Adobe Premiere is one of those easy-to-learn, hard-to-master programs. Here are 15 things I've learned along the way that will help you become a pro.
Are you tired of spending all of your time figuring things out in Premiere? Looking to speed up your editing workflow? Do you want to delete the program and never look at a render screen again, then sell your belongings to begin a life of solitude in the mountains? Well, don't do that. Today, I'm going to show you 15 things I've learned in Premiere over the years that I wish I knew as a beginner, so you can move beyond that amateur stage and become a Premiere . . . pro.
Badly-written applications randomly crashing, (Adobe Premiere Pro CC, Photoshop CC, Lightroom CC, and other third-party apps) and Adobe compatibility issues with the latest Mac OS, to name a few. In short, crap software will be crap on any machine, whether it is a PC or a Mac.
Get it . . . ? Never mind. Let's get started.
1. Audio Syncing
When I first started using clips recorded on a separate audio and video system, I would always sync each clip individually with a clapper, and use the manual process of lining the clips up correctly. I was doing that until I found the much-easier route: the synchronization button.
Drag your audio and video clip into the timeline, then select both. Right-click, and then select Synchronize. The sync window will pop up, and from there, select the audio button to sync both tracks. Remember, your camera needs scratch audio for this to work, so make sure you're recording onboard audio before you shoot. Once you click the sync button, your tracks will sync.
- When comparing video editing software, Adobe Premiere Pro and Final Cut Pro X are among the best. We compared pros and cons to help you decide which to use.
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If you'd like to make a bin full of synced clips, you can select your synced clips, right-click, select group, and then drag those merged clips to a new bin.
2. Color Coding with Bins
If you're like me, you have trouble keeping your project window organized. A little thing I learned to keep it clean from the moment you start your project is by importing folders directly into Premiere. You don't have to group-select each clip to import them all — you can drag the entire folder into Premiere, and it will automatically turn it into a labeled bin.
So to make things easier, organize your assets during ingestion to your hard drive, then when you need to import, you can just drag the folders in. To organize even further, try color-coding your clips. Highlight the clips in each bin, and select a color from the label tab. Now, each folder will have its own corresponding color in your timeline, which will help you keep track of each type of asset, especially if you have many types of audio and video clips from different cameras and recorders.
3. Workspace Customization
Your Premiere workspace is critically important to the speed of your edits. Here, I've got Premiere open. This is the normal edit page that most editors use. The three windows that I tend to use the most are the Lumetri Color tab, the Effects tab, and the Effect Controls tab. On the right side, I put the Lumetri tab and the Effects tab together so they're easily accessible during an edit. I'll also add the Essential Graphics tab over there for quick graphic access.
Once you've customized your space, you can save it by going to Window > Workspace > Save as New Workspace. Now, you can access your tailor-made space even after you close down the software. One keyboard shortcut you should know is the full-screen shortcut: the tilde key will maximize any window in Premiere, which helps if you would like a quick full-screen view of your program window.
4. Option + Drag to Copy a Clip
Tired of the old Command C + Command V to duplicate your clips? For a quick duplication, simply hold the option key and drag a selected clip to the side to duplicate that clip. You can also use the option key to select individual layers of grouped media, such as a video clip with attached audio. I use this all the time to batch delete scratch audio off my timeline once I'm done syncing.
5. Ctrl/Cmmd + K for Splitting Clips
One of my biggest pet peeves as a beginner in Premiere was using the cut tool. It was clunky, and it wasn't as efficient as I wanted it to be when I wanted to split a clip. With the Ctrl/Cmmd + K shortcut, you can create a split directly on your timeline at your playhead. This is probably my most-used shortcut, and for good reason — it saves time.
6. New Item Tab – Bars and Tone, Black Video, Color Matte
One thing that many new users don't know about in Premiere is the New Item tab. There's a whole load of assets in there that are super useful for your videos. Here are three that I find the most useful.
- The adjustment layer is perfect for applying an effect to your entire timeline. If I'm trying to apply a LUT to my entire timeline very quickly, I will add an adjustment layer to the top of my timeline and then add the LUT from there. That effect will transfer to everything below the adjustment layer.
- The black video item is great for placing underneath graphics that need a black background.
- Bars and Tone is also very convenient if you need to bleep someone out.
7. Dragging the Video or Audio tabs from clip
When you're trying to throw on a B-roll clip from your source window, just drag it from the small film strip icon, and it will drag the video only onto your timeline — without the audio. Mac marrakesh malaysia price. The same goes for dragging the audio from the waveform icon next to the film strip.
8. Replace with After Effects Comp
If you need a quick AE title sequence on top of one of your clips, but don't want to go through the hassle of opening a new project and rendering something out, try replacing your clip with an AE composition. Just right-click it, and select Replace with After Effects Composition. From there, AE will open with your clip, and you can add titles and effects directly to that clip. No need to render, either — just save the AE project, and it will automatically link to the Premiere project.
