Hey guys, what’s up.
My name is Serge, and today,
I’m going to show you three different ways
you can add a split screen effect to your project in Final Cut Pro.
Let’s jump right in and get started.
The first method is the simplest and fastest,
and that’s by using the crop tool.
Layer your two clips you want to use for this effect
in your timeline directly over each other.
Select your top clip,
and use the crop tool in the inspector window
to crop off exactly half of your clip.
My project is 4K, so I’ll just take the width of my frame,
which is 3840 pixels and divide it by two,
which gives me 1920.
Enter 1920 for the right crop value in the inspector,
for a simple split screen effect.
The problem with this method,
is if you want to re frame the clip you cropped,
it can get a bit messy,
especially if you want the split right down the middle.
This is where the second method works quite a bit better.
The second way of adding a split screen effect to your project
is by using a custom generator to hide half of your screen.
Once again, layer your two clips on top of each other,
and go to the titles and generators browser.
From the Generators dropdown menu,
select the solids category,
and add a Custom generator clip above your top clip.
Ripple trim it to the same length as your clip.
With your generator clip selected,
go to the video inspector,
and crop off the left half of this generator.
If you want a divider between your two clips,
crop off a little lit less,
so in my example, instead of cropping off 1920 pixels,
I’ll go 1900.
Select the clip under it,
and use the transform tool to reframe your clip.
With the framing the way you want it,
Command click both clips,
and combine them into a compound clip with Option G.
Press V to disable this compound clip for now.
Repeat these steps for your bottom clip.
Add a custom generator above your bottom clip,
ripple trim it to the same length,
and crop off the right half of your generator clip,
a little bit less if you want a divider between your clips.
Reframe your bottom clip with the transform tool,
and combine your two clips into a compound clip.
Select your top clip, and press V to re enable it.
Crop off half of your top compound clip to reveal the bottom clip.
And, if you want to change the color of your divider between your two clips,
double click one of the compound clips to open it in a separate timeline,
select the generator clip,
and in the generators inspector,
change the color of your generator.
Press the back arrow to go back to your timeline,
and do the same to your other compound clip.
The third method we’ll learn today is the most versatile,
and my favourite way of adding a split screen effect,
and that’s by using an adjustment layer and a mask.
The last two methods are great for a horizontal
or a vertical split screen effect,
but using a draw mask will allow us to split our clips at an angle,
or even add a shape to our split between our two clips.
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Layer the clips in your timeline,
select the top clip,
and press V to disable it for now.
Add an adjustment layer above your bottom clip.
Press Command 5 to open the effects browser,
select the masks category,
and add a draw mask to your adjustment layer.
Add 4 control points to your mask,
making a rectangle or a square.
Go to the video inspector,
open the Transforms dropdown in your mask parameters,
and reset the position X and Y to zero to center your mask.
Zoom out on your viewer window,
and readjust the control points to roughly outline your split.
If we turn on the horizon overlay, as you can see,
the split is just off center.
To make it perfectly centered,
open the control points dropdown,
and make sure point one and point four X values are the same number,
with Point four being a negative.
So, lets make point one 400,
and point 4 negative 400.
While here, let’s tidy up the rest of our control points
to bring them right to the edges.
For a 4K clip, all out Y position values
need to be half of our resolution, which is 1080.
Enter positive numbers for control points one and two,
and negatives for 3 and 4.
Change the X values for points 2 and 3 to 1920,
for a perfectly symmetrical split.
Use the transform tool to reframe your bottom clip.
Select your top clip, and press V to re enable it.
Grab your adjustment layer,
hold down the Option Key and drag up to make a copy of it,
and place it above your top clip.
Go to the inspector window,
and invert your mask to show the other side.
Use the transform tool to re frame your top clip.
Combine each clip and the adjustment layer above it into compound clips.
To add a divider between your clips,
select the top compound clip,
and move it over to the left by about 20 pixels.
Select the bottom clip,
and move it to the right by the same amount.
Add a custom generator below your timeline,
and select a color for your divider for a diagonal split screen effect.
If you enjoyed this video,
do me a favour, and share it with someone else who might like it.
Thanks for watching, and I’ll see you back here next week.