Create Blank Clips

In addition to the footage you imported from your camcorder, and photos you imported from iPhoto, iMovie supports blank clips that can be used as placeholders or just a solid screen of black (or a color you choose; see the extra bits on page 45).

You may not need to use blank clips, but I'm covering them here because you're likely to create one accidentally in the Timeline Viewer: I frequently go to drag the edge of a clip and miss by a few pixels, and accidentally drag the entire clip; I end up with sporadic sections of blank footage in my movie. Here's how to work with (or delete) them.

1.	In the Timeline Viewer, drag a clip to the right to expose a gap between clips. During playback, the gap appears as solid black footage.
2.	Press and click the gap to bring up the contextual menu, then choose Convert Empty Space to Clip.