25610cA_DVD.

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A
Lesson Files Lessons > Apdx_MotionMenu; Apdx_Soundtrack.loop

Media Media > TigerBasic

Media > TigerMotionMenu_Apdx > MotionMenuMedia

Time This lesson takes approximately 60 minutes to complete.

Goals Create a motion menu in Final Cut Pro

Work with the 3D Title tool in Final Cut Pro

Export a sequence to Soundtrack

Work with Apple Loops in Soundtrack

Build a music score for a DVD menu

Export a mix from Soundtrack

•
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Appendix A

Creating a Motion
Menu in Final Cut Pro
DVD Studio Pro is not the only application you can use to create a
motion menu; depending on your workflow or the specific needs of the
project, there may be times when you’d prefer to create a motion menu
in Final Cut Pro.

Used extensively in most motion picture DVD releases, motion menus

improve the overall DVD experience for the viewer, and simply make
things a little more interesting. Although creating motion menus can
take extra time, they’re usually worth including in any DVD project.

In the following lesson, you will learn how to create a basic motion
menu using Final Cut Pro. Before we begin, you’ll need to understand a
few basic rules for motion menus.

3
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4 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

Basic Rules for Motion Menus

A motion menu is simply an edited video clip that usually reveals a little bit of
the content found in the DVD itself. The edited video clip will eventually be
converted to an MPEG-2 stream like the rest of the video clips you’ll use to
create a typical DVD.

A motion menu (clip) is usually 20 to 60 seconds in duration. Most motion

menus will need to be set to loop in DVD Studio Pro in case the viewer does
not make a selection during the duration of the video track.

It’s wise to add a fade up from black into the motion menu, and fade to black
at the end of a motion menu to make the end loop visually smoother. If you
plan on having an audio track play during the motion menu, you should fade
up the music at the start and fade the music down at the end. Sometimes, you
may wish to leave out the fades in an attempt to create an “invisible loop” by
making the frames at the beginning of the motion menu similar or identical to
the final frames, so that the end of the movie seems to flow seamlessly into the
beginning.

Create a New Project

The first thing to do is to create a new project in Final Cut Pro.

1 Launch Final Cut Pro by double-clicking on the Final Cut Pro application
icon on your hard drive.

2 Create a new project in Final Cut Pro by choosing File > New Project. A
new project will appear in your Browser.
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Create a New Project 5

3 Save the project by choosing File > Save Project As.

4 Select a name and a location for your project in the Save window that
appears. Click OK to save the file.
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6 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

Import the Tiger Movie

Next you’ll import the video clip that will become your motion menu.

1 Choose File > Import > Files.

2 Choose Media > TigerBasic > TigerBasic_Assets > Tiger_Video >

TigerMovie1.

The type of motion menu that you are building uses a still background image
of a video camera in a grass hut featured in the Tiger movie. You will select a
30-second portion of video from the Tiger movie to create the effect of playing
the clip inside the lens of the camera. If you prefer, you can select smaller seg-
ments from the Tiger movie and assemble them together so that the cumula-
tive duration of all video clips is 30 seconds. By adding a dissolve to each edit
25610cA_DVD.qxd 7/28/04 1:21 PM Page 7

Edit the Clip 7

point, you can create a varied piece of video that will still play smoothly in the
lens of the camera.

Your finished motion menu will look like this:

Still background

Motion video
clip in the
camera lens

Text buttons

Edit the Clip

Now that you’ve imported your clip, you need to select the 30-second portion
of it that you’ll use for the motion menu.

1 Double-click the TigerMovie1 icon in the Browser window to open it in

the Viewer window. Play the clip by pressing the spacebar. Press the space-
bar again to stop playback.

2 Type 01002100 (notice the numbers appear in the timecode field at the top
right of the Viewer window), and press Return to navigate the playhead to
timecode 01:00:21;00. Press the I key (lower-case i) to mark an In point at
this frame.
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8 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

The In point will be the start of the motion menu. The video clip should
be 30 seconds in length, so we need to advance the playhead
to the Out point.

