Video editing has become one of the most valuable skills to learn and earn from.
Every person marking his online presence uses videos these days. Business
owners, youtubers, influencers, and marketers are on the hunt for professional
video editors. Every skilled video editor was once a beginner. To become a pro, one
must master the basic things that every new video editor needs to know.
Since video content is on every social media platform. Learning how to edit, open
many doors of opportunities. So, here you can discover some beginner friendly video
editing tips, tools, and techniques to master.
1. Choosing the Right Tool
It is always fun learning new software. As a beginner video editor start with some
very basic and simple tools. Gain hands on experience while creating scroll stopping
videos. There are many free software that offer professional features as well. These
tools require patience and a whole lot of practice to get handy. After learning them
thoroughly move to some more complex and technical ones.
2. Concentrating on Editing Workflow
Every video editor needs a workflow to follow along. When in beginner stage you
need to get your checklist updated. You can start with planning the video which may
include creating story and getting to know the target audience.
Here is the order that can be followed as a new video editor. You can easily manage
your workflow by importing clips, trim and cut, arranging clips, adding transitions,
adjusting colors, editing audio, adding music, inserting text to video, then finally
exporting video in the desired format.
3. Mistakes to Avoid
For any new video editor avoiding mistakes is equally important as mastering the
beginner friendly tools, techniques, and tips. To the newbies, video editing seems
technical to many. However, it is all about creating and selling stories through videos.
It is more about your creativity than technical competence.
Although mistakes are common for beginners, however knowing what to avoid is
important. Starting simple is key to your very first professional video editing
project.
Common mistakes to avoid are more likely about, using too many transitions or
flashy colors, having poor audio quality, using wrong video size, or aspect ratio,
quitting without saving the project, exporting video in bad quality.
Avoiding such mistakes can save you a lot of time.
4. Some Tips to Edit Videos Faster
Some quick tips can help you save a lot of time while editing. With small
improvements you can edit at a faster pace, hence increasing the productivity of a
video editor.
Save your time by using keyboard shortcuts, assembling all the raw data files in an
organized manner, previewing the previously edited sections more often all while
keeping your workstation aesthetic and pleasant to be at.
5. Editing and Storytelling
The most important factor in video editing postproduction is story telling, creating
emotions, and selling through meaning. Your edits must follow the rhythm of your
message. Know that the viewer does not know what to do. You are the one
compelling him to make a decision.
6. Keep Improving as a Beginner Editor
Like any other skill professional video editing also requires a lot of practice.
Consistency is the key irrespective of the nature of the project. Keep evolving your
editing. Be always open to trying new ideas, styles, software, tools, and techniques.
All you have to do is practice daily, watch the relevant tutorials, seek feedback even
from your closest friend, experiment regularly, keep an eye on other’s work to help
you get acquainted with new trends. Last but not the least, upgrade your tools
regularly.
7. Storage is Must Have
As a Professional video editors, you are going to have a diverse portfolio. Always
remember that drives run out of space very quickly when storing videos. Thus, have
enough space to store your final pieces of video editing data.
8. Using the Right Format
Using the right format means choosing the correct aspect ration while editing videos
during postproduction phase. In addition to this, exporting videos to right format is
important. Your video format dictates the format of your audio as well as the kind of
platform on which it is going to run. Most common video exporting formats include, .webm, .mp4, .flv, .wmv, and .mov. Most of the online platforms support these
formats. It is very crucial to know the right format before exporting the video to any
platform.
9. Branding your Videos
One color palette, one editing format, and one font at a time. Use this principle so
clients can know your unique way of editing videos. There are many consumers out
there who are definitely going to like your taste. They are going to be your repeat
buyers over time. Make sure what to create seems familiar to many.
10. Rules in Video Editing
Following rules in video editing makes your life easier. Here are three of them.
The 3-2-1 rule suggests that you should have at least 3 available copies of your data
stored on two different drives plus one of those drives should be offsite.
80-20 rules says that only 20 percent of your effort goes to capturing the data for
videos. The rest 80 percent should be dictated to video editing postproduction
phase.
The next one is 3 seconds rule that states, that viewers will decide if they are going
to watch the video or scroll down in first three seconds. Make those 3 seconds scroll
stopping.
Conclusion
Getting on from the stage of beginner to skilled Professional video editors is not a piece of cake.
It requires a lot of patience and practice. So, if you are a newbie to video editing
world take notes of above-mentioned tips and tricks.