Lesson Files | FCP4 Book Files > Lessons > Lesson 17 Project |
Media | Titanic folder |
Time | This lesson takes approximately 60 minutes to complete. |
Goals | Change clip speed Change clip duration Create Fit to Fill edits Create freeze frames Create run and freeze effects Work with the keyframe editor Set keyframes in the time graph Work with the Time Remap tool Copy and paste speed attributes |
A video clip doesn't have to just sit there and play in real time. It can speed up, slow down, freeze for a moment, or go backwards. You can even fit a clip of one length into a sequence space of a different length using an edit called Fit to Fill. These are only some of the speed changes Final Cut Pro can produce. In addition, speed changes can be constant or variable. To control and adjust speed changes, you can add keyframes in the Timeline and work with the Time Remap tool.
The Fit to Fill edit lets you automatically fill a gap in a sequence with a clip of a different length.
To get started in Lesson 17 end, you will launch Final Cut Pro by clicking on the program icon in the Dock and then opening the project for this lesson.
Choose File > Open, or press Cmd-O, and choose the Lesson 17 Project file from the Lessons folder on your hard drive.
Close any other open projects.
Play the open Titanic – Speed-Starting sequence to see where you will be starting in this lesson.
This sequence uses some of the color corrected clips from Lesson 15. Each gap between the dialogue clips in this sequence is five seconds long, except the last one. You will fill these gaps with different clips. Each will have a speed adjustment applied in a different way.
Play the Titanic Speed – Finished sequence to see how the speed changes will look when you've edited them into the sequence.
Between each sound bite is a clip that has had a speed change applied to it. This sequence has been rendered to play back smoothly.
To make the Titanic Speed – Starting sequence active, click its tab in the Timeline.
There are different ways to modify the speed of a clip. You can make a clip play slower or faster in either a forward or reverse direction. You can give the existing clip a different duration, and the content of the clip will slow down or speed up to fit that duration. You can freeze a frame in a clip to stop action altogether. Another type of edit—called a Fit to Fill edit—will automatically fit a clip into an existing space in the sequence.
You can change a clip's speed in either the Viewer or the Timeline. If you apply a speed change to a clip in the Viewer, you will change the master clip in the Browser. If you make a speed change to the clip in the Timeline, it will only alter the sequence clip in the Timeline and not the master clip in the Browser. It will, however, affect the overall length of your sequence. In Final Cut Pro, changing the speed of a clip changes both the audio and video of the clip.
Clip speed is represented as a percentage. Normal play speed is 100%. When the clip speed is doubled to 200%, Final Cut Pro skips frames in order to play the clip twice as fast as it originally did. If you change the speed to play slower, for example to 50%, frames are added and blended together to fill in the extra time to play the clip at a slower speed.
In the Browser, click the disclosure triangle to display the contents of the Titanic Speed bin.
For this exercise, each clip is numbered to indicate the order in which it will be used in the sequence.
Open the 1-titanic winch clip in the Viewer. Play the clip and note its duration (10:25).
To change this clip's speed, choose Modify > Speed, or press Cmd-J.
A Speed window opens with options for setting clip speed, duration, reverse direction, and frame blending.
With the Speed percent box highlighted, type 150 and press Tab.
The duration changes from 10:25 to 7:06 to reflect the new speed.
Click OK and play the clip with new speed change in the Viewer.
The clip plays at 150% of the original speed, which makes it faster, but not considerably faster.
Mark an In point at the head of the clip, and enter a five-second duration.
To edit just the video of this clip to the Timeline, park the playhead at the head of the sequence and target the V1 track only. Edit this clip as an Overwrite edit.
Press Option-+ to zoom into the clip and view its full name and information. Then press Option-– (minus) to zoom out again, or press Shift-Z.
The 150% change appears as part of the clip name in the Timeline.
Sometimes, you know the length you want the clip to be but not the percentage of play speed. In this situation, you can enter just a specific duration, and Final Cut Pro will automatically adjust the speed percentage. You can also change the direction a clip plays, either forward or backward. Changing direction does not require a speed change, but can be combined with one.
Open the 2-moving camera lights cu clip from the Browser and play the clip.
In order for this clip to fit into the next five-second gap in the sequence, you will need to give it a five-second duration. You will also change its direction so that it plays in reverse.
Choose Modify > Speed, or press Cmd-J.
