Travel Video: Transitions & Adding a Logo in Premiere Pro

Topics covered in this Premiere Pro tutorial:

The Effect Controls Window, The Cross Dissolve Transition, Adding a Transparent Logo, The Tint Effect, Title and Action Safety, Exporting H.264 Video

Exercise Preview

Exercise Overview

In this exercise, we’ll continue working on the United travel promo. You’ll learn how to add video fades and cross-dissolve transitions, as well as how to import a logo and apply an effect to change its color.

Re-Previewing the Final Video

1. You’re about to watch a video with sound, so make sure your speakers are turned on, or your headphones are plugged in.

2. On the Desktop, navigate to Class Files > Premiere Pro Class > Travel Promo > Finished Movie and double–click Travel-Promo.mp4.

3. Play through the video and take note of the following sections we haven’t completed yet:

   • The video fades in from black at the beginning, and fades out at the end.
   • The second and third video clips transition smoothly from one to another.
   • There’s a white United logo overlaid on the entire video.

   Watch the video as many times as you need—we’ll be finishing it in this exercise.

Getting Started

1. You should still have yourname-Travel open in Premiere Pro. If you closed it, re-open it now by going to File > Open Project then Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Class > Travel Promo. We recommend you finish the previous exercise (1B) before starting this one. If you haven’t finished it, do the following sidebar.

   If You Did Not Do the Previous Exercise (1B)

   1. If a project is open in Premiere Pro, go to File > Save, then File > Close Project.
   2. Go to File > Open Project and navigate to Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Class > Travel Promo > Finished Projects.
   3. Double–click on Travel-Ready for Transitions.prproj.
   4. Go to File > Save As. Name the file yourname-Travel.prproj and save it into Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Class > Travel Promo.

The Effect Controls Window: Resizing the Opera House

The Sydney Opera House clip is much more zoomed-in (larger) compared to the other clips. To create a more seamless look, let’s see how we can use the Effect Controls panel to adjust the clip’s Scale.

1. So we can better see our clip info, hover your cursor over the Project panel and hit the tilde (~) key to expand it to full screen.

   NOTE: You can expand any panel this way.

2. Expand the videos bin and select the Sydney.mp4 clip.

3. Locate the Video Info column. (If you don’t see it, use the scrollbar at the bottom of the panel to drag over to the right.)

   You’ll see that this clip is actually 3840 x 2160 px. This is a big clip! Which means we have some extra room we can use to scale back from.

4. Hit the tilde (~) key to return to normal view.

5. In the Timeline, move the playhead anywhere over Sydney.mp4 if it isn’t already.

6. Double–click the Sydney.mp4 clip to open it in the Source Monitor.

   NOTE: Double–clicking any clip loads it into the Source Monitor, and allows us to make changes to it on its own.

7. At the top of the Source Monitor, click the tab labeled Effect Controls. This is where you can adjust a clip’s placement, scale, and rotation, as well as… you guessed it, effects!

8. To the left of Motion, click the arrow to expand it if it’s not already.

9. Locate the Scale property, and to the right notice the blue number which currently reads 100. This means it’s 100% of its original size or as we saw in the Project panel, 3840 x 2160 px. Making this number smaller will result in a smaller image.

10. Hover your mouse over the Scale value of 100, to see a hand slider . Drag this slider left and right to see the Scale value decrease and increase.

11. Click and drag on the number towards the left to decrease the value and notice how we’re zooming out on the clip. If you drag too far, you’ll see black edges. We want a scale value that is similar to the framing in the other clips.

12. In the Effect Controls panel, drag the Scale value until it’s 60. We found that this looks pretty good and matches the other clips.

    NOTE: Alternately, you could click into the number, type to replace it, and hit Return/Enter to apply the new value.

13. In the Timeline, scrub through (drag the playhead) to compare it with the other clips. It should be looking pretty similar now.

The Cross Dissolve Transition

A common way to start a video is to fade into the first image from black. Let’s see how we can easily add cross dissolve transitions to video.

1. Let’s start with a fade-in at the beginning to match the audio fade. In the Timeline, move the playhead to the very beginning.

   TIP: Hit the Home key (or Fn–Left Arrow) for a shortcut to go to the beginning of the timeline.

2. Hover your cursor over the left side of the EveningSea.mp4 clip until your cursor changes to a red bracket .

3. Ctrl–click (Mac) or Right–click (Windows) on the left side/beginning of the EveningSea.mp4 clip and choose Apply Default Transitions.

   For video, the default transition is a cross dissolve. Notice at the beginning of the clip, there’s now a label that says “Cross Dissolve” (the name may appear shortened depending how much you’re zoomed in on the timeline). Cross Dissolve blends the end of one image with the beginning of the next. This actually works perfectly for our purposes here. Because there is no image before the first, it will just dissolve from black – Premiere’s default background color.

4. Play through to view the fade-in. Not bad!

5. Let’s set the picture fade-in’s duration to match the audio fade. Double–click the Cross Dissolve transition.
6. Set Duration to 1;15 and click OK.

