Edit 2 - Keyframes, Dynamic and Dolly Zoom, CinemaScope, Music Licensing and Splicing, 3D Tracked Text, Two Edit Breakdowns, a Lightning VFX Fix, Six Ways to Make Resolve Faster, and Gyroflow

Dynamic Zoom: Inspector toggle (goes red), zooms out by default - Swap to zoom in; overlay from the viewer's lower-right menu shows a green start box and red end box; drag corner dots to scale, drag inside to move; set green at the first frame, red one frame from the end; same size in two places = a pan; Ease In/Out exists, he prefers linear; a shorter clip zooms faster. Keyframes: the diamond beside any parameter (the top diamond keyframes all); Show Keyframe Tray at the timeline's top-left, drag the divider up; box-select diamonds to move them together; the playhead must sit on a keyframe to edit it - snapping (N) - or a new one appears; switch Keyframe Lanes to Keyframe Curves and pick Linear, Ease In, Ease In and Out, Ease Out; Shift-drag changes only timing (left/right) or only value (up/down); for an OFX parameter such as Zoom Blur, three-dot menu > Display Selected Parameters; a standalone Keyframes panel offers the same. Worked example: rotation keyframed to hold a drifting horizon level.

Dolly zoom: flying away, Dynamic Zoom swapped to zoom in so the background grows while the subject holds; flying toward, zoom out; crop the red box to the subject's size at the first frame; part-way keeps resolution; 6K from the Mavic 4 Pro gives crop headroom; the same toggle adds 'weird' extra movement to any push. CinemaScope: Timeline > Output Blanking > 2.35 for every clip; Reset removes it; reframe under the bars with Transform > Position Y; 'you end up losing the top and bottom of each shot', so frame for it on the shoot. For part of a timeline or animated bars: download the CinemaScope Overlays pack into a presets folder, File > Import > Timeline (Ctrl/Cmd+Shift+I), Tab Timelines to switch, copy the preset clip onto the top track - (1) static bars, (2) 16:9 → Scope, (3) Scope → 16:9, (4) black-to-Scope title reveal; drag the end for the hold, drag the corner diamond for transition length; if it stutters, Render Cache Color Output + Playback > Render Cache > User, near the end of the edit.

Free: YouTube Music Library (YouTube use), Pond5's free collection (credit), Pixabay (no credit needed, 'surprisingly good'). Subscription: Artlist ($16.60/month, $199/year, downloads stay usable after cancelling, referral gives 14 months), Soundstripe ($149/year), Epidemic Sound ($12 social-only, $25 client work, no broadcast/VOD). Per track: Musicbed, Pond5 - $60 to $600+. In Artlist: Mood, Genre (to exclude), Instrument (heavily), Staff Picks / Top Downloads / Newest, Vocal/Instrumental, BPM, Duration. Download WAV; keep a personal library folder. Splicing: two tracks need similar tempo and the same key; cut where the music changes - 'spots where there's some kind of a whoosh type sound effect work really well'; a couple of seconds of crossfade, tweak; the same cut-fade-tweak removes an unwanted 15 seconds; fade in for a second or two at the start, fade out at the end.

Fusion > Effects > search Camera Tracker, drop it between MediaIn and MediaOut. Inspector: Preview Auto Track Locations, tune the detection threshold, Bidirectional Tracking on, Auto Track, Solve. Solve Summary > Average Solve Error under 1 pixel (0.59 in the demo); retune or delete bad points if higher. Options > Reproject Locators and Patterns; box-select or Cmd-click the cluster on the object the text should sit on. Export > 3D Scene > Transformation: Unaligned, Origin > Set from Selection, back to Aligned, Export; connect the Camera Tracker Renderer to MediaOut and delete CameraTracker, PointCloud3D, GroundPlane. Add a 3D Text node into the Merge3D; Change Font; Transform Translation X/Y and X/Y/Z Rotation to match the drone's tilt and the horizon; Text > Extrusion Depth; Shading > untick Use One Material, bevel darker (~50 % grey), tint both to the scene. Heavy - render in place before export.

