(super classy intro music)
- I think that one of the most useful tools you can have
for your computer setup is an Elgato Stream Deck,
which is good for a lot more than streams,
yet mine just sat in the closet for literally years,
because I didn't understand, until relatively recently,
just how useful it could be.
(now's a good time to subscribe)
It really wasn't until my wife
Heather started using a stream deck in her setup
that I saw how valuable and customizable it could be,
and then my friend, Luis, probably better known as
MrCameraJunkie, is the one who also helped me
to see that it could really be expanded
to your entire operating system set up
and it can be a really dynamic tool to use.
So while there's basically an unlimited number of things
you can do with the Stream Deck,
what it's really been helping me with lately,
is Final Cut Pro.
It has totally sped up and streamlined my editing process,
and that's what I wanna share with you today,
is how the Stream Deck can make Final Cut Pro better...
...yo...bro. (I don't know what happened here)
So what I've done is create a profile for the Stream Deck.
If you don't know how to do that,
you can just open the Stream Deck software,
which is totally free from Elgato's website
and you should install it
when you install the Stream Deck.
And this is where you will see all
of your different profiles,
so if you're doing different streams, different shows,
different uses, you can create a different profile
for everything.
So I have made a Final Cut Pro-file.
Now what that means is when I open up this profile here,
I can then add specific actions for Final Cut.
I did click this little plus icon up here,
which will take you to the Stream Deck store,
and if you search for icons, you can look up Final Cut Pro.
(keystrokes click) (music continues playing relentlessly)
And there's a totally free icon pack,
which is really helpful.
And then basically, if I create an action
and I drag something to one of the keys,
instead of having the default, just nothing icon,
I can open the Stream Deck icon library,
and all of the Final Cut Pro ones are right here.
Now, one of the things that held me back
from using the Stream Deck for a long time,
was I felt like I didn't know how to use it
to its full potential, and I was like,
scared to learn how to do that,
and I thought that if I didn't have it all maxed out
and optimized that I would be like,
I don't know, a stream deck poser or something
and couldn't use it and I was completely wrong.
So a lot of times it comes in its little stand, you know,
which is great for when you're streaming,
but when I'm using it with Final Cut,
I actually don't use it with the stand.
(stand clatters) And I did buy
an extension USB cable,
so this can reach pretty much anywhere,
and I like to just have it right next to my keyboard.
And so what I did was, instead of trying
to base my workflow on what somebody else did,
I left it blank and started editing a project
in Final Cut Pro.
And when it comes to using any software application,
there are certain things that are just annoying sometimes.
For me, one of the most annoying things in Final Cut,
is doing the multi-blade, shoop,
like cutting through multiple layers of footage.
So, for example, a lot of times,
if I'm not using the multi-cam feature,
I'll end up with a project that looks like this,
where I've got audio, different tracks of audio,
different tracks of video and I'm trying cut between them,
and to do that, you can press, Shift Command B
and it will slice, shing, all between every layer,
wherever the playhead is.
And it's not hard to do Shift Command B,
but if you're going through 20, 30, 40 minutes of footage
and you're doing this constantly,
it's like your fingers are just crab walking all
over the keyboard, it's just kind of annoying.
So what I did is, right in the middle,
I use one of those icons and I called it, "Cut",
and basically it's just a hotkey for shift,
uh oh, I deleted it.
Well, great.
This is how you would do that.
Let's delete it and start from scratch.
When you're dealing with your Stream Deck,
you can oftentimes find specific actions
for specific software.
So like Zoom has specific actions,
Ecamm has a bunch of specific actions.
But in this case for Final Cut,
I'm mainly just using the default system actions
and pretty much everything is built around hotkeys.
So I'm gonna drag a hotkey to the middle,
which is really cool as you'll see,
and I'm going to then change the icon
to the "Cut" icon from my library
and then hotkeys, you just click right there
and then type in what you want.
So I'm gonna do shift command B,
and now it's shift command B.
I don't need a title because the icon already says cut
on it, and now when I'm in Final Cut Pro
and I press this button,
it does that command shift, command B.
I can just play through this and keep my hand here,
and every time you need to do something, just cut it,
cut it, and it's just so much quicker and easier.
Another thing that I've added
in this profile is balancing color.
So changing the color on a clip is pretty easy.
In Final Cut you can click on a clip and then go up
and do the little color wheel triangle up here.
But a lot of times,
if you're going through lots of different clips,
you find yourself bouncing back and forth
between the inspector and the color wheels,
and now I can just do a clip, press this color option,
and it's gonna open up color wheels.
I've also added zoom in and zoom out,
which is something that you use a lot when you're
in Final Cut Pro.
So as I'm going through here,
instead of doing command plus command minus,
now I can just press (keystrokes click)
these plus and minus buttons.
And I put them right next to each other, which makes sense.
This little icon down in the corner is actually
to switch profiles, so that will let me go
to all my different stream deck profiles.
Up here, I've actually done audio,
and so this is an audio devices plug in that I installed,
which let me set an audio device.
And so you drag it to one of the keys
and then you can decide if you want it to be an input
or an output, like are you switching microphones
or do you want to switch speakers?
So I have one (music continues playing)
that's gonna be my computer's built-in speakers,
one that's gonna be my headphones,
and one that is the Rodecaster Pro,
if I'm just running the audio out
through the Rodecaster Pro, which I do a lot.
How you position the keys, of course,
can affect your workflow.
I put the cut in the middle because
that's my most commonly used one
that saves me the most frustration
and the home key, the middle key on the Stream Deck,
does have a bump on it,
so you can tell just by feel which one that is.
And then from there,
you will know wherever you put everything else, you know,
just whatever works for you.
You'll also notice that I have a bunch of blank keys,
and the reason for that is exactly
what I was telling you earlier.
You don't need to like, have this totally optimized
to be an official Stream Deck user, just do, you know,
just work with what you got,
and then all you need to do is sort of be super aware
while you're editing in Final Cut,
any of those things that cause friction or annoyance,
make a note of that and then add it as a hot key
or an action on the Stream Deck.
So your configuration will be, you know, very different
than my configuration.
For example, something that just popped into my brain
as I'm recording this video is I think it's command seven.
Yeah, to bring up the vector scope and all the color things.
That's kind of an annoying one, for me,
so I'm gonna make a hot key for that right now.
And I'll just add a hot key here
and then click to assign (music continues playing)
and it'll just be command seven.
And so now when I'm here, I can just do, boop.
(keystroke clicks) There we go.
And when I don't need it, it'll go away.
Now it's super easy,
because this very useful tool is now easier to access.
That means I'm probably gonna use it more
because I can be a very lazy person
and I don't want to do things
that are inconvenient sometimes,
so if I make it more convenient,
I'm more likely to do it.
And of course,
if you decide that you want to rearrange
or reconfigure things,
you can easily just drag your keys to different places
and do whatever works for you.
But I really can't tell you how much
just having my little Stream Deck
(Stream Deck clunks) right next to my keyboard,
this has totally been an absolute game changer
for my workflow, and I think it could do the same for you.
Now, of course, I am only speaking about Final Cut Pro here,
but if you want to learn more about the Stream Deck
and how it can basically affect your entire workflow,
and you're looking for that broader overview,
my friend Luis, MrCameraJunkie, has an entire video
on his channel where he dives into that more in depth,
and like I said,
he's the one that helped me really figure out how
to bring this into my workflow in a big dynamic way.
So check out his video,
make sure to say lots of nice things to him along the way.
And then you can say: "What the heck?"
"The Stream Deck is...
...it's cool."
(Thanks Luis for all your help!)