Adobe Premiere Pro

Editing Essentials

Organization & File Management: “Edit from Chaos”   

As projects grow in size and complexity, start building professional habits early. Strong file structure + organization turns editing from damage control into creative focus. Being organized prevents missing media and broken projects. Premiere Pro doesn’t store your footage—it only references it. This means that if files are moved or renamed, links break.  

Storing and backing up media where you can find it, using a system that makes sense to you, will help you in the long run. 

First, invest in an external hard drive, better yet — TWO external hard drives. Backing up your footage, whether you get a second drive or use cloud storage, is crucial.

File Structure

If you have a multi-day shoot, including dates in file names can be helpful in locating media and keeping things organized.
It’s important to remember that this is just one way to do this. Follow your academic department or class guidelines on how to create the best workflow to use with class projects.

 

Creating a Project in Premiere 

Now that we’re organized, let’s open the latest version of Adobe Premiere Pro.  

First time? Use the Finder window to locate the Adobe Creative Cloud desktop app, or download from the Adobe CC website. 

Adobe.com/home

For easy access, right-click the Premiere app, select ‘options,’ ‘keep in dock.’

To access Adobe Creative Cloud for use on personal devices, Newhouse students must obtain a new license at the start of each semester. For instructions on requesting access, visit nhtraining.syr.edu/adobe-creative-cloud. 

 

When opening Premiere, here are your choices: 

  • Create a New Project or Open an existing Project.
  • Create a new or existing Team Project. This will allow you to work with others on the same project.  
  • Use Adobe Premiere Rush, which is a more edit-on-the-go video editor alternative for short form content creators. 

 

Start by creating a New Project.  

  • Fill in ‘Project Name’ Project name should be what you plan to label the final video. But you can change this later. 
  • Set the ‘Location’ of your project to where it will live. The location should be set to the Premiere folder of your external hard drive.  If you don’t set the location, Premiere will save your project to a default folder on your computer. Working off the desktop will slow down your computer and make it difficult to export videos.
  • You can also pick from a number of preset or custom templates for social video, broadcast, etc. 

At the end of the day, it’s up to you in how you want to organize yourself. Know that I’m here to support you in building on what you’ve already learned and guide you in creating good habits. 

 

Importing in Premiere 

In the upper left, you’ll see the home icon, which will bring you back to where we first created a new project. Next to the home icon, note the Import, Edit and Export windows of Premiere. Toggle back and forth between these sections at any time.  

The Import window 

Let’s first explore the Import window, where you have the option to locate, transfer + organize media early on to bring into Premiere. Or simply ‘Skip’ this step to move on to the Edit Window.  

On the left, you can grab Adobe Sample Media to practice with, or locate and import media locally from your computer, a device like an external hard drive or cloud storage like OneDrive. Hover over media clips to select individually or hit Command-A to select all media clips to pull into Premiere for editing.  

To the right, there are options to adjust the size of the thumbnails, change between grid or list views, and sort media by name, creation date, in ascending or descending order. There is also the option to display only certain file types (video, audio or images only). Directory viewer filters allow you to view specialized camera footage like Canon RAW. And there’s a search bar. 

Once you select media to import, you’ll find the final step under Import Settings on the right. This has five sections: Organize Media, Copy Media, Create New Sequence, Automatic Transcription, and Media Analysis. 

  • Organize Media: add your files to their own bin and even label that bin.
  • Copy Media: create copies of imported media files to move to a chosen location. The MD5 verification ensures that media copied from external drives or media cards is transferred properly. 
  • Import files straight into a new sequence to start editing quickly.
  • Enable language detection to set up footage for auto transcription, which can be helpful when creating transcripts or captions.  
  • Media analysis: analyzes imported media to search for visuals or audio to go with. 

To turn these sections on, toggle each switch to the right until it turns blue. 

But to skip this entire process, head straight into the next window, the Edit Window.  

 

Beware of Media Offline Errors 

Once you pull your media into Premiere, DO NOT rename or move original media on your external hard drive. If you do, a red message will pop up with a ‘Media Offline’ error.

This is due to Premiere being unable to link to and reference the media because it can no longer find it. Think of Premiere as only borrowing media from your drive. As long as the footage isn’t deleted, you can still relink it all, but it can be tedious.

Instead, organize and relabel media inside Premiere. This will NOT impact the organization and file structure in your external hard drive.  

We’ll go more in-depth on Premiere’s interface later on.

But first head into the EDIT window and let’s set up our Settings Preferences by navigating to the top menu of Premiere > Settings. 

  • Set up Premiere to Auto Save every 5 mins. But a lot can happen in five minutes, so be sure to manually ‘Command-S’ (Save) as often as possible!  
  • Next, set Media Cache Files to live on your external hard drive in the Scratch folder. Media Cache files are created to display audio waveforms and improve playback of media. 

