#1 Tip For Fast Video Editing
Feeling frozen.
Complete overwhelm.
How many times have you sat down to edit after your shoots and you load up all your footage, audio, interviews and feel a bit frozen?
I remember those times. I’d stare at the screen and that crazy amount of content with no idea how to start.. it was just overwhelming.
Eventually I’d just start somewhere and then maybe an hour into it I’d change my mind and start over in a different direction. But that was a horrible feeling- especially as someone who hates wasting time and wants to feel productive.
THAT’S ALL CHANGED!! HALLELUJAH
And I’d love to let you in on my secret that now helps me edit SUPER FAST.
HERE’S THE TIP:
ORGANIZE BY PLOT POINTS FOR FAST EDITING
1-START WITH THE MAIN CONTENT
This could be your main interview, or your main voiceover, or whatever piece of content that’s going to drive the story. You want to start with the meat of the story; you’ll add in all the fillers later (like effects, b-roll, text, music, etc.)
2-CUT & COLOR-LABEL BY PLOT POINTS
Grab your story structure with all your plot points, and assign a certain color to each. (I use the colors that are available in Premiere. Right-click a clip and label>choose color)
! HOT TIP: You need to have a story structure to begin with! This is something I teach in my coaching and have a step by step process and formula that you can apply to every story production. Learn more here.
For example, I have these plot points: HOOK, CONFLICT, INITIATION, JOURNEY, RESOLUTION, PUNCH
For any content that relates to my HOOK, I will label those clips as a “lavender” in Premiere.
CONFLICT will be “cerulean”, INITIATION will be “rose”, and so on… (I write all these down on a sticky note or somewhere for reference.)
So I start cutting and since I know my story structure really well, I start color-labeling those clips as they relate to a certain plot point. If it doesn’t relate to my story structure at all, I leave it the same color.
The full interview with clips color-labeled by plot point.
Once all the clips are color-labeled, I will re-order them so they follow the story-structure. (Since most interviews jump all over the place.)
I’ll also delete any of the clips that don’t have a color-label and didn’t relate to my plot structure.
Once I’ve cut and labeled the full interview, I delete the content that doesn’t apply and reorganize by color and story structure order.
After that it gets really easy because you have all your plot points covered and in order, you just have to start cutting stuff down- things that aren’t relevant or repetitive, etc.
EASY PEASY!
Final timeline.
It looks more complicated than it is because once you have your interview (or main content piece) edited by plot points, you just start adding layers. (B-roll, sound effects, music, text, color grades, overall effects and that’s it!)
Again, this all relates back to having a clear story structure to begin with- it’ll help you as you shoot, interview, and now EDIT! 🙌🏼