Adding and adjusting audio effects
• Animating video effects
• Copying and pasting effects and nesting clips
• Auditioning effects
• Creating effect presets
• Using masks and the object tracker with effects

11. Working with Titles and Graphics

• Creating a title
• Adding a lower third
• Finding and replacing title text
• Working with generator effects
• Working with a layered Photoshop file
• Titles for social media
• Using the object tracker with 3D titles

12. Basic Color Correction

• Analyzing and fixing shots for white balance
• Applying color looks
• Color matching clips automatically
• Following a proper color correction workflow
• An intro to FCP Color inspector
• Performing a basic color grade
• Adding style to your shots
• Working with color and shape masks
• Working with HDR iPhone footage

13. Project and Media Management

• Media management introduction
• Deleting generated media files
• Relinking and deleting clips in a library
• Moving and copying clips between libraries
• Managing library storage locations
• Sending your library to another editor
• Referencing a backup library

14. Sharing and Exporting

• Exporting a still image
• Exporting a hi-res movie
• Exporting part of your project to YouTube
• Exporting a project to different destinations
• Exporting different title languages through video roles
• Exporting audio roles
• Exporting closed captions
• Exporting a selection of clips

15. A Few Things to Know about Compressor and Motion

• Using Compressor in Final Cut Pro
• Creating a Compressor preset with a watermark
• Free Motion content
• Bringing a Motion generator to FCP
• Exploring title behaviors

Conclusion

• Where do you go from here?