3 Press the plus (+) key on the numeric keypad, then type 2929 and press
Return. This will advance the playhead forward 29 seconds, 29 frames.

4 Press O on your keyboard (lower-case o) to mark an Out point. The Out

point will be the end of your motion menu. The total duration will be 30
seconds.

NOTE
The duration of the clip is displayed in the timecode duration

field in the upper-left corner of the Viewer.

5 Press Cmd-U to create a subclip in the Browser. This clip will be the
motion portion in the menu. Notice the new TigerMovie1 Subclip in the
Browser.
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Create the Background Image 9

Create the Background Image

Next, you’ll import the still image to use as the background. The image used in
this exercise was taken from the full-length video clip before it was compressed
for the book’s DVD.

1 Choose File > Import > Files and import the graphic file Media >
TigerMotionMenu_Apdx > MotionMenuMedia > Camera still1.bmp.

2 In the Browser, click to select the image name to the right of the image
icon. Rename the image by typing Still Image Background.

3 In the Browser, double-click on the image to open it in the viewer.

NOTE
If you want to create your own still background image from the
TigerMovie1 clip, you can do so. Place the playhead on the frame that you
select for your still image. Choose Modify >Make Freeze Frame. Drag the
still image from the Viewer window to the Browser, and rename it.
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10 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

4 Create a new sequence by choosing File > New > Sequence. Double-click
on the sequence to load it into the Timeline.

5 Edit the Still Image Background clip onto track V1 of the new sequence by
dragging it from the browser to the V1 track in the Timeline.

6 Ctrl-click the Still Image Background clip in the timeline and choose
Duration from the shortcut menu. Change the duration to 30 seconds
by typing 3000 in the Duration field. Press Return twice to close the
dialog box.
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Adding the Motion Subclip to the Timeline 11

The Still image Background clip will now be 30 seconds in length.

NOTE
There is no need to place a decimal point while typing in the

timecode because Final Cut Pro will calculate the duration automatically.

Adding the Motion Subclip to the Timeline

In this portion of the lesson, you will need a second video track to work with.

1 To add a second video track, Ctrl-click in the blank area above the V1
track and Choose Add Track from this menu. This will add a second
video track to the timeline.

2 Drag the tiger subclip from the Browser to the new V2 track in the
timeline.

Notice that the audio tracks are automatically placed onto tracks A3 and
A4. At this point, you will have two video tracks. V1 will contain the Still
Image Background clip, and V2 will contain the subclip in it. This track
will eventually be resized to fit perfectly in the camera lens of the Still
Image Background.

NOTE
If the sequence/timeline is not activated, click once in the

sequence/timeline to activate it, then press Shift-Z to fit the clips to the
window.
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12 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

3 To delete any audio that is on the sequence/timeline, Option-click it to

select it and press the Delete key.

4 Make sure your playhead is at the start of the sequence by pressing the
Home key on your keyboard.

5 Click the video clip in V2 to select it.

6 Select View > Image+Wireframe. A white “X,” called the wireframe, will
appear in the Canvas window.
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Adding the Motion Subclip to the Timeline 13

7 Carefully click any one of the four corners of the wireframe. When the
cursor turns into a crosshair, drag that corner inward to resize the video
to an approximate size that fits inside the lens of the still image on the
V1 track.

The clip on V2 is obviously square. So the next step is to add a filter to make
the image round. This filter will create an illusion that the Tiger subclip video
is inside the lens of the camera.

8 In the Browser window, click the Effects tab, which reveals all the available
effects and filters.
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14 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

9 Click the arrow next to the Filters bin. The Filters bin will now reveal sub-
categories for all of the filters. Locate and open the Matte bin by clicking
once on the arrow next to it.

