Adding the Lower Third Graphic

The lower third graphic is used in most news and sports programming as a back drop for displaying the reporter's name or location, the name of the person being interviewed, or any other pertinent information for the story. Our lower third clip is called 144_Lowerthird2.mov and we'll simply drag it to the Timeline and make an adjustment or two.

Add the Lower Third

Select the clip, 144_Lowerthird2.mov, from the Available Media view in the Media panel.

Drag and drop it onto the Timeline of the My Project panel onto the Video 4 track. You want to position the clip so that the head (start) of the clip is at the 8 second mark.

Tip

Don't worry if you currently have only three available video tracks. When you drag the 144_Lowerthird2.mov clip to the blank area just above the Video 3 track, Premiere Elements automatically creates a new video track to hold the clip.

Tip

As mentioned earlier in this chapter, you can help place this clip at the 8 second mark by first moving the CTI to the 00;00;08;00 mark and then drag the clip from the Media panel to the Video 4 track where the CTI is sitting.

Adjust the Lower Third

On the Media panel, click the Effects and Transitions button to switch to the Effects and Transitions view.

Type horiz in the text box on the Effects and Transitions view to bring up the Horizontal Flip effect.

Select the Horizontal Flip effect from the Video Effects Transform category and drag and drop it onto the 144_Lowerthird2.avi clip on the Video 4 track.

Tip

The Horizontal Flip effect will flip the 144_Lowerthird2.avi clip so that the globe is on the right side of the screen. This will be a better look for our "set," since we already have the big gold globe spinning away on the left, behind our anchorman. By the way, note that the the Horizontal Flip effect has no effect controls to adjust in the Properties panel. In the steps below we will, however, use the Properties panel to change the 144_Lowerthird2.avi clip's position.

In the Properties panel for the 144_Lowerthird2.avi clip, twirl down the triangle next to Motion to reveal the effect's controls.

Make this change for the Motion setting (leaving all other settings "as is"):

• Position: 360.0

300.0