Stabilization in FCPX | Everything You Need to Know

[@Brad_West]

Purchase FCPX Stabilizer 2.0 👉🏼 bit.ly/FCPXStabilizerPFS How often do you need to stabilise your footage? Let me know in the comments down below. 😊👇🏼

[@MaddenScience]

Does the FCPX Stabilizer 2.0 work well for wildlife footage? I'm trying to stabilize some alligator footage from my canoe. Also, have you looked into capcut's stabilizer? It seems to be better than FCPX, but I'm not sure.

[@Brad_West]

@@MaddenScience It's difficult to tell without seeing the footage and how shaky it is. I haven't tried Capcut's stabilizer no.

[@pixelfilmstudios]

Great explanation of stabilization in Final Cut Pro Brad! It's one of our favorite tools! Happy to see that you enjoyed using it 😊

[@antonnishan109]

We need Giveaways

[@Brad_West]

Thanks for watching! It’s such a fun plugin to use 😄🙌🏼

[@klinx888]

How is it that every time I have a question, you upload a video straight away addressing my issue..... mind BLOWN!! Thank you once again brother

[@Brad_West]

Maybe I can read your mind? 🤷🏻‍♂️😂 Let’s see if I can do it again on Thursday 😄🤞🏼 Thanks for watching 🙏🏼

[@aNkHoProduction]

informative . thanks for being amazing Brad & Donna . always watching you guyz.

[@Brad_West]

Thanks so much! Appreciate you watching all the videos and I’m glad you enjoy them 😊🙏🏼

[@aNkHoProduction]

@@Brad_West absolutely

[@TymixTheMagician]

LOVE THE NEW INTRO BROOO!!!! 😍

[@Brad_West]

Thanks so much 😊🙏🏼 It was time for a change.

[@CharlieSeymourJr]

Look at you, Mr. Los Angeles! We should all have your terrific accent in the USA! Thanks for this video... I never thought of "stabilization" for keeping an object smack center in the frame. Once again you've taught me something. Thanks, Brad!

[@Brad_West]

Haha thanks Charlie. I feel like the South African accent is quite a strange one, no? 😂 Yeah that locked-on stabilization effect is a lot of fun to play around with! Thanks for watching!

[@CharlieSeymourJr]

@@Brad_West Nahhhh... sounds great to my ears!

[@Brad_West]

Haha 😄👍🏼

[@terryhur]

Your videos make so much sense! Thank you for explaining what FCP tries to do, instead of just showing how to turn it on.

[@Brad_West]

Thanks Terry! I’m glad you enjoyed the explanation and the tutorial 😄🙏🏼

[@antonvamplew]

I came just to find out how to use the FCPX Stabiliser I bought ages ago - and ended up discovering the really useful "Show Horizon" command, and then how to make a keyboard shortcut for it! Thank you!

[@Brad_West]

Great to hear! Glad you learned something else too 😄🙌🏼

[@msnspy]

Finally someone that can explain this 😍

[@Brad_West]

Haha I hope you found it helpful! 😊

[@dylanjohndickerson]

11k woop woop!! Congrats brotha! 🎉 Such a great explanation on stabilization. I usually just let FCP choose the stabilization (or just blast all the settings with smoothcam) but that's really eye opening to hear that it's not always the call. I'll start playing around with inertia cam some more. And that animation at 02:57 ow ow 🙌

[@Brad_West]

Thanks so much dude! 😊🙌🏼 Yeah inertiacam is my favorite method for sure. Definitely worth overriding FCPX’s decision sometimes 😊👊🏼

[@Notjustkpop]

I was literally just for looking for a video on stabilization! Do you have any videos on speeding up rendering time? Awesome video by the way!

[@Brad_West]

Awesome! Perfect timing 😊🙌🏼 I don’t, but one quick tip you might not know is you don’t need to render your timeline before you export. You can export a totally unrendered timeline. Also, unless you really need it on, I would turn background rendering off to help speed up your editing. 😊

[@DroneKingsInDarwin]

@@Brad_West you can export without rendering? So why do we need to let it render then?

