Blog Post 54 - Stage 3 - Adobe Premiere - Tools Panel

I decided to dedicate a separate Blog Post to the Tools Panel of Premiere as this is a selection of Tools that will be used a lot during the course of this stage of the assignment and therefore I feel that these should be looked into fully so that the correct tools are used in the correct manner too. This Tools Panel is situated to the left of the video timeline and are very important tools within the use of Premiere. These tools, in order from top to bottom include: Selection Tool; Track Selection Tool; Ripple Edit Tool; Rolling Edit Tool; Rate Stretch Tool; Razor Tool; Slip Tool; Slide Tool; Pen Tool; Hand Tool; Zoom Tool.

Although I had looked through these tools in the tools panel I decided to carry out some more research and having summarised my findings from this source (http://www.mediacollege.com/adobe/premiere/pro/tool/) below which I am sure will help me in the future of using Premiere.

The Selection Tool is very similar to the selection tools that I have previously come across in the likes of Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator whereas this is the default tool whereby you can select clips in the timeline. By selecting the clips in the timeline this means that you will then be able to move them around to your chosen location, for example.

The Track Selection Tool is a tool that is in essence a quick selection tool if I was to compare to to a tool in Adobe Photoshop. The use of this tool means that you can select all of the clips on a track at a given point, or even select multiple tracks too.

The Ripple Edit Tool is a tool whereby you can move the edit point of a clip however this will also cause the rest of the timeline to move the same amount to compensate this too. To use this tool, one must select the ripple edit tool, position the mouse at the edit point in the timeline and drag to the left or the right.

The Rolling Edit Tool is a tool whereby you can move the edit point without affecting the rest of the timeline. An example of this is that the first (outgoing) clip is made shorter whilst the second (incoming) clip is made long by the same amount... Overall, therefore, the length is not effected as compensation is made between the two clips. To use this tool, the rolling edit tool is selected, the mouse positioned at the edit point and dragged to the left or the right.

The Rate Stretch Tool is a tool that is used to change the duration of the selection clip, but whilst doing this the speed is changed to compensate. For example you can stretch a clip to fill a gap between two clips, however caution should be taken to ensure that an unprofessional effect is not created especially if audio is being used too.

The Razor Tool is a tool that is particularly useful for editing clips that you have already trimmed down from your source video and placed the trimmed down clip into the timeline. It's likely that you will need to cut down a clip futher, and by using the Razor Tool you can select a point to cut a clip. Another possible route for this is in relation to wanting to apply different effects to parts of a clip.

The Slip Tool is a tool whereby you can move a clip's Mark In and Mark Out points by the same amount at the same time, thus meaning that the rest of the timeline is not affected. This is particularly useful in that the rest of the timeline is not affected if you wanted to change the selection of the clip that you wanted - for example if you wanted the selection a bit later on from the source clip.

The Slide Tool is a tool that allows you to move a clip back and forth in the timeline, and at the same time it simultaneously adjusted all of the adjacent clips too to compensate. The duration of the target clip is kept the same, however the clips to the left and right will increase or decrease to compensate in each individual case.

The Pen Tool is a tool that I have previously seen and used in that of Adobe Illustrator, however in this case it is used to create and control anchor points - for example the pen tool can be used to control how the fade of a clip is going to appear with a steed or shallow fade being able to be drawn using the pen tool.

The Hand Tool is a tool that is very simple however one that is very useful too. By using this tool you are able to drag the timeline left or right to view what you have got in the timeline. When not needing to edit and just view the timeline this is the perfect tool to use, allowing the swift review of the timeline.

The Zoom Tool is the final tool of the Tools Panel however one that is very useful. By using this you can click on the timeline to magnify the view of the timeline. By zooming in this means that you can see more details in regards to the larger area being occupied for a shorter amount of time - very useful for that of detailed clips management.

Having now fully understood and research that of the Tools Panel of Premiere, this means that I am now ready to start exploring and explaining further features of Premiere that I will be potentially using for Stage Three of my assignment.