The best mouse for music production and audio editing is the mouse that works for you. This applies to trackballs and trackpads as well, which could be just as useful in a studio environment. In our rundown, we’ll take a look at which one of these mice will be right for you.
You may not spend a lot of time thinking about your mouse. But if you’re an editor or a graphic designer, maybe you should.
Most of the time, all that we ever expect a mouse to do is click and scroll. Of course, there are plenty out there that have expanded functionality and mappable buttons, but I’ve found a mouse that I think is truly special. The Logitech Triathlon M720 is a mouse that has a truly impressive eight mappable buttons.
You can assign each of the mappable buttons to any keyboard shortcut in your software of choice. This is obviously a really great tool when you find yourself hitting a certain key combination over and over while you work.
The only limitation to this mouse is how crafty you can be with the button mapping that you select. As a result, I keep finding myself trying out different combinations to figure out which set is the most efficient for whichever application I’m using.
Perhaps my favorite part is that, using the Logitech Options app, you can map these buttons in different configurations for different programs. For instance, if I’m hopping back and forth between After Effects and Premiere Pro, the app will recognize which program I’m using and switch the button mapping to match.
Gestures
This particular mouse has a unique feature that I don’t believe I’ve seen elsewhere. You can set parameters for four different gestures. By holding down the “gesture button” and moving the mouse up, down, left, or right, you can execute a keyboard shortcut command.
While this does take some getting used to, I found settings pretty quickly that felt very intuitive.
For instance, holding down the gesture button and swiping to the right could select the clip next to the playhead. I decided to set the down-swipe gesture as the delete key. You could even set the up swipe gesture to make a cut at the playhead’s location, allowing me to swipe up to make a cut, swipe right to select the unnecessary footage, and then swipe down to delete it.
Before long, I was editing without touching the keyboard.
The App
The Logitech Options app is the perfect complement to an already-impressive mouse. It’s very intuitive, and it’s easy to find what you need.
Any changes that you make are immediate, which makes it easy to try different options. In the app, you’ll find a selection of stock commands like “hide all windows,” “escape window,” “minimize,” However, if you find the “Keystroke Assignment” button, this is where you can assign your own keyboard shortcut of choice.
The app is also where you can access the gesture controls.
Finding Keyboard Shortcuts To Use In Premiere
If you edit in Premiere specifically, you’ll be surprised at the number of different options for keyboard shortcuts.
In Premiere, there is a whole keyboard shortcut menu that shows you what is already mapped — and which actions you can also map. This is where you can truly spend a lot of time tinkering with this mouse. For instance, you can set one of the buttons to color code your selected clip. This way you can quickly go through a timeline and color code your selects.
Or, if you do a good amount of multicam editing, you could set one key to cut to your A-cam and another to cut to your B-cam.
You’ll be surprised at how many options you have.
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