How to Add a Title to an iMovie Video Project in iLife '11

10 of 12 in Series: The Essentials of Editing Video with iMovie in iLife '11

All movies should have titles. Even Untitled is a good title. Titling gives you the chance to be witty, even in a vacation video. iMovie simplifies the making of titles and credits. After choosing a theme for your project, iLife puts titles and credits in your project and spins interesting effects for them based on the theme. The title and credits can appear superimposed over the video, or against a background. You can still edit the text of the titles and credits and change them to suit your needs, as described in this list:

If you chose a theme and the option to automatically add transitions and titles, the Project Browser shows yellow-green markers for the title on the first clip and the credits on the last clip. To change the text, move the pointer to the clip with the title or credits, select the text in the Viewer pane, and then type over the text. Click the Done button in the upper right corner of the Viewer pane to finish.
If you didn’t choose a theme, you can add custom titles and credits to your project and then make adjustments to them. Even if you chose a theme and the option to automatically add titles and credits, you can adjust or change them and add more custom titles and credits.

To add titles and credits to your project and edit those in it, follow these steps:

Click the Titles button — the T icon on the right side of the toolbar under the Viewer pane (or choose Window→Titles).

The Title Browser appears next to the Event Browser, with thumbnails for the title and credit styles, including ones associated with the theme you chose.
Move the pointer across a title or credit style to see a generic preview in the thumbnail.
To add a custom title or credits, drag a title or credit style from the Title Browser to a project clip in the Project Browser.

As you hover over the video clip with the title or credit style, a blue shadow appears over the clip — you can drag the shadow over the first third of the clip or the last third of the clip or the entire clip. After you drag the title or credit style, a blue marker appears over the clip showing its duration.
(Optional) To change the duration for a title, select and then double-click the marker for the title or credits (or select the marker and choose Window→Clip Adjustments).
(Optional) Change the duration in the Inspector dialog by entering the number of seconds (in tenths of a second) in the Duration field, and click Done.
(Optional) To move the title to a new position in the clip, drag the marker from the middle and position it where you want it.
To change the color, font, or style of the text, select the text in the Viewer pane and click the Show Fonts button in the upper left corner of the Viewer pane.

You can skim over each font and see a preview in the Viewer pane. You can also choose a different color for the font by clicking the color bars, and choose a different size for the font by clicking the numbers.
Click Done when finished choosing a font, size, and color.