Making Changes to Effects

After you've tried effects by simply applying them to successive clips, you'll probably discover that you want to make things more interesting or customized.

You can drag and drop transitions, but the drag-and-drop feature doesn't work with effects.

Because you've already applied an effect to a clip, you will need to reapply the changed effect. To do this, select the clip you want to change the effect for, choose the effect you wish to change, make the changes, and then click Apply. A dialog message sheet window will appear in some cases to let you know that the new effect invalidates the previous one. You must choose OK for your new effect to be processed .

Task: Changing and Updating an Effect

This example picks up where we left off with the last task. We've decided that we want to try the mysterious Effect In and Effect Out features in the Effects palette. We want to slowly increase the impression that the effect has on our clip over the space of a few seconds by bringing in the effect to give the clip a unique feel and then fading out the effect.

1. Select a clip in the Timeline that has an effect applied to it.

2. Click the blue slider in the Effect In area of the Effects palette, and drag it a bit to the right to choose the length of time that it takes for the effect to develop to full strength (see Figure 15.27).

   Figure 15.27. Instead of simply turning on, the effect now fades in over the course of a few seconds.

   

3. Now click the Effect Out slider and drag it to the left to choose how long it takes for the video to return to normal.

4. Click the Apply button to re-apply the effect with these new settings.

When you click the Apply button, iMovie starts to process the video. In a short while, you can preview it to see the final version of the video. Of course, if the effect doesn't measure up to your expectations, you can continue steps 14, trying out different adjustments until you're happy with the effect.