Book Image

Final Cut Pro Efficient Editing

By : Iain Anderson
Book Image

Final Cut Pro Efficient Editing

By: Iain Anderson

Overview of this book

Final Cut Pro (also known as FCP, previously Final Cut Pro X) is Apple’s efficient and accessible video editing software for everyone, offering powerful features that experienced editors and novices will find useful. FCP is the quickest way to transform your raw clips into a finished piece, so if speed is important, make this a key tool in your editing arsenal. Final Cut Pro Efficient Editing is a comprehensive best practice guide for all editors. You’ll not only learn how to use the features but also find out which ones are the most important and when you should use them. With the help of practical examples, the book will show you how typical footage can be assembled, trimmed, colored, and finessed to produce a finished edit, exploring a variety of techniques. As you progress through the book, you’ll follow a standard editing workflow to get the feel of working on real-world projects and answer self-assessment questions to make sure that you’re on track. By the end of this Final Cut Pro book, you’ll be well versed with the key features of this app and have all the tools you need to create impressive edits.
Table of Contents (20 chapters)
1
Section 1: Importing and Organizing
7
Section 2: Rough Cut to Fine Cut
13
Section 3: Finishing and Exporting

Adjusting volume levels

A clip's volume, or audio level, is one of its most obvious properties. You can hear it, and you can see it (in a few forms) in the Browser, Inspector, and Timeline. Audio levels have been discussed in passing throughout the book so far, so while this shouldn't be unfamiliar, there's definitely more to learn.

The unit used to describe audio volume is decibels, or dB, and it's used in both absolute and relative ways. However loud a clip is recorded, on a timeline it starts out at a neutral 0 dB. Adjustments made to that clip are relative, going from a louder +12 dB all the way down to the silence of -∞:

Figure 14.9: Audio volume levels on a few clips

Figure 14.9: Audio volume levels on a few clips

When you play back a timeline, it's quite different. All sound playing at a particular moment is summed together, creating an absolute value, also measured in dB, and visible in the Audio Meters (⇧⌘8). These dancing meters show the total...