Create Freeze Frames in a Flash

You can create a freeze frame in either the Viewer or with a clip on the timeline. The shortcut to so this is the same either way:

When you’re making a freeze frame in the Viewer, the process is quite straightforward. Park the playhead on the frame you want frozen and hit SHIFT N. Your Viewer will now display a 2 minute clip of the freeze frame with an in an out set in the middle for the duration you’ve specified in your user prefs (10 seconds by default). You can re-trim and edit this to the timeline as you would any clip or you can drag it to the Browser for future use.

You can also make a “run and freeze” from a clip already on the timeline. Simply position your playhead over the appropriate frame in the timeline clip and hit SHIFT N. Your freeze frame will appear and you are now free to edit that down to the timeline as an overwrite edit–note that you will need to have your playhead in its original position on the timeline. Master trainer Diana Weynand described a great workflow for accomplishing this in her Apple Pro Training Series: Final Cut Pro 6 text for the Apple Pro Training series (it’s probably in the newer edition as well, but I do not have it handy). She suggests that, after you SHIFT N to create the freeze frame, set an in-point on the timeline where the playhead is the ad an out point where you want the freeze to conclude. Now you can just hit a quick F10 and overwrite your freeze into the timeline as a 3-point edit.