Adjustment Layer basics: Why doesn't changing ONE instance affect them ALL?

[Lee James]

Please forgive my ignorance - I've been using Adobe software for 25 years (particularly Photoshop), but I'm relatively new to Premiere Pro and still getting confused over the basics. I've just read a few Adobe articles but none of them address this basic issue...

So here's the issue... I wanted to color-correct a clip in my timeline so I made an Adjustment Layer over it (containing the relevant effects). I then decided to apply the same effects to several other clips, so I dragged copies of the Adjustment Layer over those clips. This worked fine!

However, later on, I made a slight change to one instance of the Adjustment Layer, but the change didn't affect the other instances!

So from what I can tell now, it seems like when you copy an Adjustment Layer on the timeline, you're creating completely new, independent Adjustment Layers? If that's the case, then…

1. Why don't these new copies get new names? ("copy 2" "copy 3" etc.)
2. Why don't these new copies appear in the project panel?
3. If the changes you make to an Adjustment Layer don't affect the original copy in the project panel, what's the point of having ANY Adjustment Layers sitting there in the project panel?
4. This is the key question I guess: How do you set up multiple instances of an Adjustment Layer, so that changing one affects them all?

[Warren Heaton · Accepted solution]

Apply the Effect at the Master level and it will always affect every use of the Adjustment Layer.

[Lee James]

Thank you both. This answers all my questions!

So when I make copies of an Adjustment Layer, they're not brand new Adjustment Layers, they really are instances of the same Adjustment Layer (as I expected them to be), and I really can make universal changes to them all - I just need to be sure to keep all my effects in the "master" tab.

Perfect!

The only thing which seems strange to me is that when you add effects to an Adjustment Layer, they're added to the instance by default, instead of to the master. I'd have thought most people would normally want all the effects to apply to the master, with instance effects being more of an advanced feature, or for fine-tuning.

In other words, the way it works seems kind of backwards to me. Surely, everyone starts out with a set of consistent effects applied to the master, then optionally makes adjustments to individual instances? If your starting point is different effects for each instance, you might as well be using different Adjustment Layers?

That's how I would imagine it, anyway. But I don't have any experience of actually using Premiere Pro so I could be wrong.

[Peru Bob]

Here is a tutorial about Master level:

Apply effects to all instances of a clip |

[Lee James]

Update: I have now posted a suggestion regarding this on Adobe's feature request site:

https://adobe-video.uservoice.com/forums/911233-premiere-pro/suggestions/37432840-effects-added-to-a...

Basically, I think that effects applied to Adjustment Layers should default to the master instead of the instance.

I would appreciate if anyone would like to take a look at my explanation and vote up if you agree - or not, if you don't!

[Lee James]

Update: I had marked this as "answered" but unfortunately I'm still having problems…

When I try to set my effects up at the Master level, I'm not able to, because the mask tools don't appear in the Master effects…

[MyerPj]

You probably discovered that if you drop the effect onto the adjustment layer in the PROJECT panel, it goes to the Master layer, so you can add an adjustment layer to your project, rename it say, Black and White, drop on the Black and White effect onto that adjustment layer in the project, and you are good to go as you want, without Adobe having to change the default way it works...

[Lee James]

Thanks, Myer, that's a neat tip. But my masking tools are still missing

[Lee James]

To spare confusion, I'm going to mark this thread as "answered" once again, and open as a new thread about the issue of missing masking buttons.

The new thread is here.