The Boom Box Post blog provides insights into the creative sound design process of Boom Box Post's owners and employees.
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keyboard shortcuts
2025 is officially here! One of my New Year’s resolutions is to make a conscious effort to improve my speed and efficiency in my sound work. It’s easy to get stuck in your old ways, especially if you’ve been working with Pro Tools for quite a while. Since there are a million ways to achieve the same result, what better time than now to start exploring other techniques and form new habits in your workflow?
As the Assistant Sound Editor and Background Sound Editor at Boom Box Post, I am always looking out for Pro Tools shortcuts and quick keys to be a more efficient editor. Let’s review the basic Pro Tools shortcuts that you should know before jumping into your session.
Everyone knows that the key to becoming a quicker editor is learning and utilizing keyboard shortcuts, but Pro Tools is such a powerful piece of software that even the most seasoned editors or mixers might not know all the keyboard shortcuts that can help speed up their workflow. Hopefully after reading this blog. post you can walk away with at least one Pro Tools tip or trick you didn’t know before.
As Jeff mentioned in his blog post Top Ten Secret Pro Tools Shortcuts, learning Pro Tools shortcuts is a must for new sound editors if they want to be able to compete in our industry. Similarly, knowing the shortcuts to navigate through your OS quickly and efficiently is also really important. This is especially helpful to new editors trying to land their first sound job, as most of us come in at an assistant level, where a big part of the job is organizing files and multi-tasking among several projects. Learning basic navigational and organizational functions is a simple way to speed up your workflow and impress potential employers and clients.
The first piece of advice I give any new sound editor is to get Pro Tools and learn the keyboard shortcuts. Forget proficiency in typing, that's child's play. In order to compete in the real world of post production sound, you need to be FAST. Knowing your way around the keyboard doesn't just shorten your workday, it tells the clients - who expect requests to be carried out quickly - that you are on top of your game.
Basic keyboard shortcuts - switching the tools, changing the view - need to be second nature. But with literally hundreds to learn, there's bound to be a few that have slipped through the cracks. Here are some of the best 'lesser-known' Pro Tools keyboard shortcuts to help speed up your workflow.
