Adobe Premiere Pro

The world's most commonly used NLE

Premiere Introduction & Hotkeys

Think Final Cut Pro 7 circa 2006, but with bugs that have been unsolved for over a decade. If you understand how to use NLEs and you’re using it as a simple NLE, then Premiere is great. If you want to do anything scripted, automated, or complex it’s brutal to use versus using After Effects. That said, it’s fine. It renders things quick and performs fairly well. It is not my favorite application but I’ve spent a ton of time in there. It's a love/hate relationship. 

Hotkeys

Premiere has a handy tool for letting you find and modify keyboard shortcuts. 

Shift, Command, and Option are all modifier keys. 

The below shortcut keys are for Mac, but if you substitute Command (⌘) for Control, they should work on Windows as well. 

Overall
` Make selected panel full-window
Timeline Navigation and Controls
  
+/- Adjusts zoom level of timeline. 
Shift++ and Shift+- Adjust the height of all tracks simultaneously.
 I/O Mark In, Mark Out
↑ ↓ Navigates between cut points on targeted tracks

⌘ + ← / ⌘ + →

Nudge a clip forward or back 1 frame

(adding Shift as a modifier moves it 10 frames forward or back)
Keyframe
  
   
Misc

⌘ + Option + K

 Keyboard Shortcuts 😎

F

 Matches clip i/o from timeline into the source (newer versions of Premiere require this gets manually set up in shortcuts)

Premiere Plugin Directory

Premiere Pro Plugins

Many of these also work in After Effects, with more advanced functionality. 

Boris FX

 

Lots of good repair stuff as part of a CONTINUUM license. Boris’ full suite is stellar, too, but it’s expensive to have everything. I can recommend Sapphire for fun FX. 

 

Be warned : performance aint great for these plugins on Apple Silicone M1/M2 (as of 2024) vs. the same plugins in After Effects. 

 

 
Digital Anarchy's Flicker Free


Helps repair media that has rolling refresh bands due to incompatible shutter speeds and frame rate combinations with non-continuous lighting sources like CFL bulbs or projection lamps. This doesn't fix all the problems, but it does fix many many of them. Highly recommended. 

 

This plug has been around for a decade and sometimes works magic, and other times, doesn’t. Shot a concert at 120fps and 1/120.3 and it took care of it. Doesn’t do as good of a job with rolling refresh bands (like on an LED screen or in projection). A good reminder to : ALWAYS CHECK YOUR FOOTAGE!

 
Knights of the Editing Table : Excalibur


A $120 plugin that allows you turn pretty much anything into a key-command. 

 

Works like SPOTLIGHT but within Premiere. 

 

#1 must have IMHO. Like FX Console, but for Premiere. 
Mister Horse

 

Used to be a buy once and occasionally pay to upgrade. Now it’s a subscription model.

 

Great motion plug for AE (and Premiere). Can recommend a few different plugins. The text one, the background one, the shapes one, the transition one. 

 
Neat Video Reduce Noise 

 

A plugin that reduces noises very well. Best in class for noise reduction.

 
Red Giant / Maxon 

 

Many different tools, below are some of my favorites. 

 
Colorista Color Correction suite
Magic Bullet / Looks Color and looks effect chain suite. Gateway drug.
Primatte Green screen / color key tool when Keylight doesn’t get you there

Premiere Gotchas

Network Drive Won’t Show Up in PR Media Browser

Something Isn’t Working That Worked 5 minutes Ago

Restart Premiere