Applying Several Transitions at One Time
“I have some clips in the Timeline or a whole group of stills and I want to add dissolves between them all.”
N.B. This is still necessary in FCE, but not in FCP7.
1. Begin by creating the transition you want for your effect the way you want it. (In Final Cut Express you have to use the default Cross Dissolve.)
2. Next make this your default transition. If it's not one of the standard transitions save your effect as a Favorite. With the transition open in the Viewer go to Effects>Make Favorite Effect. To make it the default transition go to the Effects tab in the Browser, find the transition in its standard bin or in the Favorites bin, right-click on the effect and from the shortcut menu choose Set Default Transition.
3. Move the playhead to the beginning of the section to which you want to apply the transitions.
4. Select the clips or stills to which you want to apply the transitions. Either marquee drag or Shift-click or use the Group Selection tool or the Track Selection tool and highlight the clips.
5. Grab the selected items and drag them from the Timeline to the Canvas to the Edit Overlay to Overwrite with Transition.
Dragging the clips to Overwrite with Transition will cut them back into the sequence starting at the playhead, put them back exactly where they came from, with the transition you applied added to each cut. If this doesn't produce transitions with the right duration check the page on transitions and handles.
Copyright © 2010 South Coast Productions