At the same time, it’s a very deep application that makes the entire process of editing very rewarding. Even still, I recommend keeping the checkerboard background enabled, because it always shows up properly when quickly scrubbing through position values in the Inspector.įinal Cut Pro X is an incredibly thoughtful application that takes much of the difficulty out of editing. Final Cut Pro X appears to have a bug where the checkerboard doesn’t show up properly on some values. This can potentially save me a lot of time, avoiding the need to go back and tweak the edit after I’ve already delivered the final video.Īll of this being said, you should still recognize, from a numerical standpoint, when your clip is out of range. As you can see, it’s now immediately recognizable from a visual standpoint when my clip is out of range, no matter what color my clip is. Here is what the Checkerboard Player Background looks like without any clips:Īnd here is the same clip from above, positioned out of range, with the Checkerboard background enabled. For the record, there is a white option as well. To enable the Checkerboard Player Background go to Final Cut Pro X → Preferences → Playback and enable Checkerboard on the Player Background drop down menu. This checkerboard style means that no matter what color your clip is, you’ll be able to see when it has moved past the range of the frame, on any axis. To prevent potential issues like this, Final Cut Pro X includes an option in its preferences to change the player background color from pure black to a checkerboard style. Of course, it’s good to know the numerical boundaries of your given aspect ratio, but when you’re working fast it can be easy to overlook. It’s even more difficult to spot if the area of the clip itself is dark, which allows it to blend in with the player background.Īs you can see from the screenshot below, it’s difficult to tell at first glance that I’ve positioned the clip too far down on the Y-axis. You may ask the question: can’t you tell that you’ve moved the clip too far? Possibly, but Final Cut Pro X itself features a dark UI, so sometimes it’s easy to go past the boundary without catching it. Notice the black border at the top it’s subtle but it’s there. Here is an example of me positioning the clip too far down on the Y-axis, outside of the area of the frame. You can avoid this by knowing the exact X or Y boundary for your clip, but oftentimes when you’re working fast and dragging position sliders, it’s easy to move the clip outside the boundary of the frame. At times it’s possible to actually reframe the clip past its area, leaving you with a black area on the frame. Here’s where things can get a bit tricky when reframing shots: sometimes you can straddle dangerously close to the border of a clip without even realizing it. Now you see less hands, and more of the upper area of the clip. Or I can reframe the clip by moving it down on the Y-axis.
In the shot below, you can see how I’ve reframed the clip by moving it up on the Y-axis. This provides added flexibility in post, similarly to how you get freedom to reframe when shooting in 4K and delivering in 1080P, or shooting in 8K and delivering in 4K. The cool thing about this is that it allows you to reframe the shot on the Y-axis (moving it up and down). Notice how you can see less of the top and bottom of the frame in the image below. When you zoom in manually, or choose to automatically fill the entire frame using Final Cut Pro X’s Spatial Conform → Fill Type, the clip is zoomed in to fill the frame, which essentially crops the upper and lower regions of the clip out of the frame. Notice the pillar boxing that occurs to fit all of the frame inside the new aspect ratio.
Here’s a frame from a 16:9 video in a 2:1 aspect ratio. Here’s a frame from a 16:9 video at 16:9 aspect ratio: Subscribe to 9to5Mac on YouTube for more video tutorials