Enter a duration of 5:00 and press Return.
The clip speed is automatically changed to 220.67%. That's the speed it has to move to play the full content of this clip in five seconds.
To change direction of this clip as well, click the Reverse check box. Press Return or click OK.
In the Timeline, park the playhead at the first frame of the second gap and edit the clip as an Overwrite edit onto V1.
Zoom into this clip's name by pressing Option-+.
When you zoom into the clip, you see the new speed percentage next to the name. The minus sign in front of the percentage number indicates that the direction has been reversed.
Press Option-– (minus) to zoom back out to full view.
In the Timeline, select the clip and press Cmd-R to render the clip. When it's rendered, play the clip.
The clip duration has changed, and the clip plays in reverse.
Another way to change a clip's speed is to use a specific type of edit called Fit to Fill. The Fit to Fill edit does exactly what it says it does. It automatically changes a clip's duration and speed to fit a clip of one length into a space or gap of another length in the Timeline. If the clip contains no In or Out marks, Fit to Fill will fit the entire clip into the targeted space. If there are edit points in the source clip, only the marked portion will fill the targeted space. The fill space can be determined by an existing clip, an empty gap, or by mark points in the Timeline.
In the Timeline, park the playhead anywhere in the gap between the second ready for titanic sot clip and the cameron trimmed sot clip.
Open the 3-titanic pan l-r clip from the Browser and play the clip.
You can fill a gap with the entire clip, or you can mark a portion of the clip and fit just that portion into the gap. Let's mark a portion of this clip to fit the gap.
In the Viewer, mark an In point just before the far-left window begins to leave the frame and an Out point when you no longer see that window in the image area. Play the clip from the In to the Out.
This marked duration is about 1:22. The clip will have to be slowed down considerably to fill the five-second gap.
With the playhead over the gap, drag the clip from the Viewer into the Canvas and drop it into the Fit to Fill section in the Edit Overlay.
Press Option-+ to zoom into this clip. When you are finished viewing the name, press Option-– (minus), or Shift-Z, to zoom back out. Play the clip.
NOTE
To see how a clip was changed using Fit to Fill, select the clip in the Timeline and press Cmd-J to open the Speed window.
The clip speed in this example was slowed to 34.76% in order for the marked content of the clip to fill this gap. This is calculated automatically in the Fit to Fill edit function.
Park the playhead over the fourth gap in the Timeline.
From the Browser, open the 4-sub moves r-l clip and mark an Out point four seconds into the clip.
To make a Fit to Fill edit this time, click and hold the arrow next to the Replace Edit button on the lower left of the Canvas. Slide over and select the green Fit to Fill edit button. This button now becomes one of the three edit buttons. Click the green Fit to Fill button.
Play the clip, then play the entire sequence.
Press Cmd-S to save the current project.
Another way to modify the speed of a clip is to stop the motion altogether and freeze a specific frame in a clip. In video, a freeze frame is actually created by repeating one frame over and over for a specific length of time, or duration. Most of this process is handled automatically by Final Cut Pro. Freeze frames can be created in the Timeline or in the Viewer. But unlike changing a clip's speed in the Viewer, creating a freeze frame will not alter the master clip. Instead, a separate clip is created in the Viewer with a two-minute freeze duration, although it appears with In and Out marks to provide a default 10-second freeze.
In the Browser, click the disclosure triangle to display the contents of the Freeze Frames bin.
Each of these clips has a marker attached to it that identifies a good freeze location. You can see the clip marker name by clicking on the disclosure triangle next to it.
Open the diver kneels clip in the Viewer and play the clip. Then press Option-M to move the playhead back to the marker (or Shift-M if the playhead is at the beginning of the sequence).
This is the frame you will freeze.
Choose Modify > Make Freeze Frame, or press Shift-N, and play the clip in the Viewer.
In the Viewer scrubber bar, there is a default 10-second marked duration. However, Final Cut Pro will allow a freeze for as long as two minutes.
Enter a new clip duration of 1 second and 20 frames (1:20) in the Still/Freeze Duration field, and press Return to change the marked duration of this freeze.
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If you anticipate creating a lot of freeze frame images and want them to be a specific length, you can change the default in your User Preferences window.
In the Timeline, park the playhead at the head of the fifth gap and edit the freeze as an Overwrite edit.
