Create Pro-Level Thumbnails Directly in Final Cut Pro

This is an affordable plugin that lets you create thumbnails, or do a little graphic design, directly in Final Cut Pro of all places. If you don't want to pay for photo editing software and learn a whole second tool, and you'd rather roll straight from editing into thumbnail-making, FCB's Thumbnail Creator is going to be your best friend. Not sponsored, by the way: I bought this plugin with my own money. I'm covering it because I know some of you will genuinely find it useful.

What's in the box

The presets live in two places. In your titles: 33 presets including a magnifying glass for highlighting part of your photo, a thumbnail guide showing where YouTube's timestamp will sit, tons of customizable arrows, lines, and shapes, backgrounds, and drag-and-drop titles, all recolorable to your channel theme. In your effects browser: 20 presets you drag directly onto media, including four border styles, lighting and shadow presets for cutouts and people, a sheen effect I'm a big fan of, a split depth title, a 3D transform tool for shifting images in 3D space, and a patch tool.

Building a real thumbnail, start to finish

The example: a thumbnail where I'm cut in half and glued back together, for a video about a transition that blends cuts. Symbolism, baby. Here's the process:

1. Freeze and cut yourself out. Find a frame of yourself you like and press Shift H for a hold frame (pausing the footage so it acts like a picture). Use the magnetic mask to cut yourself out, then size and position.

2. Background and eye guidance. Add one of the plugin's gradient backgrounds in your channel colors. Then the attention lines preset: background elements that subtly steer the viewer's eyes where you want them. Set their blend mode to soft light and lower the opacity so they melt into the background. A paper texture underneath (blend mode adjusted) adds a little extra tactility. Note: stack everything with zero concern for clip lengths; we're only exporting one still frame.

3. The split. Use FCP's free Draw Mask like scissors to cut myself in half, Option-drag to duplicate the clip, hit invert on the copy's mask so the other half shows, and nudge the halves apart. Add FCP's built-in drop shadow effect behind each half for depth and realism.

4. Light spill. The plugin's inner glow preset, colored to match the cyan background, makes it look like the background light is spilling onto me. Instantly more real.

5. Objects with shine. Drop in the FCP logo and hit it with the sheen effect for a realistic shine, plus an inner glow to keep things uniform. Then the glue bottle: it was a low-quality image, so I used the plugin's sharpening effect (which looks way better than FCP's built-in sharpen, by the way), plus sheen and a drop shadow. For the glue squeezing out, I repurposed the plugin's highlighter effect: positioned it with on-screen controls, set the color to white, and Option-dragged a duplicate on top to double its thickness.

6. The text. I skipped the gradient titles and made the text plain black, then added the sheen effect so it pops off the light cyan background without looking like boring black text. The title inspector adds an outline, drop shadow, and outer glow right on the preset. Duplicate, reposition, done.

Export your frame

Go to File, Save Current Frame (if you don't see it, hit Add Destination and add Save Current Frame). Export as JPEG, and you've got a pro-level thumbnail without ever leaving Final Cut or learning new software.

Grab FCB's Thumbnail Creator here and use code DYLANSUCKS for 10% off. Have a great day!