Final Cut Pro Power Skills: Working in the Application
- Change the Size of Text in the Browser and Timeline
- Zooming the Timeline
- Zooming Faster
- The Two Fastest Ways to Zoom
- Vertical Movement
- Image Quality in the Viewer vs. the Canvas
- Monitor Your Video Full Screen
- Remove Scroll Bars for Better Playback
- Back to Square One
- iChat Theater
- Green Is Not Just for Stoplights
- Visibility Lights and the Arrow Keys
- More Visibility Shortcuts
- The Secrets of the Right-Pointing Arrow
- Displaying Audio or Video Clip Names
- Display a Filmstrip of Images in the Timeline
- Displaying Source or Auxiliary Timecode
- Display Field Interlacing
- Duplicating Browser Clips
- Sorting Browser Columns
- Sorting Out Multiple Issues
- A Faster Way to Move Columns
- Customize Browser Columns
- Searching Browser Columns
- Searching Effects
- Viewing Thumbnails in the Browser
- Display Images Instead of Names in the Browser
- Fancy Light Table Tricks
- More Browser Fun
- Browser Keyboard Shortcuts
- Hidden Tricks with Tabs
- Jumping Between Tabs
- Riddle Me a Riddle
- Selecting Multiple Clips
- Selecting an Edit Point
- Using Range Selection
- Get Moving with Timecode
- Locking Tracks
- Toggling Display Modes
- Scrolling the Timeline
- Scrubbing the Playhead
- Find the Missing Playhead
- Scrubbing Timeline Thumbnails
- Discover Project Properties
- Markers Got Spiffed Up
- Markers Can Be Moved!
- A Better Way to Move Between Markers
- Reading Clip Markers
- Using Markers to Log Footage
- Deleting Multiple Clip Markers
- Markers Have Default Colors
- Using Markers in Multiclips
- Option Means Opposite
- Other Option Key Tricks
- The Fastest Way to Find a Keyboard Shortcut
- I Feel the Need—for Speed!
- Create a Custom Keyboard Shortcut
- “A”—An Amazing Authority
- Wonderful, Wacky, W
- How to Remove a Button
- Creating a Custom Button
- Reset/Remove All Buttons in a Button Bar
- Additional Thoughts
One thing that Apple is very proud of is the interface for Final Cut Pro. The word interface, however, covers a lot of territory. It’s what we work in for hours at a time. It’s how we interact with our project. And based on how well we understand it, it can determine whether we are happy or frustrated, productive or panicking.
This chapter is filled with dozens of Power Skills you can use to turn yourself into an interface master.
Change the Size of Text in the Browser and Timeline
We can’t change the font, but we can change the size. Here’s how.
It seems to be an unwritten rule in Apple’s interface guidelines that text needs to be so small and tasteful as to be almost unreadable.
Which is a real problem when you’re actually trying to read it.
Not to worry, though, there’s a fast solution to tiny text. Control-click in the gray area of the Name column of the Browser and change the text size from Small to Medium (my favorite) or Large.
The text changes size in both the Browser and Timeline. Sadly, this only affects Browser text and Timeline filenames. But even this goes a long way to reducing eyestrain.