Tip Grab Bag Part 2
Here are a few more tips I picked up at the Keycode demo.
Scroll Wheel Joy
If you’re like me, you’ve become dependent on a mouse with a scroll wheel (my favorite is the Microsoft Intellimouse Optical). But until Adrenaline, this didn’t work in the Media Composer, and even in Adrenaline, scrolling speed was so slow as to be all but useless. Version 2.7 changes that. Scrolling is now quite effective, and once you start using it I suspect you’ll soon wonder how you did without it all these years. If you don’t like the default scrolling speed you can change it via Mouse Settings. I would have preferred somewhat finer control — normal was a bit slow and moderate was too fast — but regardless, your scroll wheel is now functional. You can assign other mouse buttons to Media Composer functions, as well.
Horizontal Scrolling
If you’re working on a late model Mac laptop, you can now scroll horizontally with the track pad. Drag two fingers left or right and you can scroll bins and even the timeline itself. The catch, unfortunately is that you’ll scroll backwards. This makes a certain kind of sense in the timeline (try it to see what I mean) but in windows it’s pretty unnerving. (If your Mac doesn’t permit two-finger scrolling from the trackpad you can add it with iScroll.)
Matchframe Without Selecting a Track
You can quickly matchframe on a specific track without first selecting it, using a contextual menu pick. Just park your cursor over the track light for the track you want to match to and right click (on a Mac without a two button mouse, use control-shift-click). A menu pops up. Select “Match Frame Track” and you’ll match that track only.
Enter Text for Several Clips at Once
Suppose you want to enter the same text in a certain column for a group of clips. You can now do that in a single step. Select the clips, then put your mouse over the column in question. The cursor turns into a double-headed arrow. Now right click and a contextual menu appears. Choose “Set Comments column for selected clips…” Another window opens and you enter your text. Voila, that text is entered in that column for all the selected clips.
Technorati Tags: avid, edit, film, video
Explore posts in the same categories: Avid, Avid Technical Tips
Splice Now 
May 28, 2007 at 3:30 am
When I worked at KPBS all the FCP editors used stylus-like pens with large electronic canvas pads in place of a mouse. They swore up and down that they’ve never been able to edit as quickly and as efficiently with a mouse. Any thoughts on this?
May 29, 2007 at 7:56 am
I used a small Wacom tablet instead of a mouse in the 90s to reduce wrist pain. I liked it a lot. It can be very fluid. The problem is that I use the keyboard a lot to enter clip names or trim numerically, and of course, to JKL play, and with the tablet, you have to move your right hand to the keyboard and — key point — put down the pen. The mouse sits on the table and is always there. Seems like a small thing, but it can be annoying. After many months of trying various things, I went with a multi-button mouse (the Microsoft Intellimouse Optical) where I could program one of the buttons to be a double click. That took care of the wrist pain and retained the flexibility and speed. But I support anybody who wants to try a tablet. Remember that all the Discreet products are tablet-based.
The flexibility of the programmable QWERTY keyboard has kept it alive. It’s a kludge in every way, but you just can’t kill it. There are probably some lessons in that about evolution.
Good enough often wins out over perfect.
May 30, 2012 at 4:51 am
Reblogged this on Uttarakhand Cinema.