With Media Composer, one of the way to apply an effect or transition effect it is to drag the effect and drop it on the clip1. The drag and drop principle is the same when saving a custom effect we just created.
It is also important to note that custom effects have to be created from already applied effects; we can not modify an effect from the Effect Editor.
Video Effects
- First you have to apply an effect that has the closest look to what you want; for example, if in your film all your fade to colour transitions have to be fade to red, you can take the Fade to Color transition effect, which is black by default. Drag the effect and drop it to the clip;
- in the timeline, stop the position indicator (blue line) on the clip to have an effect added to it. Check that the track, on which the clip is, is selected;
- press the Effect Mode button (upper-left of the timeline window), the Effect Editor panel appears;
The Effect Mode allows to edit parameters of an effect. - in the Effect Editor, execute the necessary modifications to the default effect’s values (the duration and placement of transition effects can be change via the options located at the bottom of the panel);
- once satisfied – and what comes next is the important bit – grab the effect icon, in the upper left corner of the Effect Editor panel next to the effect’s name, and drop it in one of your bin;
The hand cursor tells us that we can grad the icon. 
Save a custom effect is actually dragging and dropping an effect icon in a bin. - the newly created effect acts now like any other bin elements, so you can change its name for example. But like for the default effects, if you want to modify your custom effect, you have to, firstly, apply it on to a clip in your timeline.
A customised effect, once in a bin, can be renamed.
Add a Custom Transition Effect In The Quick Transition Pulldown Menu
The Quick Transition feature allows you to apply and setup transition effects from and in your timeline; it is quite useful when applying multiple transition effects (follow the link to see how it can be done: http://jeremyrichard.com/article/apply-to-all-transitions/).
Though, the effects pulldown list only show some default transition effects. But there is a way of having our newly created effect in this pulldown menu:
- create a new bin (right click in the project window > new bin) and name it exactly Quick Transitions (notice that the word Transition is in its plural form as opposed to the name of the feature itself);
- grad and drop your custom effect in the newly created Quick Transitions bin;
- access the Quick Transition dialog box and in the effect pulldown menu you will find, at the bottom of it, your custom effect being listed.
When dropped in a bin named Quick Transitions, a customised transition effect is then listed in the Quick Transition pulldown list.
Audio Effects
Media Composer has several tools allowing you to work on the sound: Audio Mixer, AudioSuite, Audio EQ Tool or RTAS (Real-Time AudioSuite, kind of does like the AudioSuite tool but the effects act on the whole track, not just segments, and no need of rendering to hear the changes).
With AudioSuite, RTAS and Audio EQ Tool the effects can be saved in one of your bin, like any other video effects. However the effects applied from AudioSuite tool can not be modified, so having it saved in a bin might be not that useful. But it gets quite handy when doing an equalisation as, after having saved your equalisation effect, you can keep modify it and save different variation of it. Or it is the same for effects from the Real-Time AudioSuite tool, where customisation from default effects can be made and saved as different new custom effects.
Like for the video effects, in order to save customised audio effects, we first need to apply an effect in the timeline. Let us try with an equalisation as an example:
- in the timeline, place the position indicator (blue line) on the audio clip you want to equalise;
- go to Tools > Audio EQ Tool, a new window appears;
- check that the track, on which the clip is, is selected. If it is a stereo clip and you want the equalisation to be done on both side, select the two tracks on which the audio clip is. The selection can be done from the timeline or from the EQ Tool window by holding down the shift key while selecting the tracks in the pulldown list, beneath the effect icon. There you should see a + sign next to the track name, it means that the effect will be applied on both the right and left side of the audio clip;
In the Audio EQ Tool’s tracks pulldown list, holding down the shift key, while selecting audio tracks, allows us to select several tracks. - do your equalisation;
Once we are satisfied with our equalisation, we can save it:
- from the Audio EQ Tool window, grab the effect icon on the upper-left corner and drop it in one of your bin;
The Effect Icon in the EQ Tool Window can be grabbed and dropped (even if the hand cursor does not appear). - the effect acts like any other bin elements and can be then renamed. And if you put equalisation effects and audio effects together you can quickly see what is what as their icons are different:
- effects from the AudioSuite and Real-Time AudioSuite tool have a plugin icon which look like a North American plug socket;
- equalisation effects have the equalisation icon symbolised by EQ written in capital letters.
Remark: for the Real-Time AudioSuite tool the effect icon is at the right of the tool’s window.
The End