Chapter 11. Transitions

11. Transitions

Transitions can be equally wonderful and terrible things. They can move you from one scene to another without the abruptness of a straightforward cut, or help define a movie's pace by easing you gently into or out of a scene.

But transitions can also become a distraction, because you're introducing motion or visuals that weren't recorded by the camera. Too many transitions can be like using too many fonts in a word processing application: pretty soon, all you see is the style, not the content.

My best advice is to let the content determine the transition, if one is even needed: most of the time, a jump cut (moving from one clip to another without a transition) is all that's required. I'm not saying you should skip this chapterrather, using fewer, better transitions is almost always the better route.

Experiment with different transitions, all the while knowing that iMovie creates professional transitions without breaking a sweat, enabling you to concentrate on how your movie plays instead of trying to jump over technical hurdles.