What do you do with your video after you shoot it? Do you watch the video back once or twice and then shoot over it, recycling your videotapes? Or, like most video hobbyists and amateur shooters, do you simply file the tape away and play it back whenever a suitable audience shows up at your house?
Some people edit just to get rid of bad video or boring video. Cutting out and removing video is a basic editing skill that anyone should be able to easily master. The next level of video editing is that instead of cutting out bad stuff, you are finding and assembling together highlights of the good scenes and images. This might require going through several different tapes, finding and capturing the best scenes, and then, assembling them together to create a “highlight reel” This can be the highlights of your ski trip, of your surf vacation to California, of you and your buddies flag football game.
Once you have mastered creating a “highlight” tape, the next step is where you truly begin telling a story. This is where you use your video editing program to change the sequence of scenes to create a new reality; to tell a story by cutting together various elements and scenes to make a unified production with a beginning, middle and end.
By the way, almost any video editing program is good to get started with. You don’t need to spend a lot of money on software, on fancy video editing products. Basic free programs like Microsoft MovieMaker and Apple iMovie are great packages that will enable you to effectively create wonderful looking productions and then burn them to a DVD, output them to tape or to the Internet.
Storyboard vs TimeLine
Some people get hung up on whether you should use a simple storyboard editing format or the more complex timeline format. It really doesn’t matter. Personally, I like to do a rough edit using a storyboard and then later add effects, transitions and titles using the timeline format.
The most wonderful aspect of using a modern video-editing program is its non-destructive, nonlinear capabilities. This means that you can cut apart scenes, trim and stretch them out, and move them all around, all without affecting the overall quality of the final output and the actual source or raw video.
When you edit with a modern day nonlinear editor, you are not really editing the video. You are editing a database with pointers to the video, audio and effects. The only video pixels that are actually being manipulated and changed, before you hit the final make movie command, is the creation of titles and rendered effects, dissolves and layers.
What this means is freedom for the editor to try alternatives; to look at new and innovative ways of cutting the movie together. After creating your first draft of a program, you can save it as version 1 and then go back and create alternative versions. And as all you are really doing is creating additional databases, you are not using up lots of memory space on your hard drive. The actual database of the edit decisions is quite compact.
Classic 3 step editing – wide shot, medium shot, close up.
This is the way most editors first learn to cut in film school. Many Hollywood and studio films follow this format; many TV movies and dramas follow this pattern. Each scene or episode begins with a wide shot to establish where we are and whom the actors are. The next scenes are medium shots, comprising maybe two or three actors doing their thing. Finally, to build drama and spotlight attention on the actors, the scene then progresses into a series of alternating close-ups of one actor then the other as they talk. One of the best ways to see this is on a daytime soap opera. Turn the sound off and just watch the cutting. They follow this pattern over and over again.
This is not just for dramas and fictional productions. You can construct a sport video this way, a wedding video. Begin with an establishing shot to show the viewer the location and what’s going on. before rolling into the action and the details.
Lets say you want to create a video to document your college roommate’s rock band performance. You could start with an exterior of the bar where they are going to perform, pan to a shot of the sign with the band’s name on it and then cut to a wide shot in front of the house as the band members load up the van with their amps and gear.
Then you could do a series of medium shots of them wrestling with equipment. Finally, you could have a series of close-ups of them discussing the show, who is on the guest list and what songs they will perform.
Using the classic three steps – wide shot, medium shot, close-up, is a safe way to build scenes and it works. However, once you have mastered this technique, you might want to try other ways of building the scene that are not so predictable.
Screen direction
Maintaining screen direction is essential if you don’t want to confuse your audience. If the action is going from right to left, all the shots in the scene should be going from right to the left. This is especially important when shooting sporting events, races, pursuits and chase sequences, any kind of action or movement scene where the viewer could easily get confused when watching.
A great example of this is a televised football game. Even in the SuperBowl, with many dozens of cameras, most are located on one side of the field. This way the direction of the action will always be consistent. When the red team does a running play, they are going from right to left. When the red team throws a pass down the field they are always going right to left. When the opposing blue team intercepts the ball, they are now going the other way, from left to right.
This is called preserving screen direction or not crossing the line. Imagine a line down the middle of scene. To make sure you don’t accidentally reverse screen direction, you want to keep all your camera set-ups on one side of the line.
The best way to avoid crossing the line, especially with complex scenes like fights and chases with lots of action is to actually draw out the scenes on a storyboard before shooting them. Make sure actor A is always facing towards the left and actor B, who is talking to actor A, is always facing toward the right.
