Final Cut Pro X - 4: Adjusting Audio, Adding Stills, Ken Burns

1.  Controlling volume levels

Highlight an audio track in the timeline and left click and grab the line in the middle. You can raise it 12 decibels (12db) to increase the volume. To do an audio “fade in/fade out” grab the marker at the start of a clip and left-click and drag it to the right to add a (+3db) fade in.
Right click on the marker to make it a linear or s-curve fade in.

2.  De-linking audio from video

Right click on a video track in the timeline and choose “Detach audio”. This will drop the audio track below the primary storyline track. Now if you move the video track the audio track will not follow. Highlight the audio track and press delete to remove it.

3.  Clip Connections

Clip connections automatically lock video placed above video track 2 to the primary storyline track 1. This is very useful if you move video track 1 around then track 2,3,4, etc will follow.
Be careful deleting content on video track 1 though because any clips connected to the clip on track 1 will be deleted as well.

4.  Clip Auditioning

Clip auditioning is a new feature which allows you to place a bunch of clips inside of 1 clip in the timeline and quickly switch back and forth between the lot to determine which clip fits best. To do this, drag and drop a clip from the event library into another clip on the timeline (You should see a filmstrip icon appear).

Then choose “Add clip to audition from the pop-up menu.
Next click on the spotlight symbol that appears next to the Clip Title and the audition window will pop up. Here you easily switch between the different clips to sample how they look in that section of your movie. Click “Done” to finalize.

5.  Adding still images

Go to File’ then ‘Import’ → ‘Files’. You can add it a new event or existing event. Add still images to the timeline the same way you do video clips. Drag and drop the still image from the Event Library to the Timeline.

6.  Using Ken Burns effect on still images (part 1)

Start by dragging and dropping a still image from the Event Library into the timeline. Highlight your picture then under the Canvas click on drop down button next to the Transform button and select Crop.

7.  Using Ken Burns effect on still images (part 2)

Next click on the Ken Burns tab.

Now you’ll see two rectangular widescreen boxes to represent the starting and end point of your Ken Burns motion. Just move the boxes around to control position and change their size to adjust scale.
What you see in the box is how the image will be cropped in the frame. The arrow in the center indicates the direction in which the motion will occur within the frame.

Note: This will work on a video clip