Press Option-+ to zoom into the freeze frame clip. Zoom back out after you have looked at the clip name.
Freeze frame clips in the sequence appear as a slightly different shade of blue to distinguish them from normal clips. The number on the clip refers to the location of the frame on the source clip. If you open the diver kneels clip from the Recent Clips pop-up menu in the Viewer and move the playhead to the freeze marker, you will see this same timecode number in the Current Timecode field.
Open the titanic pan r-l clip, press Shift-M to move the playhead to the marker, and press Shift-N to create a second freeze frame.
Change the duration to two seconds and edit this freeze as an Overwrite edit after the diver kneels freeze frame you just edited.
To fill the next gap, park the playhead in the gap and edit the 5-titanic bow clip as a Fit to Fill edit. Play the sequence.
NOTE
You can create a freeze frame from a clip in the Timeline by following the same steps you used in the Viewer.
In the last clip of the sequence, Al puts his thumb up and continues to move. You will freeze the frame in the Timeline where he holds his thumb up and add the freeze frame material to that point in the clip, creating a run and freeze effect.
Play the al thumbs big clip and stop the playhead when you see Al raise up his thumb. There is a point where this video action also matches a strong beat of music. Use the left and right arrows, or the scroll knob of a scrolling mouse, to find the right frame.
As you did in the Viewer, choose Modify > Make Freeze Frame, or press Shift-N.
A freeze frame clip appears in the Viewer with a default 10-second marked duration, just as before.
Edit the 10-second freeze clip into the sequence at the playhead position and play the end of the sequence.
When you create a freeze frame in the Timeline, the new freeze frame is given the name of the sequence itself plus the timecode number of the sequence location where the freeze frame was created.
You can finesse the end of this sequence a few different ways. One is to trim the end of the freeze frame clip to match the music. Another is to fade out the freeze frame.
To make the Out point of the al thumbs big/titanic speed freeze frame clip end where the music clip ends in the sequence, apply any one of the following methods:
Drag the Out point left until it snaps to the music clip Out point.
Move the playhead to the music Out point, select the titanic speed freeze Out point, and press E to perform an Extend edit.
Use the Razor Blade tool (B) to cut off the remaining portion of the freeze. Press A for the default Selection tool. Select the remaining freeze portion and press Delete.
Another way to end this sequence is to add two opacity keyframes at the end of the freeze frame clip to fade it out after the music stops.
Add two opacity keyframes on the first clip in the sequence to create a fade up.
Press Cmd-S to save the project, then close this sequence.
Another way to adjust the speed of a clip is to make variable changes to it. There are several ways to do this: You can set keyframes on a time graph in the Timeline, or you can use the Time Remap tool. In each of these methods, you are making changes to the clip directly in the Timeline.
To prepare the Timeline to create and adjust variable speed changes, you will first display the keyframe editor and speed indicators. These visual displays reflect the variable speed changes of a clip. Then you will change the duration of a clip so it plays for the full length of the music track. You have already worked with the Clip Keyframes control in the Timeline in the previous lesson. This is where the keyframe editor and speed indicators can be selected and deselected for display.
Open the Variable Speed sequence from the Browser and play it.
This sequence currently has only a music track in it. The music track has three markers. You will add a video clip to this sequence and make variable speed changes to it, using the markers as a reference.
Open the sub moves fast clip in the Viewer and play it. Make sure only the V1 track is targeted. Edit just the video of this clip as an Overwrite edit at the head of the sequence.
Select the clip in the Timeline and choose Modify > Speed, or press Cmd-J. Enter a constant duration of 30 seconds to expand the clip to the end of the music track. Click OK.
In the lower left of the Timeline, click the Clip Keyframes control, or press Option-T.
In the Timeline, a blue motion bar appears under the clip along with vertical lines called speed indicators. The blue motion bar appears because there is a change of motion, in this case speed, applied to the clip. No filters are applied to this clip, so the green filter line is not displayed.
To toggle off all the indicators, Ctrl-click on the Clip Keyframes control and select Select None.
This turns off all clip keyframe indicators. Next you will turn on only those you want to display.
Ctrl-click on the Clip Keyframes control and select Video > Speed Indicators. Ctrl-click again on the Clip Keyframes control and select Audio > Speed Indicators.
