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General Editing Techniques

we're going right into editing. We're gonna go through butter stuff like editing music, sound sound effects and, like, all this stuff is obviously gonna be quick and dirty. We're just gonna quick and dirty. You know what I'm talking about? We're gonna go through it quickly. Obviously, we're not refining things. There's, like, this rule of thumb that every minute Ah, film that you're cutting is about an hour's worth of work. And I find that that's depending on what I'm cutting. Sometimes for cutting. Was that just not have save us on the corner? My good job, Adobe. Good job. Eso. We're gonna be going through this very, very quick. So we're just looking at the general principles were not gonna make Citizen Kane today way. Yeah, It's like e harmony up in here, man. Welcome, Bill. I'm sorry. Bill's wife. All right, So here's a sketch. I'm an idiot. Eso Here's a sketch we did for film Riot. This is I just grabbed the clips that we did. You so taken out all the outtakes and everything like t...

hat and putting a lot of lead room on a lot of it and you'll see a lot of edits online, actually looking like this, Waymo. My God. Sir, we found the explosive device real slow. We're just gonna put it on the way. We found the explosive device. So there's all the clips that wasn't part of the problem. And on their own, you stay calm and still even still, even in ill timed foot could set this baby off. Good old me and my highbrow humor. I'm so mature. We got a little snap going on in here like we talked about emphasized the gravity of the situation. But all right, let's let's do some cutting. So, Waymo. Oh, my God, This thing's legit. Say letter. Say legit. Gonna cut that down. We're gonna cut to our first bomb shopping that in. Oh, my God, This is legit, actually, like that line better, and I'm just I'm going frame by frame finding when she first starts talking, I'm gonna bring it right to there, and we're gonna do this really sloppy. Uh, bring that in thinking so we can hear the difference between the two takes here. Stinks legit. Legit, Like the 2nd 1 is so much better. A lot more economy and energy in it. Yeah, This is legit. This thing's legit. Sure. We found the explosive device. Looks like Josh has sneezed. That's most fun. Part about editing is finding all those little gems. Also, this I can't not do that every time I'm editing. Sure. We found the explosive device. We're gonna start with his head whipping back and editing. It's so exciting is that wasn't part of the problem. So fast Pace, sir. And this goes along with what we're talking about with writing. She keeps calling him, sir, over and over and over again, which is done for comedic effect. Prefer hopefully. Anyway, sir, I'm going to stay calm and still still even in so intense. All right, so here we have a situation where we have the hand going on even in l time foot could set this baby off, but well built that in a second. So this is what all normally get from edits from people. Waymo. Oh, my God. This thing we should probably have that track on. What? You think she would do that? What she would do that track on. So I'm on guard. Waymo. Oh, my God. This is legit. Sure. We found the explosive device. That wasn't part of the problem, sir. I'm going to stay calm and still even in l time foot could set this baby off. Feeling super slow to May 1 person says something that another says something that so let's make this a little quicker. Waymo My Yeah, Okay, so I want to talk about this thing. So they're talking about whammo. What are they saying? Let's get to that. Let's get in there when he's saying, Yeah, she's coming in a little too late. Oh, my God. So I want him to overlap. So we're talking, We're overlapping. That's how we do it. We don't want overlap too much. So I'm always overlapping a little bit, making things sound really fast and something like this. The more Ping pong and we're doing, the faster we're making it, the quicker we're getting the comedy out. Moving on more. I'm having a laugh. Move on and entertain your last move on and entertain you. And even if I'm not hitting you with big laughs, if you're not thinking, that's very funny, at least you're probably going to be entertained. You're not laughing out loud. You're still entertained by God. Yeah, I'm gonna bring her in right at the end of his, I got legit. Legit? Sure. We found the explosive device explosive device that was in this instance. I'm gonna jump over to my other actor, and this is kind of like doing jnl cutting. I'm a lazy editor, so I don't do much jnl cutting, But if you want to, you can hold down all grab a part of your clip, and you won't affect both of them. You're just gonna affect either the audio, the video if you just grab and drag it. That's what's gonna happen if you want to do actual jnl cutting, you could hold all, grab your video file and move that back. This guy right here is gonna be, uh, wow, l and J. Okay, this is gonna be an l cut, right, because it looks like an L, obviously. And on the opposite end, that's going to be J cut. So when