Add Transitions and Effects
As you begin to create more advanced movies by adding multiple clips together, you'll want to consider adding transitions and effects to help smooth over the edges where your clips meet. In the Transitions tab, you'll find many professional-grade transition options grouped into categories. In the Effects tab, you'll discover preloaded Virtual Screen graphics with an option to create a new template from an image.
- To apply a transition (moving from one video or photo to another with a special effect), place at least two clips on the same track on the timeline. You can add clips with the green Add arrow, or by dragging and dropping them from the Photo/Video tab.
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Position the clips so that the end of the first slightly overlaps the beginning of the second on the same track. You'll notice a highlighted overlap area between them — that is where the transition will be applied.
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On the Transitions tab, effects are grouped into categories; hovering a preview shows an animated tooltip. Drag the chosen transition onto the intersection of the clips. You do not have to overlap the clips manually first: if you drop a transition where two visual blocks are merely touching, the program will intersect them and add the effect.
- The transition area on the timeline is hatched, which makes it easier to click. Right-click that area to change the effect, remove the transition, or set the intersection time (this controls the duration and smoothness of the transition).
- Alternatively, select the intersection of two blocks, choose a transition on the Transitions tab, and click the button with a single green down arrow at the top of that tab. The selected transition is applied to the selected intersection.
- Two more buttons on the Transitions tab help with batch work: one (three green down arrows) applies the selected transition to all intersections on the track; the other assigns random transitions between all clips.
- The Automate button lets you set fade-in and fade-out for all clips using predefined times from 0.5 to 2.0 seconds, and also apply a uniform overlap to all clips on the selected track.
- Start and end effects on blocks (not to be confused with transitions between clips) can be applied to several selected blocks at once via the context menu — see Tips and tricks.
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