At the moment, the speed indicators (vertical tics) are evenly spaced, indicating that the clip will play at a constant speed. But notice how the video clip speed indicators are spaced farther apart than the music speed indicators. This is because the video is playing at a slower percentage (23%) than the music (100%).
Ctrl-click once again on the Clip Keyframes control and select Video > Keyframe Editor.
NOTE
The preceding image of a smaller clip was taken after zooming out in the Timeline. This is for book display purposes. The clip in your Timeline may appear wider.
Selecting the Keyframe Editor option opens an area above the speed indicators that you can use to set keyframes to control the speed of your clip.
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If the blue diagonal keyframe line does not appear, Ctrl-click inside the keyframe editor area and select Time Remap > Time Graph.
When the keyframe editor is on, and Time Graph is active, a time graph appears representing the speed of the clip over time. The time graph for this clip is represented by a single line moving from one keyframe at the beginning of the clip up toward a keyframe at the end of the clip. This linear ramp up from one keyframe to the next represents a constant speed forward.
Once the keyframe editor is displayed in the Timeline, you can set keyframes at any location where you want to vary the speed of the clip. Keep in mind that the up or down direction of the linear time graph line will indicate what direction the clip is playing. You will place three keyframes on the time graph, one at each music marker.
Press Shift-Z to see the sequence in full view, and make sure snapping is on.
Move the playhead to the first music marker in the sequence.
Hold down the Option key and move the pointer over the time graph line at the playhead position until it changes to the Pen tool. Click the Pen tool on the line to create a keyframe at this location.
Move the playhead to the next music keyframe and Option-click the line at this point to create another keyframe. Repeat this process at the third music keyframe.
At this point, the three keyframes have not affected the speed or direction of the clip.
NOTE
To delete a keyframe, you can Ctrl-click on the keyframe and select Clear from the contextual menu. For now, keep all three keyframes.
Move the pointer over the first keyframe you created until it changes to a crosshair.
Now drag the keyframe up as far as it will go and play the clip.
Where the Keyframe line starts to come down, the speed indicators are red. The clip will play in reverse during this time.
To create more room in the keyframe editor area, move the pointer into the small vertical column immediately to the left of the V1 clip. The pointer will change to the resize tool.
This area is called the keyframe editor column.
With the resize tool, drag up in this column and then release the mouse.
A solid bar appears, indicating a change in height for the keyframe editor area, and the keyframe editor area becomes taller.
Drag the keyframe at the second marker down as far as it will go, until you see a zero in the information box.
To create a freeze frame in the time graph, drag the third keyframe you created down to the same level as the second keyframe, so that the line between the two keyframes is horizontal. Play the clip.
When the line is even between two keyframes, there are no speed indicators beneath it, indicating that there is no motion between the two keyframe locations.
You can also smooth the movement around a keyframe so the speed or movement direction changes gently. Smoothing a keyframe brings up Bézier handles around the keyframe that you can adjust. Bézier handles are used in other programs as well to finesse the adjustments of keyframe activity.
Ctrl-click the first keyframe you created and select Smooth from the contextual pop-up menu. Play around the area.
Now when you play through this area, the forward movement slows down gently before it starts to play in reverse.
A time remap keyframe identifies a particular frame of a clip. You can drag a keyframe horizontally either left or right. What you are doing is repositioning the clip frame to appear earlier or later in the Timeline. Dragging the keyframe left makes the clip frame appear earlier and increases the speed before the keyframe. To compensate, the speed to the right becomes slower. Dragging the keyframe right does the opposite.
When you drag a keyframe up or down, it changes which frame of the clip will appear at that location and adjusts speeds accordingly.
Move the playhead to the second keyframe you created so you can see this frame in the Canvas.
Drag this keyframe up to the middle of the time graph area and release it. The speed indicators will change.
When you release the mouse, a new frame appears in the Canvas. Changing the frame you want to appear here will, of course, affect the speed getting to this frame.
Drag the same keyframe up again until you see the entire sub and propeller within the image area. Play the clip.
To get to this frame sooner in the Timeline, drag this same keyframe left, and play the clip.
When you drag a keyframe horizontally on the time graph, you are speeding up or slowing down the play speed between that keyframe and the one on either side of it. In this case, the reverse play is now faster because there is less time to get to that position in the clip.
Drag the keyframe over the third music marker up higher than the keyframe before it.
When the time graph line slants upward, the clip plays forward.
