The Most Underrated Premiere Pro Shortcuts

If you’re just starting out as an editor then there’s something you need to know… shortcuts and hotkeys make you faster and slicker.

The less time you can spend moving your mouse around and actually putting the edit together then the more efficient and creative you will be.

For those already in the know and are proficient editors then this is not new information to you. You potentially have a hundred shortcuts already stored in your brain.

BUT!

Do you have these stored? And if you’re new then this is the perfect time to learn some new ones.

The Shortcuts

Extend Selected Edit to Playhead

This is extremely handy when you’ve trimmed a clip down in a gap or pasted a clip into a gap and you know there’s enough handles on the shot to reach the next edit point. Just make sure your playhead is at the next edit point using the up or down keys and then press E on either Mac or Windows.

Paste Attributes

Hopefully a lot of you already know about pasting attributes from one clip to one or more other clips in your timeline. Well, this shortcut will bring up that dialog box instantly without having to right click and choose ‘paste attributes’. Just select the clip, hit “Copy” and use Paste Attributes, Mac (Opt+CMD+V)/Windows (Alt+CTRL+V), on the clips that you want to put those on.

Select Clip at Playhead

As we said earlier, the less you can do with your mouse the more efficient you will be as an editor. Selecting clips on your timeline is one of those tasks we automatically go to our mouse for but that doesn’t have to be the case. Hit D on either Mac or Windows and Premiere will select the clip directly under your playhead. The only thing to note is that it will select all clips with an active V or A track assigned.

Deselect All

This is basically the inverse of the previous shortcut and that is the ability to deselect anything that is currently selected on the timeline without having to click away in dead space. To do it all you simply have to press is Shift+CMD/CTRL+A and your selections are gone.

Match Frame

This is an Editor’s best friend and one I hope most of you already know. But if you don’t then definitely note this one and start using it immediately. This shortcut displays the exact same frame of a clip in your timeline with the same frame in the original clip in your source monitor. So, if you have hundreds of clips in bins and you don’t want to sift through to find the correct one and then find the right point in that clip then this shortcut will save you heaps of time! Also if you match frame from a clip with in/out points then that clip’s in/out points will be set in the Source Monitor. Just press F on Mac or Windows to use it.

Replace With Clip

Ok, so this one is a hidden gem!

‘Replace with clip’ makes use of the source monitor and ‘selected clip under playhead’ to replace the timeline clip with a clip from the source monitor. The key to this shortcut is that you need to assign it to something in your keyboard shortcut menu.

Once you’ve assigned the shortcut you can go ahead and choose a portion of a clip in the source monitor and as long as there is a clip selected in the timeline under your playhead then the new shortcut will replace the timeline clip with your new chosen clip in the source monitor.

Lift or Extract

‘Lift or Extract’ is an incredibly useful and quick shortcut that can really speed up the edit of a rough cut for example. Hitting ; on Mac or Windows will lift the selected clip out of the timeline and leave a gap. Whereas, pressing ‘ on Mac or Windows will extract the clip and close the gap by rippling deleting.

Swap Clips

This is another great little feature shortcut for rough cuts and quick edits. Hold down Opt+CMD+Drag on Mac or Alt+CTRL+Drag on Windows to swap a clip with another on your timeline.

Trim Next/Previous Edit to Playhead

One more super simple shortcut for quick and rough edits or even for making changes to one clip in a complicated timeline. By pressing Opt/Alt+Q or Opt/Alt+W you can trim a clip to the next or previous edit point.

Audio Gain

This maybe a more obvious one but in case anyone is unaware you can get to the audio gain properties incredibly quickly by just pressing G on the keyboard. Just ensure you have the clips you want to change selected and you can alter their audio gain properties there and then.

So, there you have it. Some you may have known, others we think you won’t but all of them are useful tools to have in your editing arsenal.

Practice with them and you’ll be editing faster and more creatively in no time!

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