Opening and Closing Credits with Text Roll in Premiere Pro

In Graphics, we saw how one could create a title for your Premiere Pro video using the Essential Graphics panel. There we first used the Browse tab in the Essential Graphics panel to choose from a group of prebuilt graphic texts which one then edited. However, one need not use the Browse tab and one can go directly to the Edit tab as described below. One can also make the title scroll. Both of these are shown below.

As before, create a project, import one or more clips, and put one or more clips in the Timeline.

  1. Window > Essential Graphics to open the Essential Graphics Panel.
  2. Position the playhead in the Timeline panel where you want the credits to appear - typically at the beginning and/or end of the movie.
  3. Select the Type (T) tool in the Timeline Panel and draw a rectangle in the Program monitor where you want the text to appear. In the Text section at the bottom of the Essential Graphics panel, you can change the font, color, font size, and other text properties. Type your replacement text. When you get to the end of the line, hit Enter and keep typing.
  4. In the Program Monitor, type enough text to more than fill the screen vertically, pressing Enter after each line. You may find it easier to create the text in another program and paste in the text. You can adjust the position of the text block by using the Selection tool in the Timeline panel.
  5. Deselect the text layer by clicking the background of the Program Monitor with the Selection tool.
  6. Change the duration of the title in the Timeline Panel by dragging the end of it, just like an image. The default duration of the title is set by Edit>Preferences>Timeline>Still Image Default Duration. In Premiere Pro 2022, the default duration is 5 seconds.
  7. If you want the credits to roll, in the Essential Graphics Panel, click the check box to add a Roll effect. (The previous step of deselecting the text layer is necessary to see the Roll check box.)
  8. You have several options:
    1. Start Offscreen - This sets whether the credits begin offscreen and roll in, or whether the credits begin where you placed it in the Timeline Panel.
    2. End Offscreen - "This indicates whether the credits roll completely off the screen or end on the screen."

      The above two choices will affect on the rate of scroll. Because the scroll time is not changed, choosing "Start Offscreen" and/or "End Offscreen" means that the text will need to scroll more quickly. If both are unchecked, the text remains on the screen and doesn't need to scroll at all.
    3. Preroll - "This sets the number of seconds and frames to delay before the first words appear on-screen."
    4. Postroll - "This specifies the number of seconds and frames that play after the roll or crawl ends"

      The above two settings (Preroll and Postroll) also affect the rate of scroll. Delaying the beginning of the scroll (Preroll) and/or making the end of the scroll occur before the allotted time for the graphic (Postroll) speeds up the scroll.
    5. Ease In - "This specifies the number of seconds and frames at the beginning to gradually increase the speed of the roll or crawl from zero to full speed."
    6. Ease Out - "This specifies the number of seconds and frames to slow down the speed of the roll or crawl at the end."

      The above two settings (Ease In and Ease Out) appear to be rather mild adjustments to the scroll speed.
    The length of a rolling or crawling title does not appear to affect the playback speed at all or not in a significant way.

Opening credits - The instructions above would put the opening credits over the beginning of the movie. If you want the credits to appear before the beginning of the movie, you can drag the movie to the right in the Timeline so that it begins after the credits end.

To see how the various Text Roll options below behave, I suggest you use a duration of at least 10 seconds for your graphic and that the movie extends beyond the end of the graphic.

Thanks to former student Bishnu Pandey for telling me about text roll.

Source: Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2018 Release Classroom in a Book, pp. 407-408 and Chapter 15, Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2020 Release Classroom in a Book

Revised: April 17, 2022. Comments to William Pegram, wpegram@nvcc.edu