you hear J and L cutting all the time, that's all it is. You're just creating the shape of an L shape of a day to create this sort of overlap with the audio and video. I do that in the end just by what I have my tracks tracking, dropping it down that I have one track and then I'm not doing extra button pushes. I find that I just had it much, much faster when I do it this way. Explosive device. That wasn't part of the problem. So I'm cutting to him while I'm still hearing Josh talking. So he can We're still keeping up the pace because we're having a movement of him turning to look back. So instead of cutting to him first and then saying it was not hearing anything, we're using some of Josh's overlap. So we still have something to take us into this. And this is talking about pacing when you hear, when you hear people talking about pacing and I talk about pacing on the show all the way, the pacing is too slow. This is exactly what pacing is. We're finding the pacing of the piece. This is very fast paced. We're moving very fast. Look, the explosive device That wasn't part of the problem, sir. Well, sir, prob I'm going to stay calm and even in hell have been annulled. Time, foot! And then we've corrected the issue of Ah, now we're all hearing it right. Have been in l time foot. Fuck Could set this baby. So we're correcting the issue of the hand that we had before We had a little continent continuity issue with the hand up. Now we've corrected it. And now let's play back. Same scene just trimmed up. Waymo My We found the explosive device that wasn't part of the problem. I'm going to stay calm. And Stephen Anel time foot could set this baby off. Okay, so that's basic pacing with editing. Obviously you're not always going to do that. Sometimes you want to pace it, pace it out like some of the stuff we shot today. You would definitely pace out which, actually, why don't we just cut that real quick? There's gonna be no sound whatsoever. So it's not really gonna work out. Super great. Uh, let's give it a shot. I wouldn't mind it. Of Stewie. Yeah, working on that novel, working on that for three years. My God, Josh. So heroic. So much intrigue. Just because that's why because I have the power, I will never be invited back. Okay? You're mad immediately. All right, so something like this is gonna be a little bit slower paced, gonna start her in motion so it doesn't clearly look like she's just being called over. There is a good example for brand new editors. He looks over without the look over. That's weird. We never saw him look over at super weird. I see stuff like that a lot. A lot of you guys have been editing, so that's a no brainer for you. But for people who are just starting out with editing, you need to think in those terms of the audience hasn't seen. It hasn't really happened yet. You could be sound to do that movement in the frame that we're not looking at, what you could do it in different ways. But you got to make sure you indicate in some way that that action is happening. I came just all sudden looking at her, and it doesn't have to be much. He could even be in mid motion of doing it, and it will work fine as long as we're catching the tail end of that motion. So we know what's happening, man, it's so much fun to watch someone at it. Josh, what are you thinking? Right there? Waffles. Really thinking in some? All you hate waffles, Love waffles. You don't know me or my back. My past, my waffle background past. What did waffles do? Teoh Mari. So are you using? Are you selecting different clips? Are you rippling the cut points to try to find a better place for them to connect? I'm just trimming the cut points in and out. So we got this clip right here, for instance of Josh, right? And say we started too soon. I'm not moving. I'm not doing like a role sort of situation. I'm not moving that clip in time. It's saying exactly what it is. I'm just trimming the edges in and out. You can get into the role in the rippling all that. I don't do much of that on the lazy editor, but we have it here and usually would do it up here. That's just an easy way to show you guys. And I'll just trim to where I wanted to be a woman, maybe right before he moves right there And don't move it back. Pretty simple. So something this slow paced at a little bit of music into it. There you go. Now you could see kind of what we're talking about, even about the switching, the power positions when it happens, that's a really terrible edit, but you get the point. Very questions on anything for move on. That's a general, just I mean, really, when I'm editing, the main things I'm thinking of is pacing. What is my seen? What is the pacing my scene wants to be? You won't always do that overlap sometimes a character saying something. We're looking at the other to say something of Adobe and the frog Frog says something would come to Josh just sits there for a second waits. What if we cut right to the What immediately loses all of that sense of humor, seeing Josh process that first, then say it is where that comedy is. So you got to know where the pacing in your scene is and then follow accordingly, and