Operation Manual

Adobe Premiere Elements 9 guide

How to add transitions

By using transitions, you can phase out one clip while phasing in the next, or you can stylize the beginning or end of

a single clip. A transition can be as subtle as a cross dissolve or quite emphatic, such as a page turn (Figure 1) or

spinning pinwheel. You generally place a transition on a cut to include clips on either side—a double-sided

transition, but you can also apply a transition to just the beginning or end of a clip—a single-sided transition.

Figure 1 Page Peel transition between two clips (left) and Cross Dissolve transition at end of clip (right)

For a transition to shift from one clip to the next, the transition must overlap frames from both clips. To achieve the

overlap, transitions can use frames previously trimmed from the clips, if any exist (frames just past the In or Out

point at the cut), or they can repeat the frames on either side of the cut. It’s important to remember that when you

trim a clip, you don’t delete frames. The resulting In and Out points simply frame a window over the original clip. A

transition uses the trimmed frames to create the transition effect (Figure 2), or, if the clips don’t have trimmed

frames, the transition repeats frames (Figure 3).

Figure 2 Transition using trimmed frames to shift to the next scene

First clip with trimmed frames at end B. Movie containing clips and transition

Second clip with trimmed frames at beginning

Figure 3 Transition repeating frames for clips without trimmed frames

A. First clip showing last frame repeated B. Movie containing both clips and transition

Second clip showing first frame repeated