10 Drag the Mask Shape filter and drop it into the Timeline, onto the Tiger
subclip on V2.

11 Double-click the Tiger subclip to open it in the Viewer window.

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Adding the Motion Subclip to the Timeline 15

12 Click once on the Filters tab at the top of the Viewer window to view the
parameters of the newly added filter.

13 Change the Shape option from Rectangle to Oval. If you look at your
Canvas window, the Tiger subclip is now round.

You may need to center the Tiger subclip in the lens by dragging the cen-
ter of the wireframe in the Canvas window to the desired spot. You may
also have to resize the overall image to better fit it in the lens. This can be
accomplished by clicking on one of the four corners of the white wire-
frame and dragging it to the desired size.
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16 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

You may also need to adjust the Horizontal and Vertical size in the filter
options in the Viewer window to make the oval Tiger subclip fit in the lens.

14 Add the Mask Feather filter (located in the Matte bin in the Browser win-
dow) to the Tiger subclip. This filter will add a realistic feel to the effect.
Adjust the Soft option in this filter to about 14.

NOTE
Save your work as often as possible (Cmd-S).

Creating Titles
No motion menu is complete without titles. In this portion of the lesson, we
will create the titles by using the Title 3D option.

Create the Main Title

1 Click the Video tab in the Viewer.

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Creating Titles 17

2 Near the bottom right of the Viewer window, click the button with the let-
ter A on a filmstrip icon, and choose Title 3D from the drop-down menu.

NOTE
This portion of the lesson includes the necessary steps to create
the first title. For the other titles in the motion menu, you will need to
repeat the steps.

In the Title 3D window, a blinking cursor will appear in the upper-left

portion of the work area. This is where the text will appear when you type
the title. The bottom-left side has five tabs with options in each one to
manipulate what you create.
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18 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

3 Click Reset Style.

4 Type The Making of Tigers. The text created will be simple and white.

5 Position the word “Tigers“ under the words “The Making of ” by position-
ing the 3D title cursor right before “Tigers” and pressing Return.

6 Highlight all four of the words by pressing Cmd-A. Click the Center
Justify button to center the title.

7 While all the text is highlighted, click and hold the Font Selection button
located to the center left of the Title 3D window and select Papyrus. (If you
don’t have Papyrus, choose Futura).

8 Change the font size to 50 in the Font Size box.

9 To change the color of the title, click the Gradient Box tab. A new set of
options will appear. Click the white Style Color options box on the left
side of the window.

A Color options window will appear.

10 Select the Crayon box option in the upper-right corner. Select the mocha
color crayon, then click OK.

Create Button Titles

The next step is to create titles in the motion menu to identify the DVD but-
ton links and the theme of the contents found in the DVD itself.

1 To add an outline and drop shadow to the title, click the Edge Style tab
(fourth tab on the left).

2 Click the empty box to the left of the first tab. This will activate the edge
effect on the title. Make sure the Edge Style is set to Plain and the Position
option is set to Outside. To change either option, make a new choice from
the pop-up menu.

You can select the Edge Color box to change the color of the edge, if you like.
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Creating Titles 19

3 Click the Drop Shadow tab to activate the drop shadow options (fifth tab
down on the left). Once again, you will have to click in the empty box to
the left of the first tab to activate the drop shadow on the title. Select the
Drop Shadow as the Shadow Type.

Shadow Distance, Opacity, and Softness can be adjusted by typing in a

numeric value or by dragging the sliders.

4 After you’ve made all of the adjustments to your title, click Apply. The title
will appear in the Viewer window.

5 Click and drag the title to the Browser window to save it in the project.
Change the name of the title from Title 3D to Title 01.
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20 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

6 Drag the Title 01 from the Browser to the area above the V2 track. This
will automatically create a V3 track. Make sure that when you release the
title into the track, the arrow is pointing down, meaning that you’re per-
forming an Overwrite edit.

NOTE
If the arrow is not pointing down, continue to drag the arrow
down just beneath the track divider, which is the faint horizontal line run-
ning down the center of the track.

You may have to reposition the title to the upper-left portion of the
Canvas window.

