Adding black video to your timeline

If you plan to export your Pinnacle Studio movie project to tape in a digital camcorder, you’ll need to add some black video clips to the beginning and end of the timeline. To add a black video clip to the beginning of your project, follow these steps:

1. In the Edit mode, click the Titles tab on the left side of the album. A selection of titles appears in the album.
2. If any tracks in the timeline are currently locked, click the track headers on the left side of the timeline to unlock them. When a track is locked, a tiny lock icon appears on the track header and a zebra-stripe pattern appears across the track. Unlocking all tracks is an important step because you’re going to insert a title clip at the very beginning of the timeline. If all tracks are unlocked, they all shift over automatically when you insert the title. This keeps all your narration, music, and title overlays properly synchronized with your video.
3. Click-and-drag any title to the very beginning of the video track on your timeline.
4. Double-click the title to open the title editor
5. Select the text in the title and press Delete on your keyboard to delete all the title text.
6. Adjust the duration of the title using the Duration field in the upperright corner of the title editor. I recommend a duration of 30 seconds.
7. Close the title editor. The blank title will appear at the beginning of the timeline.
8. Click the blank title once to select it, and then choose Edit➪Copy.
9. Move the play head to the end of the timeline.
10. Choose Edit➪Paste.

A copy of the blank title will now appear at the end of the movie as well. Another thing I often like to do is add a Dissolve transition between the initial black video clip and the first actual clip of the movie. This technique makes the beginning of the movie a little easier on the eyes as it fades in. In Figure 15-4, I have done this by dragging a Dissolve transition to the timeline from the Transitions tab of the Studio album.

Exporting to tape in Windows Movie Maker

You can export to tape from Windows Movie Maker, but I really don’t recommend it if you have another option. Even if you use Movie Maker’s very highest-quality capture option, your video is still compressed by Windows Movie Maker when it’s first captured into your computer. This means that the quality of the source footage stored on your computer is somewhat reduced right from the start. If you don’t have any other choice but to use Windows Movie Maker, here’s how to do it: First connect your digital camcorder to the computer’s FireWire port. I also strongly recommend that you use Movie Maker’s titling tool to create a blank title with no words and a black background. Place this title at the beginning of your project and make it 30 seconds long. Copy the title and place it at the end of the project as well. When you’re ready to send your movie to tape, click Send to DV Camera under the Finish Movie step in Movie Maker (remember, I recommend using Windows Movie Maker version 2 or later; see Appendix E for information on downloading the latest version). Put a blank tape in your camcorder and follow the instructions on-screen to export your movie to tape.