Saturday, March 9

How to Become a Professional Video Creator?

Professional Video Creator

What Does a Video Editor Even Do?

As the title might suggest, you make/edit videos. The job has creative liberties, is fulfilling, and has handsome pay for it. You will be joining together segments of video footage, audio footage, graphics, music, sound effects, and other work in post-production, using specialized computer software, to create the final product. It’s vital to all types of video production, from films and TV to Youtube and passion projects. Professional Video editing, however, is a completely different dimension. It will usually require quadruple the amount of work needed as well as larger attention to detail.

Skills & Qualifications Required

A video editor must have proficiency in software tools on the technical side, but they also have to be a creative person in order to be able to even begin with. You have to have a clear picture in mind of what you want to do, and then use the software at your disposal in order to materialize it.

Talking about the skills, the first thing that shows up and is crucially important is “creativity”. Doing things differently and in a better way than others will make you outstanding.

The second factor is the presentation. before doing anything, how will you present yourself as a video editor? How are you going to persuade them to work with you? To have it passed, get some free clients and give them your best freely to make a resume for your business. A great and complete resume can easily make love your job.

The third factor that is worth being mentioned is “planning“. You should have a good plan for what you are going to do. Ask the director to tell you what he wants to have and then, draw a plan for yourself to let you easily succeed and satisfy your clients.

You have to pay attention to detail, a keen eye is needed to spot little inconsistencies on the footage and edit it in order to make it less of an eye-sore or just get rid of it entirely. Having a strong work ethic while remaining focused for extended periods of time is vital for a successful video editor, as it differs a lot from the usual artistic job, as you simply won’t be able to work at your own pace when you find inspiration, but work around timings and constantly be up-to-date with the industry.

Professional editors use professional devices too. Editing a video is sometimes hard and really boring, but by doing some basic tips you can even handle bigger projects. To start doing it, you should know the most-liked applications that video editors use.

Adobe Premiere Rush, iMovie, and the inShot app are commonly used by editors. If you do not know how to work with them, just go to YouTube and search “how to work with iMovie?”. There are hundreds of tutorials that are suitable for beginners and also professionals.

Constantly talking with the director, production staff, and other people to make sure that everything runs smoothly while everyone remaining on the same page requires communication skills. It is your job to make the directors’ vision a reality. After all, you need to be able to articulate what creative liberties you would want to implement in order to make the product better.

There are no clear qualifications needed to become a video editor. Sure, a Bachelor of Arts (BA), Bachelor of Science (BS), or Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) degree is nice, and will definitely propel you forward professionally, and open more windows, but at the end of the day, it’s not a necessity. Certificates for video engineering or from Avid and Adobe are usually going to propel you forwards as well. But the overwhelming majority of video editors don’t have any specialized degree of any sort, this means that you will largely progress in your career via hard work, networking, and a strong work ethic.

Also, read Ways to Download Any Video Off the Internet

Starting Out

One word… Experience. Experience is the key to climbing, get experience, no matter how big or small, start out somewhere. Don’t be afraid to show off passion projects if you don’t have any paid experience. Sometimes even starting out doing work for free can be worthwhile, purely so that you have something to show. If you get an offer to work at a charity event, definitely take it, as it gives you a peek into the video editing world and allows you to meet new people (and potentially new clients).

Usual Career Options

There is no path that will circumvent the need of being creative and being able to materialize it properly, you will need to master both in any category in the editing business. The most notable options are:

  • Independent filmmaker
  • Youtuber or independent entertainer
  • Freelance video editor
  • Commercial film editor

Do keep in mind that if you want to hit it big and be a film editor in the movie industry you will most likely need a degree of some sort, as well as further specialization. Although on entrance you will be moving around a lot until you find your niche.

Going professional

Now, this is where a bigger issue comes, mental endurance. Are you prepared to receive 1 yes on every 100 no’s? If not, then stick to doing video editing part-time or as a hobby. It’s a merciless business, one for which you have to grind your way to even get a chance at becoming a pro. This is especially true for film editing. Don’t expect Steven Spielberg to call you for his new movie after a month. You will be working on small projects for a while, building your résumé. You can pick up a piece of useful information or two from seeing how some professional video production companies do their work. And after some time has passed, perhaps you will get noticed, but more often than not, you will have to network in order to get an opportunity in the first place. If after all of this your spirit remains strong and your confidence unshaken then you should go and give professional video editing a shot, good luck!

 

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