3 Creative Ways to Use the Magnetic Mask in Final Cut Pro

Well hello, you beautiful person. Let's cut out the fluff and jump in: we're using the magnetic mask to do three different things with one shot, applied three different ways. (Technically four ways. You'll see.)

Way 1: The standard magnetic mask

Hit the magic wand button and choose Add Magnetic Mask, or press Option Command M. Click the areas you want masked; if it grabs too much, hold Option and click to subtract from the selection. Hit Analyze, and it tracks forward (and backward if you started mid-shot) in real time. I'm not speeding the footage up, it really is that fast. Adjust the feather for a softer edge. We'll park this first mask and turn it off for now; its purpose gets revealed at the end.

Way 2: Inside a color correction

Every color correction type (wheels, board, curves) now carries its own magnetic mask button. Press Command 6 for the inspector, add Color Curves (my preferred tool), hit the mask button, and pick the magnetic mask icon. Same select-and-track process. As far as I know you can't copy a mask between layers yet, but the object tracker works that way, so I assume that's coming in an update.

Now the grade. Switch the correction to Outside so it affects everything except her. Grab the hue picker on a curve, choose a cyan, and push up in the shadows and lower midtones. (Reading these curves: shadows at the bottom, midtones in the middle, highlights up top; push up to add the color into those luma values, pull down to subtract it and add its opposite.) The background goes moody and cool.

Switch to Inside: select orange on the hue curve. Skin lives in the midtones, slightly brighter here, and you can verify with the picker right on her skin. Push up to punch the orange, then pull the shadows down a touch so her hair cools off and the orange builds gradually toward her skin. Double-check accuracy with the vectorscope (Command 7): her skin sits right on the skin tone line, where all skin should sit regardless of race or ethnicity, unless you're going stylized.

Still inside the mask, pull up the luma curve: lift the highlights and shape a little S-curve, darkening the shadows and lower midtones for contrast. Then a similar move outside, minus the highlight lift, keeping the background a bit moodier. Toggle it off and on: cyan world, glowing subject, one mask.

Way 3: Drag an effect straight onto the viewer

Take any effect (I used radial blur) and drag it directly onto the viewer, then click-release and make your mask selection right there, Option-clicking to subtract. Notice the mask draws in a different color this time; when you're running multiple masks, the colors tell them apart. Analyze, done.

Problem: the blur lands on HER, which, unless you're chasing a look your client will hate, is backwards. Open the mask's dropdown and hit Invert: now the effect hits everything outside the mask. Feather it, dial the blur way down, and you've softened the edges of the frame while she stays tack sharp.

And that first mask? The title reveal.

Option-drag the clip up, turn that first magnetic mask correction back on, and slot a title between the two layers. The masked copy of her sits in front of the text, so the title appears BEHIND her. Position it, style it, and that's the three-for-one: a graded subject, a treated background, and text she physically walks in front of. From flat shot to that, with a few simple masks.