7 Position the playhead at the beginning of the timeline by pressing the

Home key.

8 Select the Title 01 clip on V3 by clicking it.

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Creating Titles 21

9 Click the center of the white wireframe in the canvas and drag until it is
positioned in the upper-left portion of the Canvas window.

NOTE
If you need to go back to edit the title, double-click the title
video track in the timeline. The title will open in the Viewer. Select the
Controls tab. Click on the Title 3D window. The Title 3D window will
reopen with the title in it. You can then make changes to the title.

10 You’ll need to change the duration of the title to match the length of the
other video tracks. Ctrl-click the Title 01 clip on V3 and choose Duration
from the shortcut menu. Enter 3000 and press Return twice. The duration
will change to 30 seconds.

11 Create three more titles in the 3D title: Tracking a Legend, Play Movie, and
Play Slideshow. Save all the titles by dragging them into the Browser.
Don’t forget to rename them accordingly.

NOTE
All three of the remaining titles could be made in the same
frame, at the same time in Title 3D.
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22 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

12 Place the additional title/titles on additional video tracks above the other
tracks.

NOTE
The edge color of Play Movie and Play Slideshow should be white to
help them stand out. These titles will eventually be the two choices the
viewer will have while interacting with the contents of the DVD.

After creating and positioning the additional titles, you may wish to add a
fade to black at the end of the track, and a fade from black to the beginning.
For this exercise, we will not add a fade to black, as the material at the begin-
ning of the sequence and the material at the end of the sequence are similar.
Now that your are finished creating the video portion of the motion
menu, you’ll need to render your timeline.

13 Choose Sequence > Render > Video.

When rendering is complete you can export the finished motion menu
out of Final Cut Pro for use in DVD Studio Pro by choosing Export >
QuickTime Movie.
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Exporting to Soundtrack 23

Now that you have created a motion menu in Final Cut Pro, you can export it
directly to Soundtrack in order to create a musical score for your menu.
Soundtrack is a new application that comes free with Final Cut Pro, or can be
purchased separately. In Soundtrack, users can take prerecorded loops of dif-
ferent instruments—played in different keys and at different tempos—and
arrange them in a timeline where they will all play back in the same key and
tempo. Although it is outside the scope of this manual to explore Soundtrack
in depth, these next steps will show you how easy it is to use Soundtrack to
create a simple score for your motion menu.

Exporting to Soundtrack
It is easy to export the finished motion menu from Final Cut Pro into
Soundtrack—there is an option designed for that very purpose.

1 Click the Timeline window to make it the active window.

If you wish to export only a portion of your sequence, add an In and Out
point. Otherwise, make sure any In or Out points are cleared before
exporting by pressing Option-X.

2 Choose File > Export > For Soundtrack.

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24 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

3 In the Save dialog box, type the name TigerMainMenu.

Notice that there is a pull-down menu that allows you to export scoring
markers that will be embedded in your movie. These markers can serve as
snapping or reference points in Soundtrack for moments in the movie you
wish to accentuate in your score.
There is also a check box for Make Movie Self-Contained. Since your media
files are on this system, it doesn’t make sense to create a self-contained
movie file. The reference movie you export can be used in Soundtrack as
though it were self-contained because the media files are all on your sys-
tem. If you intend to export a movie for use on a different system, check
this box.
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Launching Soundtrack 25

4 Select the location where you want to save the file and click Save.

The sequence is exported as a reference movie to the selected location.

Launching Soundtrack
To launch Soundtrack, click the Soundtrack icon in the Dock.

Depending on the preferences, the Soundtrack interface will have one or two
windows, but it will look essentially like the following figure.
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26 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

Like in Final Cut Pro and DVD Studio Pro, you can easily change the configu-
ration, or layout, of the windows in the interface by choosing View > Layouts >
Separate Windows.