For more After Effects tutorials for beginners, check out Todd Blankenship's series on After Effects.
9. Audio Gain
If you want to batch increase the volume of your audio timeline, the Audio Gain button is a super effective tool. Just highlight the clips you would like to increase, and select Audio Gain. From there, add a few decibels of volume, and your timeline will get louder.
10. Nesting Large Clips/Graphics
If you've got a huge graphics stack that is taking up way too much space on your timeline, try nesting your clips. It consolidates all of the selected layers on the timeline into a single layer. Just highlight your desired clips, right-click, and select Nest. It will shrink all those clips to one track. If you need to access the individual layers, just double-click the nest, and it will bring you to a sequence including the source clips.
11. Lumetri: Using the Curves
Adding contrast is one of the many things you've got to do to Log or S-Log footage to get it to look right. But the contrast slider on Lumetri Color just won't cut it. Try 'crushing the darks' of your clip by creating a sine curve in the Curves section of Lumetri Color. This will crush the darker parts of your clips while bringing up the highlights.
12. Lumetri Creative Tab
Adobe Premiere Mac Vs Pc Laptop
Most LUT tutorials will tell you to add the LUT to the 'Input LUT' section of Lumetri Color. I mean, that seems like the most obvious one. But, you have no control over the intensity. Try adding it to the 'Look' section of the Creative tab. It will allow you to use a slider to adjust the intensity of the LUT.
13. Copy and Pasting Attributes Using Ctrl+Alt+V
This is just a keyboard shortcut that I use a lot. Say I have a color grade on the first clip in my timeline, and a whole row of clips beside it that need the same grade. I would just Ctrl/Cmd+C the clip to copy its properties, then select the rest of the clips, and press Ctrl+Alt+V (for PC) or Cmd+Option+V for Mac. This will open up the 'Paste Attributes' tab, which allows you to paste over attributes from your copied clip.
14. Masking and Tracking with the Pen Tool
One of the biggest misses in my early Premiere education was not learning how to mask correctly. If you want to raise the highlights on someone's face, but not the background, create a new mask using the pen tool under Opacity. Circle your desired area, and then a new mask will appear. Duplicate your original clip and place it underneath the masked clip. Now, you have two individual layers that you can edit separately. If it's a face that's moving around, you can track it directly in Premiere. Just click the play button next to the mask in the Effect Controls, and Premiere will auto-track that face for the duration of the clip.
15. Time Remapping Settings
If you want to perform a speed ramp, don't bother with the 'Speed/Duration' effect on your clip. You can actually do it directly on your clip by right-clicking > Show Clip Keyframes > Time Remapping >Speed. This will place a little rubber band on your clip that you can use to increase and decrease the speed of your clip. Create a ramp by placing a keyframe with the pen tool and raising one side of the band. For more info about speed ramping, check out our tutorial on time remapping.
Interested in the tracks we used to make this video?
- 'Fine Wine' by Soulish
- 'Grooving Around You' by Ulas Pakkan
- 'Flaming Lo Fi' by Trending Music
- 'Abstract Chill Hop' by Trending Music
- 'Tempting' by Trending Music
- 'Warmer than Tape' by Sugar Beats
- 'Hot Hip' by Trending Music
- 'Classic Beat' by Sugar Beats
Looking for more on film and video production? Check out these articles.
Performance is important
At BIZON we often get many customers who want to switch from a Mac to a PC Workstation. While there are many reasons our customers want a change, it usually comes down to one major factor, performance.
Whatever you use your Mac or Workstation PC for, performance is important to help you manage your workflow, to ensure your game runs smoothly, for high-quality sound and graphics, and to edit videos efficiently.
The rise in 4K, 6K, and 8K workflows makes optimum performance a necessity for many people, so it is essential to make the right choice when considering a computer.
With performance being the most important factor when deciding between a PC or a Mac, we take a look at why a PC is a better option to use Adobe's Premiere Pro video editing application compared to a Mac or iMac Pro 2019.
To find out whether a PC or Mac is a best video editing workstation, we took three iMac systems and a PC workstation of a similar price and tested them across performance for live playback, render in to out, and export.
If you love data we're sure you'll enjoy looking at our charts, which show how the systems compare, but if charts aren't your thing you can always scroll past the data to read our conclusion.
