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The Smooth Cut effect works best on clips such as sit-down interviews and close-up head shots with a minimum of background and subject motion, and where the subject’s position on either side of the cut is not significantly different. A good example of when Smooth Cut is effective is when you’re cutting pauses, partial repeats, filler sounds such as “um” or “you know,” or other speech disfluencies out of an interview clip to tighten the dialog, and you want to eliminate the little “jump” that occurs at the cut without having to cut away to B-roll. Applying a short two or four frame Smooth Cut transition to the edit can make this kind of edit invisible, as long as the speaker doesn’t change position significantly during the cut. The more motion there is in the background of the shot, and the more the speaker changes position, the harder it will be to get a useful result using Smooth Cut. Although the default duration for any transition is one second,
you’ll find that Smooth Cut transitions work much better when they’re short; 2- to 6-frame Smooth Cut transitions often work best to disguise jump cuts.
Iris
Irises are directional transitions that are commonly used to both call attention to a specific part of the frame and indicate to the audience that one scene has ended and another begun. Irises were widely used in the silent film era instead of the more technically complicated dissolve.
— Arrow Iris: Color sets the color of the border, if there is one. Border sets the width of the border, in pixels, with 0 creating no border. Aspect Ratio allows you to change the proportions of the shape. Offset to center lets you alter the center point at which this transition is positioned. Rotation changes the angle of the iris. Feather is a checkbox that, when turned on, uses the Border slider to determine the amount of feathering at the edge of the transition. The Reverse checkbox reverses the direction of the transition.
Preset lets you choose one of the following presets:
— Arrow Up
— Arrow Down
— Arrow Left
— Arrow Right
— Cross Iris: Color sets the color of the border, if there is one. Border sets the width of the border, in pixels, with 0 creating no border. Offset to Center identifies the center point at which the cross wipe begins, as X and Y coordinates on the screen. Feather is a checkbox that, when turned on, uses the Border slider to determine the amount of feathering at the edge of the transition. The Reverse checkbox reverses the direction of the transition.
— Diamond Iris: Color sets the color of the border, if there is one. Border sets the width of the border, in pixels, with 0 creating no border. Offset to Center identifies the center point at which the diamond-shaped wipe begins, as X and Y coordinates on the screen. Feather is a checkbox that, when turned on, uses the Border slider to determine the amount of feathering at the edge of the transition. The Reverse checkbox reverses the direction of the transition.
— Eye Iris: Color sets the color of the border, if there is one. Border sets the width of the border, in pixels, with 0 creating no border. Feather is a checkbox that, when turned on, uses the Border
slider to determine the amount of feathering at the edge of the transition. The Reverse checkbox reverses the direction of the transition.
— Hexagon Iris: Color sets the color of the border, if there is one. Border sets the width of the border, in pixels, with 0 creating no border. Aspect Ratio allows you to change the proportions of the shape. Offset to center lets you alter the center point at which this transition is positioned.
Rotation changes the angle of the iris. Feather is a checkbox that, when turned on, uses the Border slider to determine the amount of feathering at the edge of the transition. The
Reverse checkbox reverses the direction of the transition. Preset lets you choose one of the following presets:
— Hexagon
— Hexagon Vertical
— Oval Iris: Color sets the color of the border, if there is one. Border sets the width of the border, in pixels, with 0 creating no border. Offset to Center identifies the center point at which this circular wipe begins, as X and Y coordinates on the screen. Oval Ratio changes the aspect ratio of the oval, making it either wider or taller. Feather is a checkbox that, when turned on, uses the Border slider to determine the amount of feathering at the edge of the transition. The Reverse checkbox reverses the direction of the transition.
— Pentagon Iris: Color sets the color of the border, if there is one. Border sets the width of the border, in pixels, with 0 creating no border. Aspect Ratio allows you to change the proportions of the shape. Offset to center lets you alter the center point at which this transition is positioned. Rotation changes the angle of the iris. Feather is a checkbox that, when turned on, uses the Border slider to determine the amount of feathering at the edge of the transition. The Reverse checkbox reverses the direction of the transition. Preset mode lets you choose one of the following presets:
— Pentagon Up
— Pentagon Down
— Square Iris: Color sets the color of the border, if there is one. Border sets the width of the border, in pixels, with 0 creating no border. Aspect Ratio allows you to change the proportions of the shape. Offset to center lets you alter the center point at which this transition is positioned. Rotation changes the angle of the iris. Feather is a checkbox that, when turned on, uses the Border slider to determine the amount of feathering at the edge of the transition. The Reverse checkbox reverses the direction of the transition. Preset mode lets you choose one of the following presets:
— Square Flat
— Square Point
— Triangle Iris: Color sets the color of the border, if there is one. Border sets the width of the border, in pixels, with 0 creating no border. Aspect Ratio allows you to change the proportions of the shape. Offset to center lets you alter the center point at which this transition is positioned. Rotation changes the angle of the iris. Feather is a checkbox that, when turned on, uses the Border slider to determine the amount of feathering at the edge of the transition. The Reverse checkbox reverses the direction of the transition. Preset mode lets you choose one of the following presets:
— Triangle Up
— Triangle Bottom
— Triangle Left
— Triangle Right