A transition moves a scene from one shot to the next. Generally, you use a simple cut to move from shot to shot, but in some cases you might want to transition between shots by phasing out one and phasing in another. Premiere Pro provides many transitions that you can apply to your sequence. A transition can be a subtle crossfade or a stylized effect, such as a page turn or spinning pinwheel. While you usually place a transition on a cut line between shots, you can also apply a transition to only the beginning or end of a clip.
By default, placing one clip next to another in a Timeline panel results in a cut, where the last frame of one clip is simply followed by the first frame of the next. When you want to emphasize or add a special effect to a scene change, you can add any of a variety of transitions, such as wipes, zooms, and dissolves. Apply transitions to the timeline using the Effects panel, and edit them using the Timeline and the Effect Controls panel.
Transitions are available in the Video Transitions and the Audio
Transitions bins in the Effects panel. Premiere Pro provides many
transitions, including dissolves, wipes, slides, and zooms. These
transitions are organized in bins 
by
type.
For a video tutorial that shows how to apply and adjust transitions, see the Adobe website.
For a video and a print tutorial on making transitions, see the Adobe website.
Franklin McMahon provides a video tutorial on the Layers Magazine website that shows how to apply transitions and set the default transition.
Phil Hawkins has two Premiere CS5 tutorial videos on applying transitions at Infinite Skills.
Kevin Monahan shows how to create new transitions based on effects in an article on the Adobe website: using effects as transitions in Adobe Premiere Pro in this blog post.
You can create custom bins to group effects any
way you’d like. (See Work
with bins.)Clip handles and transitions
In most cases, you don’t want a transition to occur during the essential action in a scene. For this reason, transitions work best with handles—the extra frames beyond the In and Out points set for the clip.
The handle between a clip’s Media Start time and In point is sometimes called head material, and the handle between a clip’s Out point and Media End time is sometimes called tail material.
- A.
- Media Start
- B.
- Handle
- C.
- In point
- D.
- Out point
- E.
- Handle
- F.
- Media End
In some cases, the source media may not contain enough frames for clip handles. If you apply a transition, and the handle duration is too short to cover the transition duration, an alert appears to warn you that frames will be repeated to cover the duration. If you decide to proceed, the transition appears in a Timeline panel with diagonal warning bars through it.
For best results with transitions, shoot and
capture source media with sufficient handles beyond the In and Out
points of the actual clip duration you want to use.Single- and double-sided transitions
Transitions are typically double-sided—they combine the last video or audio material from the clip before the cut with the first material from the clip right after the cut. You can, however, apply a transition to an individual clip so that it affects only the beginning or end of the clip. A transition applied to a single clip is called single-sided. The clip can be immediately adjacent to another clip or sitting by itself on a track. You can apply double-sided transitions only when the clip before the cut has a handle at its tail, and the clip after the cut has a handle at its head. For more information, see Applying transitions.
Using single-sided transitions, you have more control over how clips transition. For example, you can create the effect of one clip departing using the Cube Spin transition, and the next clip fading in using Dither Dissolve.
Single-sided transitions fade to and from a transparent state, not to and from black. Whatever is below the transition in a Timeline panel appears in the transparent portion of the transition (the portion of the effect that would display frames from the adjacent clip in a two-sided transition). If the clip is on Video 1 or has no clips beneath it, the transparent portions display black. If the clip is on a track above another clip, the lower clip is shown through the transition, making it look like a double-sided transition.
If you want to fade to black between clips, use
the Dip To Black dissolve. Dip To Black doesn’t reveal any underlying
clips; it always fades to black.In a Timeline panel or the Effect Controls panel, a double-sided transition has a dark diagonal line through it, while a single-sided transition is split diagonally with one half dark and one half light.
- A.
- Double-sided transition using duplicate frames
- B.
- Double-sided transition
- C.
- Single-sided transition
Applying transitions
To place a transition between two clips (centered on the cut line), the clips must be on the same track, with no space between them. As you drag the transition to a Timeline panel, you can adjust the alignment interactively. Whether or not the clips have trimmed frames determines how you can align the transition as you place it between the clips. The pointer changes to indicate the alignment options as you move it over the cut:
If both clips contain trimmed frames at the cut, you can center the transition over the cut or you can align it on either side of the cut so that it either starts or ends at the cut.
