Final Cut Express

Final Cut Express is a type of application that allows you to import and edit videos or video clips. Using Final Cut Express you can 'Capture' the footage from your camcorders so you dont have to mess around cutting and cropping clips.

We learnt that whilst doing the Capture you press 'I' to make a start point and then you press 'O' to get the end point and then Final Cut Express imports the footage inbetween these two points.

We also learnt that Final Cut Expess measures in Hours, Minutes, Secounds and Frames it measures in frames because this is then easier to get to certain points of your footage and edit it. Final Cut Express also makes editing easier by using a drag and drop system where you can simply drag footage from the browser to the Timeline,Viwer or Canvas.

The last thing that we learnt how to do was to make a new 'Bin' (Bin is another term for folder in Final Cut Express). To make a new bin you need to go to the top and click 'File' and on the drop down menu click new bin. Using the bin you can then drag footage into it, this helps keep all the clips organised so you dont mix up different videos.




In Friday's lesson we learnt how to import music into Final Cut Express, Go File, import files and find the music and double click it. Then drag it down into the timeline. If a red line appears above the timeline then it needs to be rendered, to do this you press and hold the Command button and then press 'R'. In one of the preview windows you can see a scale that shows the music waves, this is how Final Cut Express shows this type of media.


We also learnt how to import chunks of our video. What we had to do was (assuming you have your camera plugged into the Mac via the FireWire cable) rewind the tapes back to the start using the short cuts (J and L) then once it was at the start you can press the 'Capture Now' button. The video looks like it's just playing but its really importing the video and when you want to stop you just press the 'Esc' button. This then places a clip called 'Untitled' into the selected folder. It is important to make sure you re-name your clips because you can very easily muddle up clips.

Chris Ashwell