To make the reverse portion longer than it is, drag the first keyframe you created left, and play the clip.
Dragging this keyframe left made the reverse area longer, but also made the forward play area shorter. To cover the same distance in frames, it will now play much faster in the forward section but slower in the reverse section.
Another way to adjust the variable speed of a clip is to use the Time Remap tool. This tool is applied directly to the video of the clip itself. To remap time in a clip, you are actually remapping a specific source frame to a different location in the Timeline. As you make an adjustment, the speed will vary on either side of that frame. You will notice that moving the frame with the Remap tool is the same as moving the keyframe horizontally, but with the Remap tool there is no concern that you might move accidentally on the vertical.
From the Browser, open the Time Remap sequence and play it.
The fish swim sub clip does not cover the full length of the music, so you will change it in the Speed window.
Toggle on the Clip Keyframes control to activate it for this sequence, then Ctrl-click the Clip Keyframes control and select Video. Make sure Speed Indicators is checked in the Video submenu.
Select the fish swim sub clip and choose Modify > Speed, or press Cmd-J. This time select Variable speed, and enter a duration of 30 seconds, or 30:00. Click OK and play the clip.
When you apply a variable speed to a clip from the Speed window, the speed indicators under the clip in the Timeline gradually ramp up from slow to fast as the clip plays. This is the default variable speed.
Move the playhead in the fish swim sub clip to where two fish appear directly in front of the sub.
In order to make the frame of the two fishes play at the first music keyframe, you will use the Time Remap tool to drag the frame left toward that location.
To select the Time Remap tool in the Tool palette, click and hold the Slip tool in the Tool palette. When the other options appear, select the tool that looks like a clock. Or you can press SSS for the keyboard shortcut.
Move the Time Remap tool over the playhead in the fish swim sub clip. Hold down the Option key and drag left until the Time Remap tool snaps to the first music keyframe.
When you drag, an information box appears. It gives you the original source frame timecode, the original Timeline location where it was before you started dragging it, and the new Timeline location at the music marker. It also indicates that the speed of the clip is variable before and after this point.
Play the clip in this area.
Ctrl-click inside the keyframe editor area and select Time Remap > Time Graph.
A keyframe has automatically been added in the time graph to mark this location and speed.
Repeat this process by moving the playhead in the clip to the frame where the larger fish's tail leaves the frame on the left and another fish is moving across the sub window.
Using the Time Remap tool, Option-drag this frame to snap to the second music keyframe.
You can use the Time Remap tool in another way: Dragging a source frame without holding down the Option key will change the speed percentage on the left and right side of that frame. You can also use timecode numbers for source frame and location.
When setting a specific speed percentage is more important, use the Time Remap tool without the Option key. If you want to match a source frame to another location in the Timeline, use the Option key.
You can copy and paste speed changes from one clip to another just as you did with filters. You can even paste variable speed changes onto another clip. When you paste these changes, you have the option of using the actual time parameters for each speed change from the original clip, or scaling those changes so they space out evenly all across the new clip.
From the Browser, open the Pasting Speed Changes sequence and play it.
The first clip, 3-titanic pan l-r, has variable speed changes and keyframes applied to it. The clip plays forward, then reverse, then freezes. Notice how the clip that follows it is much longer.
Select and copy the 3-titanic pan l-r clip.
Ctrl-click the second clip, 1-titanic winch, and select Paste Attributes from the contextual pop-up menu. You can also choose Edit > Paste Attributes, or press Option-V.
Unlike Filters, which has just one check box to paste all filters on the clip, motion effects are separated so you can select individual motion parameters you want to paste to another clip.
Click the Speed check box. At the top of the window, make sure that Scale Attribute Times is selected, and click OK.
The second clip now has the same keyframes, but they are spread out or scaled over the entire clip.
Press Cmd-Z to undo the Paste Attributes step.
To paste these attributes without scaling, Ctrl-click on the second clip and select Paste Attributes from the contextual pop-up menu.
This time, deselect the Scale Attribute Times option, click the Speed check box, and click OK.
Now the speed attributes follow the same timing as they did in the original clip.
Always save your project before you close it or quit Final Cut Pro.
How to change clip speed
How to change clip duration
How to create Fit to Fill edits
How to create freeze frames
How to use the keyframe editor
How to set keyframes in the time graph
How to use the Time Remap tool
How to copy and paste speed attributes