Search the Sound FX library and star the sounds you reuse

If you edit often, you reach for the same handful of sounds: a short whoosh for a cut, a hit for a title, a click for a button. The Sound FX library lists every bundled sound in one scroll, and it gives you two tools for finding the ones you want fast: a search field and a star.

Open the library

Open the Sound FX tab in the left panel. At the top are two sub-tabs, Library and Generate. Library lists the bundled sounds. Generate is for making new ones from a description. DepCut remembers which sub-tab you used last, so the tab opens where you left it.

Each row in the library shows the same parts, from left to right:

• A square play button, labelled Play and then Pause.
• The sound's name, with a line underneath. The line shows the author when the source names one, then the sound's length.
• A star button, labelled Add to favorites.
• A round + button, labelled Add at the playhead.

Search by name

1. Click the Search sound FX field above the list.
2. Type a word from the name, such as impact, whoosh or shutter. Capital letters make no difference, and spaces at either end are ignored.
3. The list narrows to rows whose name contains your text.

Search looks at names only. A sound is findable by the words in its name, so try a few different words when the first one returns nothing. If nothing matches, the list says "No sound FX match that search."

Star the sounds you reuse

1. Press the play button on a row to audition it. Starting a second sound stops the first, so you hear one at a time.
2. When a sound is one you will use again, press its star. The star fills in, and the tooltip changes to Remove from favorites.
3. Clear the search field.

Starred sounds now sit at the top of the full list, ahead of the rest. Press a filled star to take a sound back out of your favorites.

Your stars are kept in this browser. Open DepCut in a different browser and you start with an empty list there.

Put a sound on the timeline

You have two ways to place a sound:

• Press + to add it at the playhead.
• Drag the row onto the timeline. The row's tooltip reads "Drag onto the timeline, or click + to add".

A clicked sound is stored in your project's media and lands on the soundtrack at the playhead. If another sound already occupies that spot, the new one slides to the next free slot, so sounds never stack on top of one another.

Build a habit around it

Spend one session auditioning the library with a few searches and starring what fits your style. A short list of favorites at the top turns a sound-design pass into a quick scan: set the playhead where the sound should land, press + on a starred sound, and move on.

After you add a sound, select it on the timeline. The right panel gives it Volume, Fade in, Fade out, Trim and Move tabs, so a favorite can sit lower in the mix when it needs to.

Build your shortlist

Open the Sound FX tab in DepCut, search for whoosh, and star the one you like best.