Top 10 Rules of Video Editing
What Are the Rules of Video Editing?
There are many rules for video editing, but we've reduced it to the top 10 that every video editor must follow.
Match the Scene
The beauty of the montage is that you can take pictures taken out of sequence or at different times, and cut them together so that they appear as a continuous scene. To do this, however, the elements of the plans must match. For example, a subject who leaves the frame on the right must enter the next shooting frame on the left. Otherwise, it seems that they have turned around and are walking the other way. Or, if the subject is holding something at once, do not cut it directly empty-handed. If you do not have the right plans to make corresponding changes, insert a roller b in between.
Cut on Motion
This means that when moving from one clip to another, you, as an editor, should always try to cut motion in the foreground. This makes the scene much more fluid. Imagine the difference between moving from a stationary train to an opening train door and moving from a moving train to an opening train door. The latter was much more fluid.
B-Roll
Suppose you cannot match the scene or your images become unstable. This is when entering a b-roll is very useful. Always try to place a b-roll between the planes that jump or do not correspond to the scene in order to minimize the effects of shaking on the audience. B-roll is also useful when breaking a long, non-dynamic scene.
Motivate your Shots
Make sure that each assembly and each cut has a reason to change. You should always have a reason to switch from one angle of the camera or the other to another. In a perfect world, this motivation will always be to improve the production's narrative capacity.
Don't Jump
A skip cut occurs when you have two consecutive shots with exactly the same camera configuration, but a different subject. This happens most often when editing interviews, and you want to delete certain words or phrases that the subject says.
If you leave the remaining photos side by side, the audience will be overwhelmed by the subject's slight repositioning. Instead, cover the cup with a roller b or use a fade.
45 Degrees
When editing a scene taken from multiple camera angles, always try to use photos that look at the subject at least 45 degrees apart. Otherwise, the shots are too similar and almost look like a jump cut for the audience.
Change Focal Lengths
Changing the focal length of your photos is useful when you are photographing the same subject for long periods of time: such as at a wedding or an interview. If you have close-ups and wide shots, you, as an editor, can avoid skips and confuse some shots or shorten the images without this being visible.
Wipe
At weddings, I love it when people walk in front of the camera. They are sorry, but unless it happened during the vows or the first dance, I am grateful for the wipe they gave me to use during the editing.
When the frame fills with an element (like the back of a black suit jacket), it's easy to cut out a completely different scene without hitting the audience. You can adjust the wipes yourself during filming, or just enjoy them when they occur naturally.
Cut on Similar Elements
Apocalypse Now has grown from a rotating ceiling fan to a helicopter. The scenes change radically, but the visually similar elements allow a fluid and creative cut.
You can do the same in your videos. Cut a flower from a groom's wedding cake, or bow to the blue sky in one scene and then descend from the sky to another scene.
Stay on 1 Plane
Draw a line where your subject is located. Imagine that it is the X-axis on a coordinate plane. You never want to cross this X-axis because it would disturb the natural perspective of the audience.