Fall colours (Mini 5 Pro): colour-code while sorting - orange definite, apricot strong, yellow good, blue maybe; cut sometimes on the beat, sometimes a beat late, sometimes mid-phrase 'so it doesn't get too boring and predictable'; cut on action, a foreground object leaving frame two frames before the cut; stabilise Translation for drift, Similarity when it twists (Smooth 0.5 and up); a 282 % clip goes into a compound clip first; 3D text plus a fly-through composite (separate lesson); wind, forest and waterfall ambience throughout, whooshes on some passes not all, 2-3 whooshes staggered to thicken one, a phone recording of a windmill when Artlist had nothing, waterfall crescendo on approach; outro - Alt-drag the clip up to duplicate, Edge Wipe on the graded copy, nodes off underneath, corner-to-corner, 'ungraded/graded' labels with the same wipe. Real estate: tag keepers with backslash while scrubbing, Show Tagged Files Only, scrub the bar not the clip; ~100 clips → 35 → 23-24 in a 1:55 video; mixed lengths, ramps, text overlays for stats; grading in the COLOR section.

Grade first (log correction, ground mask, a free LUT, temporal NR). Alt/Option-drag the clip up to duplicate; R > Freeze Frame > Change so everything after the bolt frame holds. Reset Node Grade on the NR node (it dimmed the bolt); click empty node space > Add Alpha Output, connect the node's alpha to the clip's alpha; a circle Power Window isolates the bolt over the original clip below, edges softened. Marker (M) on the bolt frame, comma/period trims, Ctrl+B splits, a two-frame cross dissolve at both ends. Double flash: extend, E to the playhead, a new node Serial Before the mask, Flicker from ResolveFX Color; contain it with the Qualifier (Shift+H to view the matte) keyed on luminance - colour and saturation keys failed - then a polygon Power Window tight around the bolt (static shot, no tracking); copy the key to the second clip.

1 GPU: Preferences > GPU Configuration - Auto normally; Windows/NVIDIA CUDA (OpenCL otherwise), Mac Metal; pick the 'discrete' GPU. Hardware decode of H.264/H.265: Studio-only on Windows, free on Mac - Preferences > Decode Options, tick all. 2 Timeline resolution 1920x1080 while editing, 4K before export (native only for tracking, keying, compositing). 3 Render cache: Playback > Render Cache > Smart or User (his), right-click > Render Cache Color Output, red bar turns blue; clear via Project Settings > Working Files > Cache Files Location > Browse, delete the folders (Mac: Show in Finder); 'media offline' after → Playback > Delete Render Cache > All. 4 Playback > Timeline Proxy Mode > Half or Quarter. 5 Optimized Media: right-click > Generate; Playback > Use Optimized Media if Available; format in Project Settings > Master Settings; delete from the Optimized Media subfolder. 6 Render in Place: right-click > Render Cache dialog, handles, bake chosen effects, save location; Decompose to Original to revert (loses later effects). A base M1 Mac mini or Air with 8 GB is enough.

Free at gyroflow.xyz; works for Avata 2, Avata 1, Neo and GoPro. Prerequisites on the Avata 2: RockSteady off (in-drone stabilisation can't be undone) and field of view Wide (Ultra-wide or Normal records no gyro data). Shot right, lens profile and motion data load themselves. In/out with the bracket buttons or I/O. Field of view 1.0 (raise if too zoomed; red sections warn of black edges); smoothness 0.5 by default, adjusted per shot; advanced settings untouched; Horizon Lock off to keep the FPV feel (partial amount available); Dynamic zoom keeps it wide and only zooms for big moves; rolling-shutter correction default. Export: H.265/HEVC - small files and full 10-bit, unlike H.264 - 3840x2160 16:9, 'Original' for 3:4, 9:16 tab for vertical; bitrate 124 Mbps default, sometimes 150; Use GPU encoding on; no audio (the Avata 2 records none); Advanced: GPU decoding and the right device. Export writes '<name> stabilized' beside the original; add to render queue for batches; presets and project files can be saved. He avoids the Resolve plugin because it 'cannot play back in real time' and he'd render anyway.