Premiere 101

From Storyboard to MooV: Constructing your movie

Premiere By now you have finished the task of recording your voice, and have all your images gathered, scanned and properly sized. Whew! Premiere is the non-destructive, non-linear digital video editing program used to construct your Moov. This tool will allow you to control time itself.
A place to store: Project Bin window Choose Import… from the File menu. Import complete ƒolders or individual pieces/files. They are stored alphabetically in a list with a small thumbnail to identify them visually. The Project Bin is the point of access to all your files. It stores pointers as thumbnails to the source files of your images and voiceover. Drag and drop from the bin into the Timeline. Double click a folder icon to display its contents. Save and Save As… often. The Project window needs to be active to properly save a new version to your Projects folder, do so every session to save work you don't want to lose.
A place to edit: Timeline window The Timeline displays the layout sequence along a time-based ruler with thumbnail icons. You can drag your thumbnail images from your Project Bin's specific folder, and drop (scoot & nudge) in the A and B Video tracks	Snaking your images from the A to the B track allows you to overlap images in the timeline, The Transition and Superimpose tracks will allow you some artistic license with how your still images are displayed. Music and voiceovers are placed into A and B Audio tracks at the bottom of the timeline. Alphabetically named AIFF files (a.intro, b.mother, c.dog) in your Voiceover folder can be dragged by folder into the audio track for sequential positioning.
A place to view: Preview window Once you have built a portion of your movie you can preview it in several ways. Dragging your cursor over the Timeline ruler will approximate playback at the speed of your drag. This is a good method for testing quickly. The Return or Enter keys will build a Preview the clip
Transitions The animated icons show how the transition will look between the two tracks as the playhead moves from one image to the next in the timeline. Drag and drop into the Transition track between your alternating and overlapping A and B tracks. It will snap to the proper size if you hover before you drop. Double-clicking the Transition icon will allow you to tweak it's direction or look. A Transition over a portion of blank Timeline will dissolve from black or any color you choose. Transitions can enhance or cheese up your story. Ask yourself, does this truly help in the telling of the story? Use Cross Dissolve when in doubt.
A Toolbar at the bottom Most of the simple tools are for making selections of portions of time or by groups of thumbnails. The magnifying glass will zoom in closer to fewer and fewer frames of time (hold the Option key to zoom out for more of an overview). The slider works numerically to the same effect. The razorblade can split the duration of a clip image to shorten or insert another clip midway. Markers can help to tag specific points in your voiceover.
Markers for synching Synching your music or voiceover to images or the transition between them can be assisted with markers. Double click an audio clip in the timeline. It will be displayed in its own window. The horizontal scroll bar or slider can help you position the portion of the audio track you want to view. Position the Playhead by clicking in the waveform display. Use the spacebar to PLAY/STOP the clip to listen and find the exact place in the audio to set a marker. The pull-down menu gives you a numeric choice for marking the clip. The markers appear as little flags in the waveform display and in the timeline window so you can position your image at that marked point.
Creating the Title of your Moov Perhaps the first file you'll Import into your newly created Project and then drag into your timeline is the Title of your Movie. Choose New->Title from the File menu. These Photoshop-like Text and drawing tools offer font design, shadows, gradients, and color choices. Choose the T(ype) tool and insert your cursor on the drawing page, and type the title. The arrow tool will allow you to select the title object to move it around and apply choices from the Title menu. You can also draw simple boxes, circles and polygons, then apply color, gradient, or shadow choices to these objects. Once saved to your Titles folder, Import the title as you would any fresh still image or drag it into the timeline as an alternative way of 'importing'.