7. It can be frustrating to see how small the Program Monitor is when you’re previewing your video. Remember that the tilde key works on any panel. Hover your mouse over the Program Monitor and hit the tilde (~) key to expand it to fill the interface frame.

8. Preview the fade-in again to see that it’s syncing up with the audio quite nicely.

9. Press tilde (~) again to return to the full interface.

10. Let’s add a fade-out at the end as well. Move the playhead to the end of the Timeline.

11. Ctrl–click (Mac) or Right–click (Windows) on the right end of the LakePanorama.mp4 clip and select Apply Default Transitions.

12. Double–click on the Cross Dissolve transition.

13. Change the Duration to 2;00 to match the audio fade-out and click OK.

14. Let’s see what happens if we apply this default cross-dissolve between two clips. Hover between the second Sydney.mp4 and third LakePanorama.mp4 clips until you see the red bracket.

15. Ctrl–click (Mac) or Right–click (Windows) between the clips and select Apply Default Transitions.

16. Click once to select the Cross Dissolve transition.

17. If it’s not open already, switch to the Effect Controls panel.

18. Notice that Alignment is set to Center at Cut.

    • Center at Cut means the cross dissolve will be equally centered over the cut.
    • Start at Cut begins the cross dissolve when the second clip currently starts.
    • End at Cut ends the cross dissolve when the second clip begins.

    Feel free to play around with these, but set it to Center at Cut before moving on.

19. Move the playhead to anywhere within the Sydney.mp4 clip and press Spacebar to preview the cross dissolve. The first clip is fading directly into the other. Looking good!

    NOTE: Cross-dissolves can occasionally look nice between shots, but be careful not to over-use them (a common habit amongst those new to editing). A well-timed cut is often the best “transition” between 2 shots.

Adding a Transparent Logo

To complete the travel promo we’re going to add a logo that will be visible over the entire duration of the video.

1. Use the zoom slider to zoom out on the Timeline so that you can see the entire sequence.

   TIP: When working in the Timeline, you’ll want to zoom in and out to better see what you’re doing. You can also use the plus (+) key to zoom in to the Timeline and the minus (–) key to zoom out.

2. In the Project panel, expand the graphics bin and locate the unitedCard.png file. This is a PNG file saved with transparency, perfect for overlaying on a video layer.

3. Drag unitedCard.png to the Timeline, placing it at the start of V2. It should be 3 seconds long, as that was the default duration for still images we had set in our Timeline Preferences, in section 1A.

4. Drag the right end out to match the duration of the whole video.

5. Move the playhead anywhere over unitedCard.png and notice that this blue is much too dark, and the logo would look better over our clips if it was white.

The Tint Effect

An Effect is something that makes a clip look or sound different, by changing its color, amount of blurriness, and other details. We’ll be using one of Premiere’s effects to change the color of the logo.

1. Let’s see how we can use a trick to change the color of the logo by using an effect. Go to Window > Effects to view the Effects window.

2. At the top of the Effects panel, in the search field type tint

   Tint is usually used to turn things black and white. It maps the black areas of your image to one color and the white areas to another color. So for example it can be used to turn a color photo into black and white. It can also be used to fill opaque areas of a solid color logo with one color, such as white!

3. In the Timeline, double–click unitedCard.png so that it opens in the Source Monitor.

4. In the Effects panel, double–click Tint to apply the effect to the logo.

5. In the Program Monitor, notice that the tint has been added and the logo has now turned a dark gray.

   NOTE: Any clip loaded in the Source Monitor will show its pre-effected state, so don’t worry that the logo clip still shows blue in that window. Instead, pay attention to changes as can be seen in the Program Monitor to the right.

6. Switch to the Effect Controls tab at the top of the Source Monitor.

7. Scroll down to the Tint section. Next to Map Black To click on the color swatch to open the Color Picker window.

8. Change the color to white (one precise way to do that is to click in the hex code box (#) and type FFFFFF).

9. Click OK to apply the color.

   The logo should now be white in the Program Monitor. Much better.

   It’s huge though! Fortunately, the Effect Controls panel also contains controls for Position and Scale.

Title and Action Safety

1. In the Effect Controls panel, scroll upwards to the Motion section, and change Scale to 50.

   Now that it’s more appropriately sized, we also want to position it further down at the bottom of the screen but not so close to the bottom of the screen that it’s going to end up getting cut off on television. To ensure this, we need to bring up the Title and Action Safety guide.

2. At the bottom of the Program Monitor, look for the Safe Margins icon . If you don’t see this icon, do the following:

   • Click the Button Editor icon .
   • Find the Safe Margins icon and drag it down into the lineup of used buttons below.
   • Click OK.

3. Click the Safe Margins icon . You should see two rectangle borders in the Program Monitor. The outer border designates the action safe area. The inner border designates the title safe area.

   Title and Action Safety

   TVs enlarge a video and crop off some of its outer edges, and this amount varies. Safe areas are used to make sure important content is visible on any TV. The action safe area ensures viewers can see any essential action, and the smaller title safe area is for text and logos.