 

Workspaces 

In the Edit Window, in the top menu, head over to Window > Workspaces, or navigate to the top right of Premiere, and you will see the Workspaces icon to the left of Quick Export.

Workspaces offer a variety of layouts that support you in honing in on a certain aspect of the editing process. This feature adjusts panels in a way that provides ease of access to the most useful tools related to that aspect of editing.  

If focused on linear editing or classic view of Premiere, select the Editing Workspace. Narrowing in on editing sound, use the Sound Workspace. Moving on to basic color correction or color grading, use the Color Workspace. And when creating graphics or producing captions, use the Captions and Graphics workspace.  

When using multiple monitors, the panels can move around or get lost when going back to using a single monitor, so the quickest way to reset your workspace is to select the ‘Reset to Saved Layout’ option. You can also create your own Workspace preset, which is pretty neat and nice to have if you’re used to working a certain way. 

 

Episode 6: Navigating the Edit Window (Main Panels) 

Let’s tour Premiere’s interface in the Editing window. There are FOUR main panels; the project panel, the source monitor, timeline and program monitor. 

PROJECT PANEL 

The Project panel is the media organizer. Footage imported locally, from an external hard drive or cloud storage will live here.  

At the top of the panel, you will see tabs: Project, Media Browser, Graphics Templates, Libraries, Info, Effects, Markers, and history. Selecting the three lines next to each tab will allow you to close, edit and undock panels. The Media Browser is another way to reference media locally, from a device or cloud storage. The Effects Panel is helpful for finding video and audio effects and transitions.  

In the lower left of this panel, you will see a pencil icon to toggle the project between read only or read/write. Next to this icon, you can change the view between icon, list and freeform. The Freeform View allows for visual organization and sorting, turning a rigid list or grid of clips into a blank canvas. You can also adjust the size of icons and thumbnails and sort by label, media type, and so on.  

In the lower right, the Automate to Sequence icon lets you automatically drop multiple clips or images from the Project Panel onto the Timeline. Next to this, you can create bins, similar to folders, to organize media. Next to the bin icon, you’ can create ‘new items’ like a new sequence, adjustment layer, color matte, among other things. And next to this icon is the trash where you can drag media to remove from the Project panel. 

When in List View, if you expand the project panel to the right, you can see metadata attached to your media, such as frame rate, media start and end timecode, media duration, video in and out points, resolution, audio and other information you want to add. 

Double-click on a media clip in the Project panel, and it will open in the Source monitor in the upper left, where it can be reviewed easily.    

SOURCE MONITOR 

The Source monitor allows you to preview media clips selected from the Project panel before adding footage to the timeline. At the top, there are tabs: Source, Effect Controls, Audio Track Mixer, Audio Clip Mixer, and Metadata. If you don’t see these tabs, go to the top menu of Premiere and under Window, you will see an option to turn engage these panels. 

At the bottom of the source monitor, you will see the playhead position in timecode in blue on the left and to the right the timecode of the in and out duration of the media clip. Between the timecodes, you will see three icons in the center – Drag Video Only, Drag Audio Only and Drag Audio AND Video. Drag from the icons to pull only video or audio or both to the timeline. 

At the bottom of the panel, you will see the following options; add marker (M), Mark In (I), Mark Out (O), Go to In point of the clip (using the up arrow), Go to Out point (using the down arrow), and of course there’s the play or step back or forward a frame buttons. You will also see icons for Insert (,), Overwrite (.) and Export Frame. 

  • Insert will take the media clip you created in an in and out point and place it between two clips where the playhead on the timeline is currently moved to.
  • Overwrite will take that clip and write over another clip on the timeline.
  • Export Frame will take a screenshot of the image in the source monitor at the same ratio and resolution of the footage.
  • Next to Export Frame, there is a double arrow to the right icon, which will give the option to toggle proxies, search similar frames, and mute source monitor. Below these icons, you can use this bar to expand or narrow in on media in the source monitor.  

THE TIMELINE PANEL 

The panel in the lower middle of Premiere’s interface is your Timeline – where media clips can be arranged in a sequence from left to right.  

The easiest way to match original media to timeline settings is to drag a media clip from the Project Panel directly into the Timeline.  

At the top, you will see a blue timecode showing where the blue playhead is positioned on the timeline. Quickly stop and play media on the timeline by pressing the space bar.  

Below the timecode, you will see three icons: must be highlighted in gray to be engaged. 

  • Insert, Overwrite sequences as nests or individual clips
  • Snap in Timeline (S)
  • Linked Selection
  • Add Marker (M)
  • Timeline Display Settings
  • Caption Track Options (CC)

Video and Audio Tracks

By default, there are three audio and video tracks labeled V1, V2, V3, A1, A2 and A3. 