[@Brad_West]

Oh yeah! You don’t need to render in order to export. Rendering helps things play back more smoothly if you have added a bunch of effects or you have a bunch of different codecs on the timeline. I turn background rendering off and I only render things that can’t play back smoothly without being rendered by selecting those clips and hitting Ctrl + R 😊

[@DroneKingsInDarwin]

@@Brad_West but if you have added an effect (de noiser) or stabilised etc it needs to render?

[@Brad_West]

Yeah if you have stabilized a clip or something like that where the clip needs to be analyzed, then that process needs to finish before exporting. But you still don’t need to render it before exporting. Does that make sense? 🤔 If you stabilize a clip, when it says “analyzing dominant motion” you can open the background tasks window and you’ll see the progress bar moving next to Transcoding and Analysis. Those tasks need to be done before exporting but once the analysis is done, rendering isn’t needed 😊👍🏼

[@TravelAddictsLife]

Thank you Brad, great tutorial

[@Brad_West]

Thanks, glad you enjoyed it 😄

[@MyHomeFarm]

Very helpful Brad. Great video… again.

[@Brad_West]

Thanks Mars 😊🙏🏼

[@gnolarockmantika6399]

Wow 🤩.. and new intro too!

[@Brad_West]

Haha, yeah! Thanks for noticing. It was time for a change 😄🙌🏼

[@travisreed5965]

Flipping Brilliant And Thanx For The Explanation - Have Been Running With Automatic Setting Only - Now My Options Make Sense - Much Appreciated Brother Man Cheers

[@Brad_West]

Yeah sometimes you need to override those default settings. Thanks Travis 😊👊🏼

[@imadclicks]

I always learn lot of things from your videos.. Can u please make a video on leaming Luts and how best to color grade using those luts

[@Brad_West]

Thanks Imad. Appreciate you watching all the videos 😊🙏🏼 That’s a great idea! I’ll add it to my list.

[@aNkHoProduction]

you guyz deserve more subscriber and i am pretty sure i will happen soon. keep it up

[@Brad_West]

Thank you. That means a lot 😊🙌🏼

[@davidkersten8251]

Great video!

[@Brad_West]

Thanks David. Appreciate that 😊👊🏼

[@BonVoyageCruiseTravel]

Thanks so much! I did learn something! Great information and lovely scenery!👏

[@Brad_West]

I’m glad you enjoyed it 😊 Thanks for watching 🙏🏼

[@EleanorBarkes]

Thank you! This video was incredibly helpful!

[@Brad_West]

I'm so glad to hear that Eleanor!

[@travel_paradise]

Explained clearly, even I can understand… thank you guys 👌

[@Brad_West]

Haha 😆 I’m glad to hear that. Thanks for watching 👊🏼

[@elmono3939]

Another great tutorial ! Yes, you should do tutorials on Pixel Film Studio plug-ins, because they don't really offer them anymore. And the ones they did offer, they were too difficult to follow. Thanks ! PS: Dig that LA t-shirt !

[@Brad_West]

Thanks El Mono! Glad you enjoyed the video 😊👊🏼 I’ll definitely add a tutorial for FCPX Stabilizer 2.0 to my list. Haha, it’s a pretty old shirt 😉

[@NigelBaines]

Thanks for creating this helpful video and translating Apple's techno speak within the Stabilization plugin. The Pixel Film Studios FCPX Stabilizer appears to need an update to work with the latest Apple OS. The PFS plugin kept on crashing FCPX until I removed it from the effects browser.

[@Brad_West]

Glad you enjoyed the video. It's possible that it needs an update. The new OS has just recently come out. I haven't updated yet so I can't test it. They will probably roll out an update at some stage.

[@splberg1]

Please make a tutorial for this FCPX Stabilizer 2.0 plug-in. Thanks, Chris

[@Brad_West]

I definitely will. Thanks Chris 😊👊🏼

[@SarahJonestoo]

Great!

