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.
