If you’d rather use Preview as your default Final Cut Help Viewer, this article tells you where to find your help files and how to change them.
Larry fields a question related to transferring HDV footage and traces the problem back to the process of compressing the video. A walk-through of changing the output settings in the Geometry tab provides a detailed guide to preventing this problem from reoccurring.
By definition, all DVDs are only standard-def (SD). If you need high-def, you need to create Blu-ray Discs, which are not the same thing. But what if you want to take HD material and put it on a DVD? You need to convert it. And this article, describes how.
HDV uses rectangular pixels to represent its image. Each pixel is short and fat, which means it only needs 1440 pixels to represent an entire line of HD video. However, the computer (and some other video formats) use square pixels to represent the image. So, when you export from HDV to a QuickTime movie, Final Cut converts the pixels from rectangles to squares.
Trying to get up to speed on HDV quickly. This article gives you a primer on the current status of HDV – what’s good, what’s bad, and what you need to know.
DVDs are always standard definition video. Which means that if you shot your project in HD, you need to down-convert it to SD before you can put it onto a DVD. This short article describes what you need to know.
HDV is the latest video format craze, but it isn’t like DV; or any other video format we are used to working with. This article explains how HDV is different and what you need to know to use it successfully.
We can shoot HD, we can edit HD, but we still can’t effectively distribute HD due to the market standoff surrounding HD-DVD and Blu-Ray. Recently, things just got worse, as this article explains.
Hard drives are essential to video editing. Which makes it really, REALLY aggravating when they stop working. Here are two techniques you can use to trouble-shoot hard drive problems: having too many disks attached, and not being able to boot from the system disk.
It is a long-known, but little-discussed secret that hard disks slowly lose their magnetic signal. If you archive your projects on hard disks, you need to read this article before all your carefully stored files… are gone!
As I was investigating how Final Cut Pro handles multiclip editing, it struck me that, after a certain point, the speed of your storage doesn’t really matter. Which means that we need to pay attention to more than just the raw speed of our storage systems.
Handles are critical for transitions and trimming. In this article, discover what handles are and why they are necessary.
This article is based on research done by William Aleman, who sent instructions and links on how to embed metadata into H.264 files. Some interesting reading!
This is a comprehensive look at how computer and video graphics are different and what you need to know to create great looking video text and graphics. This article can make your life a LOT easier!
Great looking chroma-keys start on set with how you light. However, once you’ve got the footage, what’s the best way to create a key. Here’s a quick sidebar that lists some other software you might want to try if you are not able to get the effect you want using the keyers that ship with Final Cut or Motion.
Have you ever wondered what that thin green line means at the top of some of your audio clips? Well, this short article let’s you in on the secret.
Gradients are a smooth ramp from one color, or shade of gray, to another. Gradients can be easily created in Final Cut Pro, but the button to do so is very hidden. In this article, I show you how to create a gradient, how to adjust it, and provide some ideas on what you can do with it.
Looking for different ways to add some excitement to your transitions? This article explains a little understood transition in Final Cut that provides some truly exciting, and unusual, transitions.
Creating good voice over recordings is part art, part craft, and part technology. In this short article, Ben Balser provides some suggestions on what kind of gear you need to make great-sounding recordings.
This tutorial shows you how to create a glowing lantern effect in Final Cut Pro using the Light-rays Glow filter and some video generators. It isn’t fine art, but this will show you how to create some amazing effects, easily, on your own system.Easy, I thought… use Light Rays.