To compare the iMac Pro and Mac Pro to our BIZON V5000 4K/6K/8K video editing workstation, we tested the following system configurations, using Premier Pro version 13.1:
1. BIZON V5000 14-Core 4K/6K/8K Video Editing Workstation Computer 2020
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Price $5700 + $520 (4K monitor) = $6220 –> ~$6200
- Processor: 14-Core 3.30 GHz Intel Core i9-9940X (up to 18 cores)
- Memory: 64 GB DDR4 3200 MHz
- Graphics Card: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Ti 11GB
Note: With NVIDIA GPUs you get advantages of Adobe's Mercury Playback Engine acceleration and CUDA support. AMD that comes with Mac have no CUDA. - Hard Drive (Operating system): 1 TB PCI-E SSD (Up to 3500 Mb/s)
- Additional HDD (Storage): 2 TB HDD SATA
- Operating system: Windows 10 Pro
- Monitor: Dell U2718Q 27-Inch 4K UHD IPS Monitor
- Keyboard + Mouse: Logitech Wireless Mouse and Keyboard
- Warranty: Life-time Expert Care with 5 Year Limited Warranty (5 Year Labor & 3 Year Part Replacement)
- Software Premiere Pro CC 2019 (ver 13.1)
Price $7000 + $79 (mouse) + $129 (keyboard) + $520 (4K monitor) + $249 (Apple Care) = $7556 –> ~$7500
Adobe Premiere Mac Vs Pc
- Processor: 2.7GHz 12-core Xeon
Note: Old generation CPU (2013 Year) - Memory: 64GB 1866MHz DDR3
Note: Old DDR3 RAM - Graphics Card: Dual AMD FirePro D700 GPUs 6GB
- Hard Drive: 1TB PCIe-based SSD
- Additional HDD (Storage): Not available
- Operating System: macOS 10.13.4
- Monitor: Dell U2718Q 27-Inch 4K UHD IPS Monitor
- Keyboard + Mouse: Space Gray Magic Keyboard with Numeric Keypad + Magic Mouse 2
- Warranty: AppleCare+ for Mac (3 yr limited warranty & telephone technical support)
- Software: Premiere Pro CC 2019 (ver 13.1)
3. Apple iMac Pro 2019 (14-Core)
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Price $8000 + $169 (Apple Care) = $8169 –> ~8200
- Processor: 2.5GHz 14-core Intel Xeon W processor
- Memory: 64GB 2666MHz DDR4 ECC
- Graphics Card: Radeon Pro Vega 64 16GB
- Hard Drive: 1TB PCIe SSD
- Additional HDD (Storage): Not available
- Operating System: macOS 10.13.4
- Monitor: 27-inch LED-backlit 5K display
- Keyboard + Mouse: Space Gray Magic Keyboard with Numeric Keypad + Magic Mouse 2
- Warranty: AppleCare+ for iMac (3 yr limited warranty & telephone technical support)
- Software: Premiere Pro CC 2019 (ver 13.1)
Price $7200 + $169 (Apple Care) = $7369 –> ~7400
- Processor: 3.0GHz 10-core Intel Xeon W processor
- Memory: 64GB 2666MHz DDR4 ECC
- Graphics Card: Radeon Pro Vega 64 with 16GB
- Hard Drive: 1TB PCIe SSD
- Additional HDD (Storage): Not available
- Operating System: macOS 10.13.4
- Monitor: 27-inch LED-backlit 5K display
- Keyboard + Mouse: Space Gray Magic Keyboard with Numeric Keypad + Magic Mouse 2
- Warranty: AppleCare+ for iMac (3 yr limited warranty & telephone technical support)
- Software: Premiere Pro CC 2019 (ver 13.1)
We used version 13.1 of Premiere Pro, as the latest version wasn't released at the time of this article. We also found major performance issues with Premiere Pro CC 2019 (ver 13.1), with performance drops in ProRes footage on the PC and RED footage on the Mac when using versions 13.1 and 13.1.1.
For a fair comparison we kept the specs and pricing as similar as possible. For example, as Mac systems only support a single internal drive, we used a single 1TB PCI-E SSD drive on our BIZON Workstation PC, rather than multiple storage drives, which improve performance when generating peak files and importing media. As the iMac Pro requires a keyboard and mouse, we also bought a monitor, keyboard, and mouse for the Mac Pro and PC.
To compare the systems, we tested three different functions in Premiere Pro: live playback, export, and render in to out.
Although we didn't cover every available codec, we covered a large number of RED clips so that we could really see how different compression levels impact performance. Our tests also used three different timelines to stimulate different types of workload.
Recording results
We recorded the export time from the moment the ‘Export' button was clicked until completion. We also measured Live playback FPS (frames per second) based on the number of dropped frames relative to the total number of frames in the sequence. For example, by dropping 100 frames in the 4K ProRes 422 HQ 'Basic' timeline (which has 579 frames), you will render 479 frames over 24 seconds for a result of ~20 FPS.
We used Lumetri effects from the 'Lumetri Presets –> Speedlooks –> Universal' effects folder. However, if you're using a Mac you'll probably need to delete and re-apply the Lumetri Color effects, as sometimes they don't translate properly from the PC to Mac.