this one, it just happens to be super fast pace. But that is where I see the most issue is in the more fast paced scenes that throw people off. Did you have a question? That's all? You kind of nervous? Yeah, I don't know if this is the right time to ask it, but it is around editing. I've heard a lot that you should. You should cut on the action, and that's a really good time. It's a fluid time to cut. When do you think there's an exception to that? And you shouldn't cut while there's some action in the shot? Always. I mean, it doesn't matter, so it depends if you're doing action. Ah, fight scene, then. Yeah. I mean, it's obviously if you have the more gorilla level, it's harder to cut on action, Really. Pro actors that have been doing this for a long time. We'll do the exact same move every time. So if I say hey, Sam. All right, next, take Hey, Sam. Every time I'm gonna do that every single time without fail every angle that we do it, I'm gonna do that every single time I take a sip on. I gotta go to the movies, you know? I mean, I do it every time. Where is more amateur actors aren't going to really keep that in mind. That's a lot to process and do so they're not going. So it's really hard if you're in a dialogue scene to cut on action like that continuity nightmare because he's not gonna do the same motion every single time. And even pro actors once they get into it sometimes if you're doing a multi cam shoot, then, yeah, go crazy. And if I'm grabbing a cup and I cut on that action, then, yeah, that's gonna be a lot more fluid. Or if I have somebody getting into a car, for instance, this would be a scenario where you would definitely want to cut on action where I walk up to the car opened the door of the car as the car doors opening. We're outside. We cut inside. Why the car door? Still opening that cut is going to be 10 times more fluid that if you cut between action. So it depends on what you're talking about. If you're talking about an action scene or someone just moving from Point A to point B, or if you're trying to connect scenes like we showed you and tell when you go to the one door, which is a bathroom, and it leads into a bedroom by cutting on that action midway through the door. You're connecting those two things perfectly and become seamless and helps sell the effect. So just like with everything else, it really depends on what you're talking about. So don't get set to anyone rule. Whenever anyone says you have to do this exactly every single time. Never listen to them again because then we would never have a Tarantino. Dude throws almost every rule out, and he's a genius. So but any other questions On day one, you talked about how you kind of for lack of a better term set the mood for writing. Is there kind of the same kind of mindset you want to get into when you're editing? Yeah, absolutely. I'm cutting. To which we're gonna show in a few tabs right there. 10 needs to clear that. We're gonna talk about using temp music while you at it. Not everybody doesn't. Some people hate it. I love it. I always use temp music to my composers dismay, but I'm using that tone toe. Help me edit my piece, and it helps you refine the edit as you go is well and not get discouraged on what did I shoot? Because usually your first draft. You're kind of punching yourself in the face thing. What did I do? I will never work again. But, yeah, I use pretty. But usually the exact same music that I wrote to is what ends up becoming My temp score tells a great example that the entire temp score with music I wrote to proximity was the opposite. It was almost like polar opposite music that I edited to that I listen to what I was while I was writing anything else. Poor move on, editing wise There's some questions coming in. Do you wanna take a couple right now? Let's go to paying 100. Wanted to know. Are there any benefits to working with eight book eight bit footage in a 32 bit? It's kind of what we were saying on the first day. Five doesn't give you six eso If you're a pit and you go up the 32 bit, just have a bit in 32 bit, so it's not really doing anything for you. Okay, Aravind wanted to know. How do you cover for continuity? Errors during editing you can trim in the coverage is really gonna help you with that. So if you have over the shoulder. This has killed me so many times. And the character does something, which is what we're talking about about cutting on action. But then in the other shot, they're not doing it. And I want to cut on the specific point because of the emotion of the scene of the pacing of the scene. And I can't I have to hold that until he stops doing the thing. So I can then So the continuity of this scene could have suffered if the hand wasn't put where it was. Since we had to do the hand at the exact moment that I knew I was going to cut it, it worked out nicely. If she would have done it second later, the continuity of that pacing wouldn't have worked, and we would have had to slow it down or speed it up a little bit. But getting singles or even digitally punching in, which we're gonna show a bit later will help get rid of some of that stuff.