On the left window (or the left side of the interface when using the Single Window
layout) is the Media Manager. The Media Manager contains three tabs.
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Launching Soundtrack 27

The File Browser tab allows you to search through your computer in order to
find files to add to the next tab, Favorites. The File Browser is not used as the
primary method of finding files, however. Once a folder containing loops has
been added to the Search tab, it is much easier to use it to find loops by various
search criteria.

With over 4,000 Apple Loops to choose from, not to mention the Acid Loops
and loops that people are bound to be creating and sharing over the Internet,
it can be a challenge to find an appropriate musical loop. Once you do find
one you like, you can add it to the Favorites tab.
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28 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

The Search tab is the heart of the Soundtrack interface. Similar to the Palette in
DVD Studio Pro, the Search tab contains references to files you may add to your
project, rather than assets that have already been added. With it you can search
for and play any loops that have been referenced to this tab.
The right side of the Porject Workspace window is divided into two sections. The
right section is a multi-track timeline like the one in Final Cut Pro and DVD
Studio Pro. You will add loops to each track and arrange and edit them in this
section, just like clips in Final Cut Pro. To the left of the tracks are the track head-
ers, which list the names of the instruments each track contains. Controls for vol-
ume and pan are also located in the header section for each track.

Above the track headers are three tabs: Video, Audio, and Meters. The Video
tab will act as a viewer for the movie you will import later in this lesson. The
Audio tab lists the files in your timeline. Unlike those in the Search tab, these
files are actually part of your project. The final tab, Meters, contains audio
meters you can use to monitor audio levels.

Building a score, as you will discover, is as easy as dragging loops from the
Media Manager to the timeline tracks.
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Importing Movies into Soundtrack 29

Importing Movies into Soundtrack

Importing movie files is done using the File Browser. Once you find a movie file,
you simply drag it into the Video tab.

1 Click the File Browser tab to bring it to the front of the Media Manager.

2 Just as you would on the Finder level, double-click a drive to open it and
navigate to the location where you saved the TigerMenu movie.

3 Select the file and drag it from the File Browser tab to the Video tab.

A blue bounding box will indicate that the file is in the right location.

When you release the mouse button, the Video tab will display the first
frame from the movie.
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30 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

Notice also that a video clip has been added to the timeline, with a
thumbnail displayed in the video track.

If you add scoring markers to the movie before exporting, the

markers will appear in the timeline, and a thumbnail will be displayed in
the track immediately to the right of each marker. Scoring markers make
it very easy to match certain actions in the video to musical moods or
beats.

4 Click the Play button in the transport controls to watch the movie.

The movie will begin playing. You can view it in the Video tab. By
default, when the playhead reaches the end of the movie, it will return to
the beginning and play again. This is known as looping, which is at the
heart of the Soundtrack application.

5 Click the Stop button to stop playback.

6 Press Cmd-S to save your project.

There are additional options in the Save dialog box, but they will be cov-
ered at the end of the chapter. For now, just select a location to save the
project and click Save.
Now you are ready to begin building a score.
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Building a Score 31

Building a Score
This exercise walks you through the building of a score for the motion menu.
If you wish, you may embellish the score, or build your own from scratch, after
the exercise is complete.

Adding the First Loop

1 Click the Search tab in the Media Manager.

The Search tab has a very sophisticated file browsing engine that allows you
to find and play back loops. Each button will refine the search to a partic-
ular instrument or mood. You can even Cmd-click to select more than one
category.

2 Click the Percussion button. Hold down the Cmd key and click World.

Now the search for drum loops is restricted to percussion loops that have
a World descriptor added to them. Additionally, you can further limit the
criteria for your search by entering keywords in to the Refine Search field
underneath the buttons. Since this is a menu about Africa, you can further
refine your search by including the term “Africa.”

3 Type Africa into the Refine Search field and press Return.

The search now been filtered so that only files with the word “Africa”
appear in the window below.

4 Click the North Africa Percussion 01.aiff icon.

The file begins playing. Notice that the key and tempo of the loop are dis-
played in columns to the right of the name column. You do not need to
match sequence and clip settings like in Final Cut Pro. The loop will slave
to the tempo and key of the sequence automatically, without needing to
be rendered.
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32 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

There is absolutely no rendering necessary in Soundtrack.

