FCPX Tutorial: How to organise your clips with keywords

If you are an avid filmmaker, you’re likely to be dealing with lots of video clips. This is fine in itself until you come to start a new project and are confronted with a never-ending list of clips which seem almost impossible to navigate if you have no organisation system in place. Final Cut Pro X’s Keywords system is great for two reasons: they help you find your clips easily, but also help you categorise your clips so that when you create a project with a particular theme, such as a film about the sea, you can locate the existing clips with all the relevant Keywords. Trust us, it will save a lot of time in the future. Put your feet up, open Final Cut Pro X and learn to let Keywords do all the hard work for you over the next nine steps. We’ve got it all covered – you’ll be super-organised in no time.

Step 1: Get started

Navigate to the Event Library. Click on the event that requires organising. If you can’t see the Event Library, select Window>Show Event Library.

Step 2: See it differently

Working with clips in their preview form can be fiddly. It’s easier to assign Keywords while viewing the clips in a list. Click the Show clips in a list icon.

Step 3: The Keyword Editor

There are two ways to open the Keyword Editor. The quickest way is to click the key icon above the Project Library. Alternatively, click Mark>Show Keyword Editor.

Step 4: Choose Keywords

In the Keyword Editor pop-out, use the main field to assign Keywords to the clip. You can use more than one Keyword. Just hit Enter after typing each Keyword.

Step 5: Don’t repeat yourself

You can assign Keyword Shortcuts – applied with a single click. Enter popular Keywords into the numbered fields and click the number to apply them.