MacMost: Archives

Overlays in iMovie are the key going beyond the basics. With overlays you can have multiple layers of video, use a green screen, split the screen between two videos and show one video on top of another using a picture-in-picture effect. You can go even further with overlays using keyframe animation and other filters and effects.

The row of Function Keys at the top of your Mac's keyboard serve a dual purpose. You can use them to trigger keyboard shortcuts as keys like F1, F2, F3, etc. But you can also use them to control your Mac's screen, volume, media playback and trigger other special features of macOS. Learn how to toggle between the two sets of functions with the Globe / FN key.

While it isn't difficult to subtract a start time from an end time to get a duration value, it takes some extra work to convert that into a decimal number of hours, and more work to round it to the nearest quarter-hour.

While Final Cut Pro comes with many ready-to-use titles, you can also build your own custom titles to fit your needs and style.

If you are using some slide elements across many slides, put those elements on a slide layout. Then you can change those layout elements and the changes will be reflected across all slides. You can also use text and media placeholders on slide layouts to preserve size, position and other properties even if the content of those elements change.

Context menus appear in the middle of your screen when you right click, two-finger click or Control+click on an object. You can use them in almost any app on almost any object. You can also bring them up in some cases with a keyboard shortcut.

Before sending a link to a web page in an email or text message, here are some things to consider like keeping the URLs short, copying just the link, highlighting text on a page and more.

A new feature of Final Cut Pro allows you to automatically mask an entire clip to isolate a person, pet, sky, foreground, background and more. You can use Auto Mask to remove the background or apply an effect to only a portion of the clip.

Most apps don't have a function to export documents or views as PDF files. But if the app can print, you can intercept that printout and save it instead as a PDF.

A simple checkbox in the Mail app will start logging every connection to your email server. That log file will fill up fast. Leave this checkbox off unless you need it, and be sure to delete any large log files it leaves behind.

ClickFix is a type of social engineering attack that tries to get to you run malicious code on your Mac or other computer. Here's how to spot ClickFix and avoid it.

Learn more about using the Passwords app on your Mac. You can use it to store any secure information you like, look at a history of older passwords, check on the security of your current passwords, generate two-factor codes and much more.

If you are new to Mac here's a quick guide to using keyboard shortcuts. You'll learn how they relate to the Menu Bar, how to find shortcuts, how to add your own and customize them.

Learn how to customize your iPhone's Home Screens to include only the apps you use the most, pick a design that fits your style, change according to the time of day and much more.

Stickies is an app that you already have on your Mac that you can use to keep information handy on your screen at all times. You can use it for note-taking, a visible reminder, a quick reference, and more.

If you notice that when you first launch an app it automatically opens some windows, that could simply be because you never closed those windows before quitting previously. There are settings to control how this works.

If you have duplicate contacts in your Mac Contacts app, or you have some contacts that show up on your Mac but not your iPhone or iPad, then multiple accounts is probably the issue. Check to see if you have multiple Contacts accounts and clean up your Contacts app.

A new feature that comes with your Apple Creator Studio subscription is the ability to create vector shapes native to Pages, Numbers and Keynote using an AI prompt. The shapes are just like the ones that have been in these apps for years, but now you have an infinite variety.

You can use a filter like Blur or Pixelate, combined with a shape mask to blue a portion of your video. By also applying a Tracker you can have that blur follow something like a face or license plate.

A friend or family member can show you what they are doing on their Mac and you can help them to troubleshoot problems or learn new skills. Screen sharing can begin through the Messages app without needing any extra software or configuring anything beforehand.