For example, in our scene where the actor is loading up the van, make sure that the actor is moving in one direction. The house is on the right, the van is on the left. The actor needs to be consistently moving from left to right as he loads up.
You CAN cross the line by inserting a straight on shot. Have the actor either moving directly towards you or away from you. You could create a series of shots showing Josh the lead guitar playing lugging his amp and guitar from right to left. As he gets to the van, you now switch to a shot inside the van, so he is facing the camera head on as he lifts the map into the vehicle. Now, without being overly disconcerting, the editor has the freedom to switch screen directions if he needs to.
You also need to preserve screen direction during dialog scenes.
Lets say a couple of people on the band are having an argument about the song list before they leave. You start with an establishing shot that shows the two of them outside the van. Next we go into alternating two shots, a reverse angle, and over the shoulder shots as the argument gets more heated. And as the fight reaches a crescendo, we cut to close-ups of them interspersed with close-ups of the marked up song list.
Fixing Holes in Your Coverage
The best way to fix a scene with gaps is by using close-ups, reaction shots and cutaways. A close-up is usually part of an ongoing scene. As the editor cuts from the middle shots to faces, the faces would be close-ups. You can shoot full close-ups, medium close-ups and tight close-ups. Think back to the old Italian spaghetti westerns with their extraordinary close-ups of a mouth snarling, of a nose twitching, of an eye winking.
Another close-up could be a shot of the guitar player’s hand as he locks the van up or maybe a shot of the mom anxiously watching the band prepare to leave.
A reaction shot is usually a shot of someone who is not paramount in the scene but is in the room participating. For the roadie film, it can be the admiring kid watching the van load up. It could be the old lady across the street that thinks the band is too noisy and doesn’t like them. It could the mom of the band members who is hoping that they don’t get booed off the stage again. All of these are possible reaction shots that can spice up your movie as well as cover possible holes.
Finally cutaways. Cutaways are similar to reaction shots but usually are not a shot of a face. For example, while they are loading up the van, we see a close-up of the bald back tire with a nail sticking in it. Or, we could cutaway to inside the house were the band members are getting dressed.
However, if the director has not planned and shot these scenes, it is very difficult as an editor to fix it. Lets say that during the loading the van sequence that some shots are missing. What can you do?
Maybe you can steal scenes from other sequences during the movie. For example, while they are loading, you insert shots of the actual performance and create a foreshadowing effect. Another creative act that might work is to insert shots from an entirely different movie. During the loading shots, you could insert stock video shots of famous rock and roll bands. This might give the viewer an inside look of what the musician might be thinking as he loads up the gear of this unknown band. You never know what might work. Go crazy and experiment. You can always take it out.
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Cut on action
A good editing technique is to cut on action. This works for cutting within a scene as well as a transition to another scene. For example, in our rock and roll roadie flick, you could cut from a shot of the roadie throwing a case of extension cords to a shot of the cords landing in the back of the van. You don’t need to show the entire flight of the bag. Viewers are smart enough recognize the beginning throwing action and the ending landing action and to put them together with you having to show them everything.
In a fight sequence, you could see a punch being thrown and then cut to the reaction as the victim staggers from the punch. You don’t have to show it all. To smooth the cut, most editors will remove a few frames between action shots. Then again, you could add a few extra frames to create an overlap and sort of a staggered time echo effect. It might work.
You can also cut on action as a way of transitioning between scenes. For example, in our roadie flick, you could start a shot with the guitarist picking up his guitar’s cable. The next shot is a close up of the plug sliding into the guitar. Pull out to reveal he is on stage and ready to start playing in front of a crowd.
You can also use cutting on action as a way to transition between scenes.
You might remember the classic Kubrick film, “2001 A Space Odyssey” with its often-mimicked transition between the caveman throwing a bone into the air and a spaceship zooming through space.
In our short film for example, the roadie could throw the bag of cords from left to right. And as the bag flies through the air you could cut to a shot of the van traveling to the show, also going left to right.
You may have noticed that there are a couple common themes running through this article. The most important is that if the director has not shot the action or sequence, the editor can’t cut it. If you don’t have the coverage, the various angles, cutaways and close-ups, the editor is hard pressed to perform miracles.
This is why working as an editor can improve your skill as a director and cinematographer.
The second major lesson is that its good to learn the rules but is also OK to break them Sometimes crossing the line, adding in jump cuts and doing all kinds of strange stuff that shouldn’t work, actually works and looks pretty darn cool.
