Video Editing - Know Where to Draw the Line

Several tips on how video editing should be done. Knowing where to draw the line in video editing is challenging for many people; these tips can help. (Courtesy of www.videocaddy.com)

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Editing is a crucial part in every type of video production. It is used to tell the story the way the director imagined it. However, many people tend to get caught up too much, thinking that they are actually making their video better by implementing unnecessary video edits.

Let’s go over a couple of things you should pay attention to while editing. It will help you stay in control and create a better video for everyone to see.

Take a break at the right time

We are all limited to a certain amount of focus and concentration. This resource is being spent while you are working on something, like video editing. Even though it might be a good idea to get the job done fast, it is not always possible to achieve this goal.

On many occasions, this leads to making the mistake of over cutting scenes or changing the look and feel of the video, a decision that you will absolutely hate later on when you take a look at the video.

Therefore, it is important to know when to make a break and recompose. This will make the whole process run smoothly, with greatly reduced chances of making an editing mistake.

Always make things look natural

There are plenty of good filmmaking cameras out there that capture RAW video footage. This gives you better control in post processing. But, keep in mind, like with images, doing too much editing can do more harm than good.

Unless you want to send a message with how a particular scene looks, it is best to make everything look as natural as possible. Otherwise, the video might not look appealing to people as it would ordinarily. Therefore, be careful with color correction and make the footage look natural.

Did you notice grain? It's time to stop

Grain is a good effect to add in some circumstances, but generally, it is a sign of lower video quality. Therefore, during the editing process, pay attention to how much grain you are going to have throughout the video. The lower, the better.

You should draw the color correction line when you notice a high color saturation or grain in darker parts of videos. Simply carry on with other editing tasks and forget about making changes that would make the grain even worse.

Find that cutting middle ground

This is a problem for many amateur filmmakers. During the filming process, you acquire a lot of useful footage that would fit greatly into the project you are working on. However, when you start editing, it is important to analyze and see what type of footage is actually useful for your story telling and what should be cut out. Just because you have a lot of footage does not mean that you should include it all. It can severely impede the flow of your story, making the video much less appealing.

Dedicate enough time and take into consideration how the length of every scene affects the story. Use some of the footage and once you are nearing completion, stop questioning whether you have made the right choice. Play the video and judge whether it achieves the goal you have initially planned. If it does, consider the work done and draw the line.

Steer away from transitions

Video editing software tools include an abundance of features. Usually, when newcomers are working on videos, they tend to be more focused on some features and effects than the story they are trying to tell. That is why you see some videos using different types of transitions to make a video unique.

Unfortunately, this is not always the right approach. There are situations when inserting transitions makes sense, however, in a majority of cases, it is best to use traditional approaches. Therefore, when you are doing editing the videos, put a higher focus on the video you are working on, and forget about the software features. It will make it easier for you to know when and where to draw the line.

Video editing is no simple task. However, the more time you spend doing it, the better you are going to become over time. Simply stay focused on improving your skills, and you will be able to more easily draw the line between a fine edited and over an edited piece of video footage. This will ensure better quality videos coming from your studio, and a bright future.