5 Drag the North Africa Percussion 01.aiff icon to the Untitled Track in the
timeline, but do not release the mouse button.

You will see a green ghost image that shows you the length and placement
of the loop. You can drag it to any location in the timeline. Loops will snap
to beats, bars, and markers, depending on user settings.
For this exercise, drop it at the very beginning of the timeline. Notice that
the name of the track in the header has changed to reflect the name of the
clip that it now contains, North Africa Percussion 01.

6 Click the Play button. You will hear the loop while the movie plays.

7 Position your cursor on the right edge of the loop until it turns into a
resize cursor.

Making a loop play over and over again in your sequence is as simple as
dragging the edge of a loop to resize it, like a clip in Final Cut Pro. You can
resize during playback as easily as when it is stopped.

8 Drag the loop’s edge until it loops enough times to cover the movie dura-
tion and release the mouse.

As you resize, you can see slightly rounded corners, which indicate where
one loop ends and another begins.
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Building a Score 33

Auditioning and Adding Loops

Soundtrack allows you to audition other loops to add to the score while the
sequence is playing. In real-time, the application will change the tempo and key
of the loop to match the sequence.

We are going to build a track completely out of percussion, which means that
key is not as important a factor to match as tempo.

1 Drag to highlight the word “Africa” in the Refine Search field and replace it
with the word Drum. Press Enter.

2 Click the top loop, Brake Drum Percussion, to play it.

You will hear the loop play in tempo with the North Africa Percussion
track in the timeline. You may audition other loops by clicking on them,
or by pressing the down arrow on your keyboard to cycle down the list of
loops.

3 Press the down arrow to listen to the next loop play with your score. Click
the down arrow a few more times to audition other loops, or click a loop
to hear it.

4 Drag the scroll bar to the bottom of the window.

5 Drag Log Drum Loop 07 to the timeline and position it under the North
Africa Percussion track, but do not release the mouse.

Even though there is no track here, dropping a loop will create one.
Instead of dropping this new track at the beginning, drag it to the
border between the first and second loops in Track 1 and release the
mouse.
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34 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

6 Drag Log Drum Loop 07 until its left edge is flush with the left edge of the
second loop in the track above.

The loop will snap to the bar, which is labeled as 3.1 (bar 3, beat 1) in the
timeline ruler.

7 Resize Log Drum Loop 07 until it is as long as the top track.

8 Type Wood into the Refine Search category and press Enter.

9 Drag the Wood Block Pattern 01 loop to the timeline and place it
directly under the Log Drum Loop, at bar 3.1. Resize the Wood Block
Pattern loop until it is as long as the top track.

Now both the Wood Block Pattern and the Log Drum Loop will start at
bar 3. To add even more interest to the score, so that it builds, it might be
nice to have the Log Drum Loop come in a little later, so that the score
builds in intensity.

10 Drag the left edge of Log Drum Loop 07 until it snaps to the beginning of
bar 5.1.

11 If it is not already playing, play back your sequence.

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Building a Score 35

12 Add a final loop to your song by typing Batajon in the Refine Search field
and press Enter.

13 Audition the numerous Batajon loops in the list by clicking on their icons
and pressing the down or up arrow to listen to the previous or next loop.
Press spacebar to audition the loops while listening to the timeline simul-
taneously.

14 Drag Batajon Percussion Loop 10.aiff from the Search tab and place it
directly under the Wood Block track at bar 9.1.

15 Extend the loop by positioning the cursor at the end of the loop and drag-
ging the resize cursor until the loop ends at the end of the movie.

Now lets perform a split edit to remove four bars from the Log Drum
Loop 07 track.
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36 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

16 Click the Log Drum Loop 07 track to select it and then click in the time-
line ruler on 9.1 to position the playhead at the beginning of bar 9.