  • Use hotkey (+) to zoom in on the timeline to see more detail
  • Zoom out (-) to see the video edit in its entirety 

Tips: Expand tracks to see more of the video or audio layers. And to add another track, just pull media above the third track to create a fourth.  

On each video layer, you will see icons locking the track, so media can’t be accidentally moved, or if you want to move audio separately from its video counterpart. Also, by selecting the V1 highlighting it blue, toggle track targeting so when you move media from the source panel to the timeline, it will end up on this specific track highlighted.  

  • Toggle Sync Lock keeps associated video and audio tracks locked together in time. It is easy to confuse sync locks with track locks. Track Lock (Padlock icon): Completely freezes the track. You cannot select, move, or edit any clips on it. Sync Lock (Chain icon): Acts as a “soft lock,” allowing you to freely move or edit the clips on that track, but ensures that if you make a major timeline edit (like an insert or ripple delete), that track will shift along with your other edits to prevent them from going out of sync. Toggle Track Output (eye icon) will hide the media on that entire video track, so you can see the track underneath or above. You can also create keyframes to adjust the opacity of video clips creating a fade from or to black.
  • Under the Audio tracks
    • Toggle Track Lock (Padlock) – Freeze track
    • Toggle Sync Lock (Chain) – Soft-lock track
    • Mute Track
    • Solo Track – selecting this will automatically mute the other tracks.
    • Voice-over record (directly to timeline)
    • Add keyframes to adjust the volume on sound clips

PROGRAM MONITOR 

Above the timeline is the Program monitor. When media is added to the Timeline, you’ll be able to preview the assembled sequence in the Program monitor. It looks similar to the Source panel, but instead of viewing media from the Project panel first, this is where you review what’s already on the timeline.

  • Tell this panel how you want to view what’s assembled on the timeline, zooming in on media or at full, half or quarter playback resolution.  
  • To playback timeline edit in Full Screen, select the Program Monitor and navigate to the top menu and under Window > ‘Maximize Frame’ (up arrow + `) located just below the escape key. Press this again to restore the frame back to normal. 

In the upper right corner, notice a panel that will look differently depending on which Workspace you are in. This panel will allow you to make adjustments to effects among other things. 

All of these panels and tools have their purpose, so familiarize yourself with the interface so when it comes time to edit, you can work efficiently.  

 

Premiere Editing Tools, Shortcuts + Hotkeys 

Let’s explore Premiere’s helpful editing tools, keyboard shortcuts and hotkeys meant to get you editing faster and more efficiently. 

  • Save (Command ⌘ – S). This will manually save your project. Save often!
  • Space bar to Play + Stop your playhead, the blue line meant to scrub through footage on the timeline.  
  • Command ⌘- A to select all media
  • Command ⌘- C to copy media 
  • Command ⌘ – P to paste media 
  • Command ⌘ – Z to undo mistakes. A lifesaver
  • Zoom in (+) and Zoom out (-). Use these hotkeys to zoom in and edit more in detail or pull out to look at the entire video as a whole on the timeline. Manually adjust how zoomed in or out the timeline looks by using the bars near the timeline.
  • The Arrow keys can also be useful in moving or scrubbing the playhead frame by frame in each direction. 
    • Up Arrow is used to jump the playhead to the previous edit point (cut) on the timeline.
    • Down arrow will allow you to skip to the next edit point 
  • Export (Command ⌘ – M): Once finished editing, use this shortcut to bring up the Export window quickly.
  • Command ⌘ – Q: to close Premiere

After double-clicking a video clip from the Project panel to show up on the Source panel, use the following shortcuts:  

  • (,) – Insert part of the video clip from the Source panel to the timeline
  • (.) – Overwrite part of a video clip from the Source panel on top of a clip on the timeline

Mark IN and OUT Points

Set the Mark IN Point (I) + Mark OUT Point (O) to define a specific segment of your footage or sequence. This is helpful for selecting exact clips to edit, creating subclips, looping playback, and specifying exactly what you want to export.  

  • Mark IN (I): Move the playhead to the exact frame where you want your selection to start and press I (or click the Mark In bracket button in your Source or Program Monitor).
  • Mark OUT (O): Move the playhead to where you want the selection to end and press O on your keyboard (or click the Mark Out bracket button).  

The highlighted area on your timeline ruler indicates your selected range. Once you set an In/Out point in the Source Monitor, simply drag that video clip directly onto your timeline to use only that portion. It’s helpful for exporting a specific section on the timeline. Set the Range to Source In/Out in your Export Settings to render only that marked portion. You can also use the Mark IN and OUT points for enabling Looping Playback to repeatedly review that specific section while editing. 

