I can't add transitions to .mov files on my timeline.

I imported .mov files shot on a iTouch in the hopes of editing this piece. The first transition, a dissolve from a black slug to the first clip gave me a drop frame warning and has a nasty jump at the completion of the transition. The rest of the sixty+ clips are on the timeline and rendered-it took about an hour to render them, but FCP won't allow me to drag and drop a transition at any point. I get a black X and a message that the media is not long enough when in reality Im linking say two 40 second clips with a 1 sec dissolve.

Thanks and Viva Amsterdam!


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You need to allow handles on your media in and out points on the timeline. That is - you need to trim the head and tail of all the media so that the place where you add a transition is later in the clip, and there is some room before the edit for the dissolve to happen.

This is a notoriously difficult thing to explain, but simple once you understand it. Maybe try doing a search for 'handles' on this forum for other explanations that might bump you in the right direction.

yeah, FCP does not trim media to add a transition.
you have to do that yourself
if there isn't enough handle FCP trims the transition.
if there is no handle you cant add the transition.


"The first transition, a dissolve from a black slug to the first clip gave me a drop frame warning and has a nasty jump at the completion of the transition."

does it need rendering?


"The rest of the sixty+ clips are on the timeline and rendered-it took about an hour to render them"

you need to transcode your footage to an FCP friendly format.
that might take about the same amount of time,
but could be quicker if compressor is set up correctly.
however, once the footage is a format FCP likes, then it will be much easier to work with.

what you convert to depends on what version of FCP you are using, and what you plan to do with the footage.


nick

Thanks Nick and Jude. I'll take the time to get reacquainted with FCP, The last FCP version I used was 3.0.