[@Brad_West]

Thank you 🙏🏼

[@liviohans9261]

Nice ! I'd love to have a more in depth tutorial about FCPX Stabilizer 2.0 :)

[@Brad_West]

Thanks Livio! I’ll definitely add that to my list 😊👊🏼

[@kevinlefournis6293]

Thanks 👍🏻

[@Brad_West]

😄👊🏼

[@trendingwwwandw]

thanks for sharing this valuable information!!!!!!!!!!!!💝👍2

[@Brad_West]

You’re welcome! Thanks for watching! 😊🙏🏼

[@sergiojmazure]

Always helpfull!

[@Brad_West]

Appreciate that Sergio! 😊🙏🏼

[@AlexHarephotographer]

Hi Brad, when do you use the stabiliser and when do you use the pro follow as a general rule?

[@Brad_West]

I generally use the stabilizer most often. The pro follow plugin lets you add dynamic camera movement to your footage. Basically you can get the camera to follow the trajectory of a ball, or focus on objects passing by in a tripod shot.

[@abbasbaig3128]

My footages can never be stabilized using Final Cut Pro’s stabilizer, I have tried every method possible, it gets even more shaky when I apply stabilizer..can you tell me where I’m making a mistake? Thanks

[@Brad_West]

It’s hard to tell without seeing the footage. Are you able to share a link to an example of the clip you are trying to stabilize?

[@DroneKingsInDarwin]

Great timing with the lights. 😂

[@Brad_West]

😂😂 I was so confused!

[@DroneKingsInDarwin]

@@Brad_West It showed lmao

[@dronevideographyproduction]

Another great tutorial! I am trying to get better result with hyperlapse on my drone.... Would it help if I make a compound clip, stabilize the footage, export it and stabilize it again?

[@Brad_West]

You could try that, although I’m not sure you could apply stabilization twice like that. You might need to stabilize, export and reimport to stabilize again. Also, you might get that “jelly” kind of warping on the edges of your frame from over stabilizing. If your hyperlapse has a subject that kind of stays in one part of the frame, you might get better results with the FCPX Stabilizer plugin. I would try the export and reimport method first to see what that looks like 😊👍🏼

[@dronevideographyproduction]

@@Brad_West Thank you for your advice... Really appreciated! 🙏

[@mythologycreativemedia7454]

I always find FCPX stabiliser hit and miss so I bought the PFstudio plug in which worked fantastically till I upgraded to an m1 Mac……now I give up 😞 great video guys and I’d love a video on the plug-in pretty please 🙏 also any tips on getting it to even update on m1 MacBook?

[@Brad_West]

I’ll definitely do a more in-depth tutorial on the plugin soon 😊👍🏼 There is an M1 update available for it. I would reach out to their support team to see how you can download the update from your account. I’m not sure if they charge for the update or not if you’ve already bought the previous version, but it’s worth finding out from them 😊

[@mythologycreativemedia7454]

@@Brad_West awesome thank you, I have tried the download a couple times but it just crashes everything to the point of regretting my M1…….I’ll send them an email, thanks again 😎

[@Brad_West]

That’s strange. I wish I could be of more help. I would suggest the usual reinstall, reset FCPX prefs, etc to see if that helps but I imagine you have already done that. Best bet is to get their support tees to help you out 😊👍🏼 Best of luck!

[@mythologycreativemedia7454]

@@Brad_West thank you, I wish you could too 😂 yeah I originally did that and now it bounces between all licenses used and updating…..your video has given me the courage to try FCPX again, rather than turning blue whilst holding my breath at events 😂 I think you are right and emailing should be the next step…….thank you ever so much, super appreciate your time 😊

[@Brad_West]

Haha 😂 I know the feeling! Are you shooting handheld or on a gimbal at events?

[@MRNYCRISPY]

Can you stabilize after you have loaded a multicam, or only before? Thank you, your videos have helped me so much

[@Brad_West]

Yes you can! But you have to do it inside the multicam. So if you want to stabilize a portion of it, you can open the multicam, make cut points and the beginning and end of the range you want to stabilize and then just stabilize that section and exit the multicam to go back to the project.