17 Press S to split the clip at the playhead position (bar 9.1). The clip is now
split into two pieces.

18 Click the Log Drum Loop 07 clip and make sure the playhead is posi-
tioned at bar 13.1.

19 Press S to split the clip at that position.

The Log Drum Loop track should now contain three clips. All we have
done is essentially added an edit at bar 9.1 and bar 13.1. Let’s now remove
the second piece.
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Mixing Your Tracks 37

20 Click to select the second Log Drum Loop 07 loop and press Delete to
remove it from the track.

21 Press spacebar to play your score.

Mixing Your Tracks

Soundtrack also has many powerful mixing features, giving you complete con-
trol over the volume level, panning, and effects of your individual loops and
tracks. Let’s refine the mix and adjust the volume levels and panning position
of each track.

1 Lower the volume of the North Africa Percussion track by dragging the
Volume slider to –8.

You can also type directly into the Volume field and enter a value.
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38 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

2 Raise the volume on tracks 2 and 3 (Log Drum Loop and Wood Block
Pattern) so they both are at –5.

3 For the fourth track (Batajon Percussion Loop), lower the volume
to –9.

Each track can also be precisely positioned in the stereo field, giving you
the ability to choose whether a sound emanates from the left speaker,
right speaker, or a combination of the two. In order to change which side
of the stereo field a track plays from, you must adjust its Panning slider.

4 Drag the Panning slider for the second track (Log Drum Loop) all the way
to the left (–100). All of the loops on this track will now be positioned to
come out of the left speaker.

5 Drag the Panning slider for the third track (Wood Block Pattern) to 60.
This track will play a little bit to the right of center in the stereo soundfield.

At this point, we have made volume and panning adjustments to individ-

ual tracks. Soundtrack also allows you to globally adjust the volume of all
of the tracks at once. This is useful for musical fade ins and fade outs, as
well as volume adjustments on a global basis in the middle of the song.
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Mixing Your Tracks 39

If you want to mix the volume for the entire timeline so that all tracks
fade out at the end, you can use a Master Envelope to add a fade.

6 Click the Master Envelope button at the bottom of the Tracks window.

A Master Envelope section appears in the timeline. This section contains

the master volume, master transposition, and master tempo envelopes for
your song. In this exercise, we will only adjust the master volume enve-
lope.

7 Double-click the Master Volume graph line at bar 15.1. This will add a
keyframe for volume.
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40 Creating a Motion Menu in Final Cut Pro

8 Double-click the Master Volume graph at bar 16.1 (the end of the song).
This will add an additional keyframe for volume.

9 Drag the second keyframe downward until it is at the bottom of the

graph. This will cause the volume to drop, creating a fade out.

If you had your video fade to black in the Final Cut Pro sequence, you should
try to match the envelope points of your audio fade to the beginning and end of
the video fade. If your video does not fade to black, an audio fade may seem
incongruous.

If there is no fade to black, you can skip steps 5 through 8. Or, if you have
already followed the steps, you can delete any envelope points by clicking on
each envelope point and pressing Delete on your keyboard.
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What You’ve Learned 41

Exporting Your Mix

The final step in creating your finished mix is to export it from Soundtrack. You
can choose to export your creation as a stereo file or individual tracks. In this
exercise, you will choose to export your song as a stereo file. This stereo file
can be used in DVD Studio Pro as background music for your motion menu.

1 Choose File > Export Mix.

2 In the Export dialog box, type a name for the exported mix into the Save
As field at the top.

3 Navigate to a location where you want to save the file and click Export.
Your music is mixed during export and saved as a stereo file.

The file that you created is ready to be imported into DVD Studio Pro.

What You’ve Learned

How to create a motion menu in Final Cut Pro

How to add text using the 3D Title tool

How to export a movie from Final Cut Pro for Soundtrack

How to browse through loops

How to add loops to a timeline

How to move and resize loops

How to adjust levels and pan

How to export a score as a stereo mix