Final Cut Express Help Needed

[slu]

I just got Final Cut Express and I am working on my first project and I need some help:

How do I add a transition at the end of a sequence (i.e. a fade out at the end of the movie)? When I place the playhead at the end of the last clip and try to add a transition from the menu, the selections are grayed out. And when I drag from the Effects tab of the browser window, it does not fade the audio out.

How do I adjust the audio levels for part of a clip? Like in iMovie where you can move audio levels up and down during a clip. For example, I have 15 second clip of someone doing something, and for the 5 seconds in the middle, a bus roars by and I want to lower the audio level for this part of the clip only.

Do transistions dragged from the effects tab of the browser only affect the video? It seems to me that if I add a new clip with the default transition in the canvas window, the transition effects both the audio and video, but if I add one later from the effects tab, it seems to only affect the video.

I did a search and didn't get much luck.

Anyone know any good FCE sites/tutorials? The book is good for the basics, but I need some practical application type stuff!

Thanks in Advance!

 

[slu]

Nobody here uses FCE HD?

Help a brother out!

 

[snickelfritz]

To fade out the end of your clip, select edit point at the end of the clip.
Right-click and choose "add transition cross dissolve"

Adjust the audio using keyframes.
ie: open the audio track in the viewer, then option-click the level overlay to place a keyframe. You will need four keyframes to create a dropout in the middle of the track (one at each end of the dropout and two between them to set the level of the dropout)
Once the keyframes are in place, you can simply click and drag them to the desired level.

 

[slu]

Thanks!

This was exactly what I was looking for!

slu