How to Write in Adobe Premiere Pro CC

The Write-On effect in Premiere Pro lets you draw directly on your footage. You can create handwritten text, arrows, circles, underlines, or any freeform path you want. The effect animates the drawing process, so it looks like someone is writing or sketching on screen in real time. It is great for vlogs, educational content, tutorials, and anywhere you want to annotate footage with a hand-drawn feel.

Today I am going to show you how to use the Write-On effect in Adobe Premiere Pro CC.

How to Use the Write-On Effect

Setting Up

1. Create a sequence and add your footage to the timeline.
2. Go to the Effects panel and search for Write-on (under Video Effects > Generate).
3. Drag the Write-on effect onto your footage.
4. In Effect Controls, find the Write-on effect settings.

Drawing the Path

5. Click on the Brush Position property. A small crosshair will appear on the Program Monitor. This is your drawing cursor.
6. Adjust the Brush Size so the line is visible. For annotations, something around 10-20 works well. For thicker marker-style lines, go higher.
7. Set the Color to whatever you want the drawing to be. White and yellow work well on most footage.
8. Click the stopwatch next to both Brush Position and Color to enable keyframe animation.

Animating the Writing

9. Move the crosshair to where you want the drawing to start. This creates your first keyframe.
10. Move forward a few frames on the timeline. Then move the crosshair to the next point along the path you want to draw. A line will be drawn between the two positions.
11. Continue moving forward a few frames at a time and repositioning the crosshair. Each new keyframe adds another segment to the drawing. The more keyframes you add, the smoother and more detailed the drawing will be.
12. When you are finished, play it back and you will see the drawing animate on screen as if someone is writing it in real time.

Tips

• Use more keyframes for smoother curves. If you are drawing letters or curved shapes, place keyframes closer together (every 1-2 frames) in the curved sections. Straight lines can use fewer keyframes.
• Change colors mid-drawing. Since you keyframed the Color property, you can change the brush color at any point during the animation. This lets you draw with multiple colors.
• Adjust the Paint Style. In the Write-on effect settings, you can change the Paint Style to “On Transparent” if you want to apply the drawing to a transparent layer (useful if you want to add effects to just the drawing).
• Combine with other annotations. Use the Write-on effect alongside text elements to create tutorial-style annotations with both handwritten and typed text.
• For more complex handwriting, consider creating the animation in After Effects and importing it. After Effects has better drawing tools and a dedicated paint system for this kind of work.

That is how you use the Write-on effect in Premiere Pro. It takes a bit of keyframing patience, but the handwritten look it creates adds a personal, engaging touch to your footage.