Project 1: Premier Pro Trailer

Create a new project in Premier Pro by clicking the "New Project" button. 

First give your project a good name such as "Game Jam Trailer" by typing in the top left corner.

Next make sure you are saving the files in the correct place. Check with your teacher where is appropriate for your school computer systems. When choosing a location you can create a new folder for your project by right clicking and pressing New>Folder.

When this is done press "Create"

Skill: Basic timeline management

Task: Create a montage of clips to tell a short story without sound, using stock video

Pexels is a great source of stock images and video. You may also want to use a thesaurus to look for synonyms and give you more inspiration for what clips you could use.

1. To get started, download at least 5 videos related to journeys. We'll use these videos to practice your editing skills so just try and get it done as quick as you can. Rename them in your file explorer so you can easily tell them apart. 

2. Make a Bin in your Project Window and import your videos into this by dragging them in.

3. You can then start adding videos to your sequence by dragging them from your project panel into the sequence. Put these in the V1 track. To insert a clip in between two other clips press Ctrl (PC) or Command (Mac) and drag the chosen clip you to the right spot in the timeline. Release the mouse to insert the clip. By holding Alt and scrolling you can zoom in and out one your sequence timeline.

4. Remove all the audio from the clips. To remove audio from a clip press Alt and click on the audio track. This will select only the audio which you can then erase with the Delete key

Skill: Syncing audio and video

Task: Add a background music track to an existing video, ensuring synchronization.

A good source for music is Pixabay

1. Find a suitable piece of music and download it and put it in your project folder

2. Create a new Bin Called "Audio" and import the music to this.

3. Add the Music to the sequence under the A1 Track.

4. Adjust the Audio Gain by right clicking on the audio track in your sequence and click "Audio Gain". You then need to adjust the audio levels by fixing the "Set Gain by..." value. You can then play the video and by watching the levels (these are the green bars next to the sequence)

As a rule of thumb:

• The overall volume should be around -10 to-14db 

• Dialog and voice around -12db 

• Music should be around -18- -22db

• Sound effects be around -10 to -20db

5. Use the Razor tool to cut your videos into a pleasing sequence. It is often a good idea to transition between clips when there is a change in tempo in the music. When deleting the excess clip you can hold down Shift when you press Delete and this will Ripple Delete, pulling all your other clips into line.

Skill: Adding text overlays

Task: Create a video with titles, captions, and basic animated text.

You are now going to add in a title to go at the end of the video "revealing" the theme

Watch the video and implement your own! You can experiment with importing a graphic from the Internet or simply use one of the defaults.

There are many websites with free templates including MixKit 

If you are using Premier Pro Beta the Graphics panel is called Essential Graphics

Skill: Using transitions effectively

Task: Edit your video with various transition effects between clips.

Watch the video and add some transitions of your own! You can also add transitions to the end of your sequence to allow for a smooth ending to the video as well.

Skill: Applying simple effects

Task: Add basic effects like slow motion, speed ramping, or basic visual filters to a video.

Watch the video and add some effects of your own! Add at least 3 different effects. These could be audio or video filters or adjustments. There are some ideas in the videos below.

Great Job! You made your first video in Premier Pro. Make sure you watch it all the way through and that it looks alright. Last step is to export your video to an mp4 so that it can be seen on any device.

Now make a copy of this document and fill out a learning reflection.

Teachers: You may want to assign this as a task and have students hand it in when they are done.