Adobe Premiere: Changing parameters of a transition instance

A transition instance refers to an individual occurrence of a transition in the Timeline. The default settings make the transition operate from clip A to clip B. You can change the direction for a specific instance without changing the default. You do this by changing the direction of the transition after it has been inserted into the Timeline.

  1. Double-click the Cross Dissolve transition icon in the Video 1 Transition track of the Timeline. Now, the Cross Dissolve Settings dialog box appears.

    A. Start/End slider  B. Track selector
    C. Transition thumbnail icon area

    The Cross Dissolve Settings dialog box shows the “start” clip in the upper left and the “end” clip at the upper right. By default, “A” and “B” are displayed in these clip thumbnail viewers, but you can display the actual clips instead by clicking the Show Actual Source box below the viewers.

    Now you’ll explore transitions.

  2. Click in the Show Actual Sources box to display the starting and ending frames of the clips used in this transition. Solar1.mov is now displayed as clip A and Earth.mov is displayed as clip B, because the direction is set for “A-to-B”.

    Below each clip thumbnail viewer is a Start/End Slider that allows you to change the initial and final appearance of the transition. You can adjust the Start sliders separately for different settings, or you can adjust them simultaneously if you want the same setting.

  3. Press and hold the Shift key as you move one of the sliders to 40%. Notice that the other slider moves to the same position.
  4. Put the Start and End sliders back to the original settings for this transition instance.
  5. Click the track selector tool in the Cross Dissolve Settings dialog box once. The track selector tool sets the direction of the transition—from A-to-B or from B-to-A.
  6. Notice that the direction of the transition is now from clip B to clip A and the arrow faces up. Click OK.
  7. In the Timeline window, select 1/2 Second from the Time Zoom Level. Now you can see the track selector tool with the Cross Dissolve transition icon.
  8. Click the track selector tool once to restore the A-to-B direction for this transition instance. (The arrow now faces down).