[@adss70]

Hi, I have been really enjoying your instructional videos... you have the structure and clarity that seems to be the perfect fit for my learning style. As a side favour, if you are looking for ideas and I missed your video that already covers this, how do people create the postcard effect where photos appear throughout a video sequence? Do they use a plug in, or the simply create a PNG file and use the green screen effect?

[@Brad_West]

I’m so glad to hear that, thanks for the feedback 😊 I’m not 100% sure I know what you mean. Can you send me a link to an example so that I can get a better idea of the effect you want to learn?

[@ginotarabotto]

Great video. Please do a tutorial on the stabilization plugin, looks great! Does it require a lot of computer ram/power?

[@Brad_West]

Thanks Gino! I’ll definitely do an in-depth tutorial on it. It’s not that heavy on processing power. I find that it works and runs really smoothly on my 2019 MacBook Pro. 😊👍🏼

[@HeyQuinton]

Hi there - is there a plugin or a tutorial you can recommend for that website tilt effect? I assume it is just a tilt keyframe but cant quite wrap my head around it

[@Brad_West]

Yeah I actually use a free plugin from MotionVFX called mCamRig: bit.ly/mCamRigBD Super handy little plugin 😊👌🏼

[@sdadantravel]

Can you stabilise multiple Video clips at same time?

[@Brad_West]

Yes you absolutely can. You can select a range of clips and stabilize them all by turning stabilization on. Hit Cmd 9 to check on the progress of FCP analyzing those clips. 😄👍🏼

[@sdadantravel]

@@Brad_West thanks 🙏

[@mahmoodomran564]

what happened to the lights? :D

[@Brad_West]

The battery died 😂😂

[@SeeYouUpTheRoad]

Thank you so much! I sub'd

[@Brad_West]

Thanks for the sub! I appreciate the support!

[@masternick94]

hi Brad, I'm happy with the integrated stabilizer in final cut but I can't stabilize vertical videos for Instagram, do you know how I can do it? Thank you

[@Brad_West]

That's odd. I am able to stabilize vertical clips without a problem. Is your FCP up to date?

[@thegodlur]

Hello and Nice video, I have a problem hope you can help me, the thing is when I stabilize in proxy all look good, and smooth, But when I rendering and go to original, the stabilize is lost. Thx in advance

[@Brad_West]

That’s strange. I haven’t worked with proxies for some time. Do you have trouble stabilizing the clips again when you switch to original media? Or is the issue that you have loads of clips you’d have to do that for?

[@Zimvg]

what camera were you using?

[@Brad_West]

Everything was shot using the Sony A7iii except for the drone shot which was a Mavic mini 😄🤙🏼

[@monizfilms]

Is there a way to change the default Stabilization setting from Automatic to InertiaCam or SmoothCam and copy and paste across multiple clips in FCPX?

[@Brad_West]

Unfortunately not. FCP analyzes each clip and assigns the stabilization method it thinks is best. What you could try, is to select all the clips you want to stabilize, click the stabilization checkbox and wait for final cut to analyze all the clips. When it’s done, with them all still selected, switch the mode to inertia cam. That might change it for them all but I’m not 100% sure.

[@monizfilms]

@@Brad_West It worked!

[@Brad_West]

Awesome!

[@dannycorona]

Do you turn off the stabilization in your camera?

[@Brad_West]

No I leave it on. Just so that the shot is not too shaky to begin with 😄👍🏼

[@dadwatts3606]

I was hoping you would comment on downfalls of FCPX stabilization, like corner warping. I want to know how to catch the unpleasant artifacts from FCPX stabilization and would appreciate a workaround.

[@Brad_West]

Yeah that corner warping can be super frustrating. When I experience that I’ll generally try one of the other stabilization methods or a third party plugin but if you’re still getting the warping, it’s generally too shaky to be stabilized in my opinion.

[@mucsimon]

thanks for your work I got Stabilizer 2.0 after your video. Unfortunately it's not what I was hoping for. I want to eliminate the impact of my feet and achieve very smooth timelaps. I would be happy about a tutorial from you and maybe you will also respond to my wish.