It can be a challenge to accurately test live playback performance because performance depends on the codec and resolution of your media, as well as the playback resolution (full, half, etc.) and the effects you've applied.
At BIZON we often get asked about live playback performance, so we decided to test our media with three different timelines, as well as with a full and half playback resolution. We also decided to calculate the average performance of each system relative to the 10-core iMac Pro using OpenCL.
We found that using Metal with a Mac is a bad idea for playback performance and found a 20-30% drop in FPS with most of our test media, and a massive drop in FPS with RED footage when using Metal on the Mac system. For example, with 4K RED 11:1 footage the iMac Pro 14-core went from 24FPS to 6FPS without any effects being applied to the footage.
Even when using OpenCL you will get a bump in FPS with a PC. However, compared to the iMac-Pro 10-core, our PC workstation gave 25% higher FPS with ProRes media, 30% higher with DNxHR HQ/H.264/ARRIRAW, and almost 75% higher FPS with RED footage, and was 94% faster on average in our ‘Heavy Effects' test.
In comparison, the 14-core iMac Pro did slightly better with RED footage and was about 10% faster than the 10-core iMac Pro. However, the PC workstation was the clear winner for playback performance and was 25-60% faster depending on the type of footage used; making our PC workstation a better option for FPS as well as better value for money.
8K Footage
It takes time to export on Premiere Pro and export time is often used to measure performance. Taking 4K, 6K, and 8K projects using the different codecs listed in the Test Hardware & Methodology section we measured export performance on all the systems.
With our export tests we found using Metal on a Mac, rather than OpenCL often resulted in a decent performance gain. RED footage was an exception, usually taking twice as long or longer to export with Metal. However, as our findings in the Live Playback test show, Metal was significantly worse than OpenCL, so keeping Premiere Pro in OpenCL mode will be the best option for most Mac users.
If you do decide to stick with OpenCL a PC is your best option, as our Custom workstation computer exported projects approximately 40% faster than the iMac Pro 2019 10–Core. The performance gap closed by a small amount with the 14-core iMac, but the PC still had a 30–40% performance lead. Surprisingly, the Mac Pro managed to keep up with the newer iMac Pro systems with ProRes footage, but fell behind with other types of media, making our PC workstation 40% to 60% faster, as well as saving you a whopping $2,000 on price.
If you're willing to switch between Metal for exporting non-RED footage and OpenCL for live playback, the Mac systems do better. However, the iMac Pro systems were still around 15% slower with DNxHR, H.264, and ARRIRAW footage, although the 14-core iMac Pro was able to pull slightly ahead of our BIZON V5000 PC with ProRes footage.
8K Footage
Rendering previews are sometimes a necessity, so we tested the ability to render in to out on all the systems for 4K, 6K, and 8K projects using the different codecs listed in the Test Hardware & Methodology section.
Using Metal on the Mac caused another performance problem, with RED footage dropping to 15-20%. However, due to the lower live playback performance with Metal across the media tested, we feel OpenCL offers the most valid comparison across the PC and Mac systems.
With ProRes media, there was around a 40% performance gain with the PC compared to iMac and Mac Pro. Mac app to clean up computer. This reduces slightly with DNxHR HQ, H.264, and ARRIRAW media, but our PC was still faster and outperformed the Mac by around 35%.
Surprisingly, our PC had a smaller performance gain in RED media compared to the other tests, however, the PC was still around 20% faster than the 14-core iMac Pro.
Impressively, PC performance was also 30% faster than the 10-core iMac Pro and 40% faster compared to the Mac Pro.
8K Footage
Best Video Editing Workstation. Conclusion: iMac, Mac Pro, or PC?
Cost wise the BIZON V5000 Workstations is already a winner, with a $6200 price tag compared to a $8,200 iMac Pro 2019 (14-Core) or $7,500 Mac Pro system.
It's also worth keeping in mind that we paid $420 for a 4K monitor, keyboard, and mouse, so if you already have them you would reduce the costs even more.
In terms of performance the PC Custom Workstation also comes out on top, with a 35-45% performance gain.
What was surprising was that the iMac Pro 2019 14-Core wasn't that much faster than the 10-core version and only increased in performance by around 5%. However, live playback performance was usually twice as good on the PC, with tendering and exporting being 40-50% better.
Therefore, our BIZON V5000 video editing workstation PC is the clear winner on both cost and performance.
Find word on mac. However, if you're already stuck with a Mac and want to increase your performance, our findings indicate that OpenCL is a better choice for the majority of Mac users, who want better live playback performance, but Metal was faster with non-RED media for exporting and rendering.
For more information on PC performance compared to Mac systems, you can check out our other articles here.
You can also take a look at our Recommended Workstation PC for Premiere Pro and contact us if you have any questions about making the move to PC workstation.