   By default, Premiere Pro’s Safe Margins, are what is known as HD title safety. There is a smaller safety guide called SD (for standard definition) title/action safety, which you can customize in your Overlay Settings as described above. At the time of this writing, most TV sets are HD but some channels like Comedy Central and CNBC still adhere to SD title safety. For best results when working for TV, always ask your producer, editor, etc. which title safe area you need to place your content inside of.

4. If you see more than 2 lines in your Safety Guides, do the following:

   • Click the Settings button under your Program Monitor, and choose Overlay Settings > Settings.
   • In the window that opens up, under Action and Title Safe Area at the bottom, uncheck Include 4:3 Safe Margin.
   • Set Title Safety Area to 20% horizontal and 20% vertical
   • Set Action Safe Area to 10% horizontal and 10% vertical.
   • Click OK.
   • You may have to toggle the Safe Margins button to see the change.

5. We want to make sure that any text in our video is within the smaller title safe border. In the Effect Controls panel, notice that the Position property has two values: x (distance from the left) and y (distance from the top).

   To move the logo down, drag the second value (y) to the right to 900 (the Position values will read 960  900) so that it’s still within the title safe area.

6. Even though Premiere has put the logo in the center of the frame by default, you may notice that it still looks a little unbalanced. This is because the square icon to the right of the text throws off the centering. Let’s cheat a little and move everything to the right. We want the center hash mark of the title safety to be directly under the letter “e” in Friendly. Set the first Position value to 980  900. Looking good!

7. Hit the Home key (or Fn–Left Arrow) to move the playhead to the beginning and play through again. Notice that the logo is present even before the video starts. Not what we want!

8. To add a fade-in to the logo that matches the video, Ctrl–click (Mac) or Right–click (Windows) on the left side of unitedCard.png and select Apply Default Transitions.

9. Double–click the transition3 and change the Duration to 1;15 so that it fades up with the picture.

10. When you add an image over the top of video it’s a good idea to preview carefully and make sure nothing is clashing. Scrub through the Timeline, checking that the logo looks good.

    If you haven’t already come across it, move the playhead to about 4;27 and notice that the logo is colliding with the boat in the Sydney clip.

11. To fix this, in the Timeline double–click Sydney.mp4 to open it in the Source Monitor.

12. Switch to the Effect Controls panel.

13. Set Position to 960  445 so that our boat now appears above the logo.

14. Add a fade-out by Ctrl–clicking (Mac) or Right–clicking (Windows) on the right side of unitedCard.png and selecting Apply Default Transitions.

15. Double–click the transition and change the Duration to 2;00.

16. Play through from the beginning to see how the video looks. Nice work!

Exporting H.264 Video

Finally, we’ll export our video so we can share it. Just as with the Source Monitor, we can set in and out points in our Timeline, to specify which sections of the video we want to play back or export.

1. In the Timeline, we need to set In and Out points around whatever section of video we want to export. Move the playhead to the beginning of the Timeline and hit the i key to set the in point.
2. We want to leave some space at the end of the content so that there’s some extra black screen at the end of the video. Move the playhead to 12;15.
3. Hit o to set the out point.
4. If you don’t see in the Project panel (at the bottom left of the main window), click the Project: yourname-Travel tab. (You could also click the double arrows at the top right of that panel area (the section at the bottom left of the main window) and choose Project: yourname-Travel.)
5. In the Project panel make sure nothing is selected by clicking in the empty part below the list of items. (We do not want our new item to be put into any of our existing bins.)
6. At the bottom of the Project panel, click the New Item button and choose Black Video.

7. Click OK to accept the default settings.

   This is an easy way to create empty black space within or at the ends of your edit.

8. From the Project panel, drag Black Video to V1, dropping it at the end of your sequence.

9. Use the red bracket to shorten it to last as long as your sequence out point (12;15).

10. File > Save the project.

11. Go to File > Export > Media.

12. In the Export Settings window, towards the top right, expand the Export Settings section if it isn’t already.

13. Click the menu next to Format and set it to H.264 to get a nice compression with decent quality.

14. Click the menu next to Preset and set it to Match Source - High bitrate.

15. Next to Output Name, click on the blue name.

16. Navigate to Travel Promo > Exports.

17. Name it Travel-Promo.mp4 and click Save.

18. Further down in the Export Settings window, click the Video tab.

19. Click the Match Source button to make sure our export is the same dimensions as our sequence settings.

    NOTE: In this window, it’s important to scroll down to see more settings, only by dragging the scroll-bar on the right. Using the scroll-wheel on your mouse, or your track-pad, might accidentally change settings.

20. Use the scroll-bar to scroll down and find the Bitrate Settings.

21. Set Bitrate Encoding to VBR, 2 pass. This refers to a Variable Bit Rate and number of encoding passes (more passes take longer, but are better).

22. At the bottom of the window, check on Use Maximum Render Quality.

23. Click the Export button.

    NOTE: If you were exporting this for a website, you would adjust the Target Bitrate and Maximum Bitrate per their specifications.

24. After the export finishes, feel free to go into Desktop > Class Files > Premiere Pro Class > Travel Promo > Exports and check out the finished video. Nice work!