How to put video inside text

Putting video inside text is done with a track matte in Video by Zaweba. Place a title on the track above your clip, then set the clip to show only inside the picture on that track, using its alpha or brightness. The footage now plays inside the letters and nowhere else. It's free, offline and takes a couple of minutes.

The same trick puts video inside a shape or a logo, so once you've done it with words you can do it with anything.

Making the title

Press T to add a title and type your word. Big, bold and short works best, because the letters need to be wide enough to show the footage inside them. A heavy font, set large, with tight letter spacing gives the video the most room. Titles in Video by Zaweba support bold, letter and line spacing, outlines and more, though for a matte the shape of the letters is what counts; the colour won't be seen.

Put the title on the track directly above the video clip you want inside it, and line the two up so they cover the same stretch of time.

Setting up the track matte

Select the video clip and set it to use the track above as its matte. There are four ways to read the matte: by alpha, which uses the title's transparency (the letters are solid, everything else is clear), by brightness, which uses how light each part is, or the inverse of either. For text, alpha is the natural choice. The inverse puts the video everywhere except inside the letters, which is a nice look in its own right.

The matte track is hidden by default, so you see only the result: footage in the shape of your words over whatever is below. If you need to see the matte itself while adjusting it, the 'show the matte' effect displays it.

Choosing the footage

Busy, colourful footage reads well through letters: city lights, waves, fire, crowds, a sky full of clouds. Slow movement is easier to follow than fast cuts. Plain footage tends to vanish inside the letters, and very dark clips can leave the word hard to read.

Move and scale the video so its most interesting part sits behind the letters. You can keyframe its position too, so the scene slowly drifts behind the word, which gives a subtle sense of depth.

Adding the finishing touches

Put a background below, on a lower track: a solid colour, a blurred copy of the same footage, or a different clip altogether. A blurred copy is especially effective, as it ties the letters to the rest of the frame.

Animate the title for an entrance. Title animations include fade, slide, pop, zoom, blur and others, and because the matte is the title itself, the video follows it, appearing letter by letter or sliding in with the word. A shadow or glow effect on a duplicate of the title, placed below, can lift the letters off the background.

Using shapes and logos instead

Anything with transparency can be a matte. Shapes from the Graphics menu, such as an ellipse, a star or a heart, make good frames for video. A logo saved as a PNG with a transparent background works the same way as the text did. Imported SVG graphics can be placed as shapes too.

Once you're happy, export with Ctrl+E as normal. The matte is rendered into the picture, so the effect looks the same wherever the video is played.