If neither clip contains trimmed frames, the transition automatically centers over the cut and repeats frames from the first clip, or from the second clip, or from both clips, as needed to fill the transition duration. Diagonal bars appear on transitions that use repeated frames.
If only the first clip contains trimmed frames, the transition automatically snaps to the In point of the next clip. The transition uses the first clip’s trimmed frames for the transition and does not repeat frames from the second clip.
If only the second clip contains trimmed frames, then the transition snaps to the Out point of the first clip. The transition uses the second clip’s trimmed frames for the transition and does not repeat frames from the first clip.
The default duration of a transition, for either audio or video, is set to 1 second. If a transition contains trimmed frames, but not enough to fill the transition duration, Premiere Pro adjusts the duration to match the frames. You can adjust the duration and alignment of a transition after you place it.
Apply a transition between two clips
- To place a transition between two clips, drag the transition
to the cut line between two clips, and release the mouse when you
see the Center At Cut icon
. Note: As you drag over heads or tails of clips in a Timeline panel, you can see the area covered by the transition outlined.
To preview the transition, play the sequence or drag the current-time indicator through the transition.
Apply a single-sided transition
- To place a transition on a single cut, Ctrl-drag (Windows)
or Command-drag (Mac OS) the transition into a Timeline panel. Release
the mouse when you see either the End At Cut or Start At Cut icon.
- End At Cut icon
- Aligns the end of the transition to the end of the first clip.
- Start At Cut icon
- Aligns the beginning of the transition to the beginning of
the second clip.Note: As you drag over heads or tails of clips in a Timeline panel, you can see the area covered by the transition outlined.
To place a transition at the end of a clip
that is not adjacent to another clip, drag and drop the transition.
Don’t Ctrl-drag (Windows) or Command-drag (Mac OS). The transition
automatically becomes single-sided. - End At Cut icon
To preview the transition, play the sequence or drag the current-time indicator through the transition.
Specify and apply default transitions
You can specify a video transition and an audio transition as default transitions and quickly apply them between clips in a sequence. A red outline marks default transition icons in the Effects panel. Cross Dissolve and Constant Power Crossfade are preset as the video and audio default transitions.
If you use another transition more frequently, you can set it as the default. When you change the default transition setting, you change the default for all projects. Changing the default transition doesn’t affect transitions already applied to sequences.
If
you want to apply the default transition to most or all of the clips
in a sequence, consider using the Automate To Sequence command.
Automate To Sequence places the default video and audio transition
between all the clips it adds. See Add clips to a sequence automatically.Specify a default transition
- Choose Window > Effects and expand the Video Transitions or Audio Transitions bin.
- Select the transition that you want to make the default.
- Click the Menu button for the Effects panel, or right-click the transition.
- Choose Set Selected As Default Transition.
Set the duration of the default transition
- Do one of the following:
Choose Edit > Preferences > General (Windows), or Premiere Pro > Preferences > General (Mac OS).
Click the Effects panel menu button. Choose Default Transition Duration.
- Change the value for the Video Transition Default Duration or Audio Transition Default Duration, and then click OK.
Add the default transition between two clips
You can apply the default transition to adjoining pairs of clips on one or more tracks
Apply default transitions between selected clips
You can apply the default video and audio transitions to any selection of two or more clips. The default transitions are applied to every edit point where two selected clips touch. The placement does not depend upon the position of the current-time indicator or on whether the clips lie on targeted tracks. The default transitions are not applied where a selected clip touches a non-selected clip or no clip at all.
- In the Timeline, select two or more clips. Shift-click clips, or draw a marquee over them, to select them.
- Select Sequence > Apply Default Transitions To Selection.
Copy and paste a transition
You can copy any transition in a sequence, and paste it to any other cut line on a track of the same type: video transitions to video tracks, and audio transitions to audio tracks.
- Select a transition in a sequence.
- Select Edit > Copy.
- Move the current-time indicator to the cut line where you want to paste the transition.
- Select Edit > Paste.
When you paste a double-sided transition to a double-sided location, the transition remains double-sided.
When you paste a double-sided transition to a single-sided location, the transition becomes single-sided.
When you paste a single-sided transition to a double-sided location, the transition becomes double-sided.
Replace a transition
Drag the new video or audio transition
from the Effects panel onto the existing transition in the sequence. When you replace a transition, the alignment and duration are preserved. However, this discards the settings for the old transition and replaces it with the default settings for the new transition.
