GMC:er Posts: 25.297
Joined: 23-December 09
From: Atlanta, Georgia, USA
1.)MULTIPLE TAKES Make sure you get multiple takes of whatever your shooting. If you just get one take, anything can be wrong with it and you won’t know until you go through the footage. So always try to get multiple takes of important shots and then you can have some options on which take or which parts of the take to use. Also, get some “Establishing” or Wide Shots. Just a wide shot that shows the place you are recording. If it’s your home studio, try to take a wide shot of you in the space. If you don’t get wide shots, you can still edit with your takes. It just can come in handy in an edit some times. 2.)BACK UP YOUR FOOTAGE This sounds basic but most people don’t do it. Then, they don’t have a backup when something goes wrong, which is often can. A hard drive dies, footage file become corrupted, etc. etc. etc. Anything that can go wrong, often does go wrong. Making a backup of your footage is easier than ever. Just copy the folder with your footage to another drive. Any other drive. Drives are cheap. If you don’t have a spare drive. It’s worth getting one. Backups can save your project.
3.)EDIT SPACE Make sure you pick an edit space that will let you focus. Some place hopefully quiet where you can focus on the edit for a good amount of time. This is nearly impossible in some situations. Folks have families, kids, pets, etc. It can be very hard to find a quiet place to collect your thoughts and think about your edit. Try to locate a space that is just yours. Protect that space. 4.)ORGANIZING YOUR FILES Import and organize your files. Make sure you label the clips. Make sure you label the folders the clips are in. Taking the time to name your files and folders can save you huge time during the edit. If you are just doing one take videos, this is less of a problem. Once you start creating more advanced clips with more than one shot, one angle, etc. Organization is key. 5.)WATCH YOUR FOOTAGE Once you start making videos that have more than one shot, you will need to actually watch the footage before you start to edit. This will get you familiar with the footage you have so that you can start planning your edit.
6.)STARTING TO EDIT Mark the best takes (rename them or flag/tag them in your software) and do a “string out” or put them in order in your timeline. This will give you your first “Rough cut” that you can watch to start seeing what you actually have to work with.
7.)FINE CUTTING Once you have the clips in the timeline, start to trim them down. Always “Cut on action” if possible. Don’t leave too much dead time between edits or the video will feel boring. Keep things moving visually. If you are talking in your new creation, edit out any “um”, “ah” etc. as this sound very un pro and makes your vid look bad. You’ll find lots of these at first when you start talking on camera. If you have never talked on camera, you’ll see when you try it.
8.)WATCH ON REPEAT Watch your creation over and over to make sure you have something that works visually. Also, watch for any dead spots, or mistakes, or UM or AH, or silence, etc. These things are easy to miss. Also, have someone else watch it and get some feedback from a pair of fresh eyes. 9.)BUILDING UP YOUR EDIT Add in some “B Roll” (Extra shots/footage) and add a title card at the start. This lets people know what the video is about. You can use titles throughout the vid if needed. You can also put in a “hit subscribe” bit. 10.)WORKING WITH SOUND Folks can take bad lighting, but they HATE bad sound. If you are recording your voice, make sure it’s not distorting. Also, if you are adding music, or even playing, make sure the levels never distort.
11.)MIXING YOUR SOUND Once you have all of your sound working, turn off the video and just listen to the mix. Are any parts too loud or too soft? Think of it as a mix for a song. Each element should be balanced. You should NEVER hit the red line. 12.)COLOR CORRECTION Every decent Video Editing program will offer some type of color correction. If your package doesn’t allow color correction it’s time to upgrade. ADOBE PREMIERE is a great option and it runs about twenty bucks a month on the adobe plan. This is better than the several hundred bucks it used to cost. It has power color correction tools with great presets. Make use of them. Your footage will be raw and probably needs some color tweaks. The level of production on youtube these days has gotten really good. Follow these steps and make your videos great
This video was very helpful in making this article.