 

Premiere Tool Bar

  • Selection Tool (V) is the most commonly used tool used to select, move, trim and reposition clips directly in the timeline.
  • Track Select Forward (A) / Backward (Shift + A) selects all clips on a track and will group them to move forward or backward from the cursor without affecting timing.
  • Ripple Edit (B) trims clips while automatically closing space in the timeline, so there’s no need to move clips together.
  • Razor (C) slices clips into separate segments at a specific point, making precise edits + removing sections.
  • Slip (Y) moves the content of a clip forward or backward in time while keeping its position + duration stays fixed.
  • Pen Tool (P) creates + adjusts keyframes for animation + control of effects. For example, you can adjust opacity, volume, and motion this way.
  • Rectangle creates customizable shapes often used for lower thirds, backgrounds, or graphic overlays.
  • Object Mask Tool (New) – Hover over your subject, click and watch Ai mask and track your subject.
  • Hand (H) navigates the timeline horizontally without changing clip positions. This is helpful to use in complex, multitrack edits.
  • Type Tool (T) creates and edits text directly in the Program Monitor for titles, captions, and graphics.
  • Generative Extend Tool uses AI to extend video + audio up to 2 seconds or Audio-only up to 10 seconds. This can be useful for smoothing cuts, extending reactions, or filling small timing gaps.

 

Episode 8: Editing Sound 

Editing sound in Premiere may seem complex but follow these steps and you’ll build good habits. First, make sure your video is picture-locked and then shift gears to editing sound. 

This involves cleaning, mixing, and sweetening your audio using specialized panels and tools.  

Make sure your workspace is set to sound, so the panels are geared toward editing sound. 

The Essential Sound Panel, located under WINDOW in the top menu, will feature AI-driven tools for auto-repair issues and effects. 

Categorize an individual sound clip by selecting whether it’s Dialogue, Music, SFX, or Ambience. Use the Enhance or Reduce Noise sliders under the Repair section to automatically clean up background hums, room reverberation, or muddy voices.  

Balancing the volume of your dialogue, music, and sound effects is critical for a clean mix.  

Audio Gain: Select an audio clip, right-click (or press G) and select Audio Gain. This allows you to set the overall decibel (dB) level uniformly. Aim to have your dialogue peak around -6 dB, and background music sit at lower levels so it doesn’t overpower the vocals.  

Rubber Banding: Use the horizontal white line directly over the audio track in your timeline to drag volume up or down dynamically. You can use the pen tool to create keyframes, allowing the music to dip when someone starts talking (ducking).  

Audio Track Mixer: For more advanced, project-wide mixing, use Window > Audio Track Mixer to adjust levels for entire tracks (e.g., Track 1 for Dialogue, Track 2 for Music). 

You can apply creative effects or fix specific acoustic issues via the Effects panel using DeNoise, Parametric EQ (great for vocal enhancement), or Pitch Shifter. Drag and drop effects directly onto the clip. 

Adjust specific parameters of these effects in the Effect Controls panel.  

You can also use Text-Based Censure to quickly censor or bleep out words without having to manual cut audio. Go to Window > Text to open the Text panel and auto-transcribe the sequence. Search for a specific word you want to censor directly within the transcript text. Highlight it and apply a built-in bleep sound effect or upload a custom audio file to instantly cover the word across single or multiple occurrences 

 

Exporting 

Exporting your polished video is the crucial final step. Let’s look at the settings options within the export window.  

On the left, you can publish your exported video directly to social media or FTP.

In the center, set up your final video how you want it to be outputting.

  • File Name – Make sure you name your final video.  
  • Set location / tell Premiere where to export your final video. ‘Export’ folder of drive. 
  • Preset: match output to source or to a custom setting. Recommend: Match Source – Adaptive High Bitrate
  • Format: H.264 (ideal for web upload), Quicktime (for larger format)

VIDEO

    • Video Dimensions / Resolution: 1920 x 1080 (upload standard)
    • Frame Rate: 24FPS (to match original footage)
    • Field Order: Upper First
    • Aspect Ratio: Square Pixels (1.0)

AUDIO

    • AAC format
    • 48kHz sample rate
    • Stereo channels
    • 320-bit rate. 

Here, you can also:

  • Turn on captions and decide if you want them burned into the final video.
  • Engage effects
  • Turn on Metadata to create a sidecar file or include markers.
  • General > use previews and proxies

On the right, preview your final video to make sure there are no unintentional black frames, and make sure your source and output settings look right before selecting the blue ‘Export’ button. You also have the option to send the video to another Adobe application, Media Encoder, if you want to continue to work in Premiere while it’s exporting. This is also a useful method when exporting multiple versions of your final video at once.