[@Brad_West]

Maybe locking onto your subject will help? You can try this locked on technique: kzbin.info/www/bejne/eJrQe2yGeKtooas

[@johnnyweissmuller5838]

InertiaCam and SmoothCam is actually the same thing, just that with Smoothcam is 3 sliders vs 1 slider and default is set to 1.5 instead of 1.0

[@Brad_West]

Not true. They are different methods of stabilizing the footage. InertiaCam is optimized for footage with pan and zoom motions in it, whereas SmoothCam is optimized to stabilize position, rotation and scale movements.

[@johnnyweissmuller5838]

​@@Brad_West I ahd to read the manual again. "SmoothCam: Applies the default stabilization method described above, allowing you to adjust the translation, rotation, and scale parameters:" I thought "Above" refers to the paragraph above which describes "inertiaCam" but it seems to refer to the "Automatic" setting. So SmoothCam is only "Automatic" but with 3 sliders.

[@Brad_West]

Automatic will pick between SmoothCam or InertiaCam depending on its analysis. So if it’s set to automatic, FCP will sometimes use the InertiaCam method of stabilization and will give you one slider, and sometimes it will choose the SmoothCam method and will show 3 sliders. It all depends on the footage 😄👍🏼

[@djjrodnyc]

Do a dedicated FCPX Stabilizer 2.0 video

[@Brad_West]

Thanks for the suggestion!

[@gastelumproductions]

Hello, Brad! Thanks for the video. So, I watched this and stabilized a one take video. I just ended the color grading process and when I was about to export, I cropped (sliced, bladed, make shorter) the last part of the video. When I did that it appeared "Analyzing for dominant motion" and it automatically zooms out the whole image (I am almost sure it has something to do with stabilization). But I wanted this to be exactly as it was without the zooming out. Is there a way to do this without Final Cut Pro automatically modifying the image. I don't know if manually zooming in or exporting (which format?) and then cropping that exported video will work, but I am afraid it will loose quality. Thank you! (Hope i made myself clear.

[@Brad_West]

Yeah when you change the duration of the clip, FCP will sometimes re-analyze the footage in order to stabilize it. A quick workaround is to create a compound clip of that one take using Alt G and then just trimming the compound clip down. That way FCP won’t have to re-analyze the clip 😄👍🏼 Hope that helps!

[@gastelumproductions]

@@Brad_West Just finished watching the final result after exporting. Brad, you just saved me! Thank you so much. I appreciate the help and the fast response. I owe you big time. Have a great day!

[@Brad_West]

You’re welcome! Happy to help 😄👊🏼 Have a great weekend!

[@KrishnamRaju7]

hi need help why cursor is not going automatically near mark fcp

[@Brad_West]

Your snapping might be turned off. You can use the shortcut “N” to toggle it on and off.

[@eddiepedroza7593]

I need help, I usually record vertically and when I try to add stabilization it makes the video worse and more shaky. How can I fix this?

[@Brad_West]

If your footage is super shaky, the stabilization option in Final Cut Pro might struggle to stabilize it properly. Are you able to share a link to the unstabilized clips for me to have a look at?

[@ryanhorgan2]

Do you have issues with the quality once you stabilize? Your vid quality looks the same, but when i do it , the quality goes to hell 😭

[@Brad_West]

That's weird! I don't have issues with quality. Are you shooting in 4K or 1080p?

[@ryanhorgan2]

@@Brad_WestI’m shooting in 4k… my video will be super crispy and clear and as soon as i toggle on the stabilizer, it goes blurry … it’s so weird

[@Brad_West]

@@ryanhorgan2 Yeah that is super odd. I would reach out to their support team. Maybe there is a known bug and they can help you troubleshoot.

[@bitcoin4life798]

make tuturial I bought it.Dont have time to learn, Make video i send you 1000 SATS via LN

[@Brad_West]

I’ll definitely make a dedicated tutorial on the FCPX Stabilizer 😊