imovie

•Use the crop tool to improve composition and resize clips

1 Remove any unwanted objects

Import our supplied Unwantedobject.mp4 clip. The crane is distracting. Click the ‘Cropping’ icon. Click the ‘Crop to Fill button’.

2 Recompose clip

A crop overlay window appears around the edges. Drag the top-right corner handle to resize the window. Drag inside the overlay to move it upwards to include more church.

3 Apply crop

Areas that will be removed by the crop tool appear faded. Click the tick to apply the crop. The crane has now been removed and we’ve zoomed in closer on the girl.

4 Import iphone clip

Import Portraitshape.mov. This clip was captured on an iphone. When you add it to the timeline you’ll see black bars around the edge due to our project’s widescreen aspect ratio.

5 Crop to fit

One way to lose the black ‘pillar box’ bars at the sides is to click on the cropping icon then ‘Crop to Fit’. This zooms in on the subject, though you lose the top and bottom of the clip.

6 Layer the clips

Click the cropping icon. Tick ‘Reset’ to restore the clip to its original composition. Click the clip and choose Edit>copy, then Edit>paste. Drag the clip onto the top layer.

7 Fill the edges

Click the clip on the bottom layer then the cropping icon. Click ‘Crop to Fit’. Click the tick. Now you’ve replaced the black pillar box bars with zoomed-in footage of the same clip.

8 Add background effects

The zoomed-in background is just there to fill the black edges while we view the clip. To make the background less important click ‘Clip Filter’ and add a Black & White look.

9 Non-destructive crops

None of the crops applied to your clips will permanently remove any original footage. To restore a clip to its original state click on it. Click the cropping icon and then click ‘Reset’.