Video editing can be intimidating. But as a beginner, it’s essential to realize that the goal is to add content, not to remove content.
Use transitions to connect your clips and create a polished, professional look. This can be as simple as a direct cut or more complex effects like dissolves.
Planning
Video editing is essential for up-and-coming content creators, social media marketers, and small businesses. Composing raw footage for a finished video requires art, precision, and communication. The right video editing software makes creating impactful, professional-looking videos easy.
Whether you are using professional-grade software or the free iMovie app on your Mac, practice and experiment to learn the tools of the trade, you can also get feedback from other videographers and filmmakers to improve your skills.
Once you have the footage, organizing it and planning your edit are essential. Organizing clips by scene, adding clip names, and creating bins helps you find the right one quickly when needed. This can save you a lot of editing time and avoid costly mistakes.
Another helpful tool is a color correction or LUT (Look Up Table) tool, which can help you correct your colors and make them look natural. Another useful feature is motion tracking, which lets you track an object in a video and then apply effects or text.
Lastly, a tool like Dropbox Replay can boost your reviews and polish your videos faster. It offers on-screen markups and frame-accurate annotations, making it easy for reviewers to comment and provide suggestions.
Shooting
Video editing is the process of arranging video shots to tell your story. The first step is to gather all your raw footage and organize it by creating folders for each clip type or where they belong in the edit. Having a clear vision for your project will help you structure and arrange clips efficiently. Creating a shot list and a script that details each scene’s visual and audio elements is also helpful.
The next step is to edit and add effects. The most common video editing techniques include cutting (instantly replacing one clip with another), dissolves (two clips overlap in time for a few frames), and fades. These simple effects can make your edit more visually appealing and help maintain the flow between scenes.
Other standard video editing techniques include audio cleanup, color correction and grading, visual effects, and motion graphics. Audio cleanup includes adjusting the audio level and removing background noise. Video effects complement the footage and may include overlays, blurring, enhancing contrast, and brightness. Visual effects, also known as VFX, are used to add special features that would be impossible or impractical to capture on film. This could include things like spaceships flying or CGI explosions.
Many video editing programs have advanced features that can streamline the editing process and increase efficiency. AI technology, such as Descript’s speech-to-text capabilities, can convert audio into text and eliminate the need for manual transcription and editing of spoken content. Additionally, cloud-based editing allows editors to work on projects from anywhere with an internet connection using video proxies, which are lower-resolution copies of the source material.
Editing
During this video editing phase, editors ingest, transcode, and create proxy files for all the footage to make it easy to find when needed. Then they start organizing the raw clips into bins and labeling each with a name to make them easier to find when editing a particular scene. They also read over the voiceover and make any required edits for clarity. This is often when editors will sift through the entire shoot looking for the best footage for the video.
This is the stage where the editor assembles the footage into a sequence and adds effects like transitions, music, and text graphics. They also work on the pacing of the scenes by adding pauses, title animation, dummy narration, and more to help build a narrative. This is also when editors fine-tune the audio quality by reducing background noise and enhancing sound effects to help immerse viewers in the story.
After they’ve finished assembling the sequence and are happy with its timing (known as picture lock), editors will then make a master file of the final product that will be used for several finishing steps, all of which require the clips to synchronize perfectly. They will then export or render the final video for specific devices and upload it to a server to easily embed it on websites or social media.
Finishing
The finishing phase involves arranging all the raw footage into a coherent story. This is generally the first time you’ll see whether the shot sequence your team planned during pre-production works in reality. It’s also when you’ll identify the gems from your clip heap—the shots that contain irreplaceable production values and storytelling elements. You’ll also trim out clapperboard, director-yelling takes, and any unusable or unwanted sections of the shoot.
This is where you’ll apply color corrections, other effects to give your video a unique look and feel, and text graphics for logos and call-to-actions. It’s where you’ll hone the edit to its final length, considering audience attention spans and genre expectations. And it’s where you’ll re-sync the audio with your edited video to ensure everything sounds great together.
Once you’re happy with your work, it’s time to deliver the video files. Depending on the platform and client requirements, these can be delivered as high-resolution ProRes 422 or H. 264 files for broadcast or web, or lower resolution proxies for online video platforms and mobile devices. You’ll also prepare the video for a Conform—the process of recreating your edit using high-quality source media. In the world of digital post, you’ll probably want to use a tool like MASV for accelerated media transfer to speed up your workflow.
