Video Editing is HARD. (but doesn't have to be!)

Got a bit of a different one for you this week, wanted to really start to tackle the real problems I see creators having, and look to solve them in a real way. Back next week with another episode of nerd plays sonic and talks philosophy

As a professional editor I can tell you: 90% of editing is just the simple straight cut.

giving the video the edits it NEEDS not the edits you CAN DO is such a good take away and philosphy

I really really dislike those high speed high energy videos. Those that cut away natural pauses in vocals etc. I never manage tp watch them. It triggers my anger and makes me close it asap.

I've seen alot of people who don't edit their videos at all and just state their opinion or do something. It's interesting to watch even if there's no intro or cuts. I'd love to watch someone draw art for an hour even if it's not edited.

I realized that the best way to make a good video is to basically video edit less. Meaning, just get straight to the point, make it appealing enough for the audience, and have fun. Especially have fun because when you have fun, the energy is there in the editing process and the video becomes better.

As one of the 255K views on the big video, I remember listening to most of it while getting a project done - it was what you were saying (and the way you cut out the dead space) that kept me hooked. The gameplay was a nice human touch that made it feel like a friend was just chatting/ranting/encouraging me while playing video games. I think I cheered when you said “F that - art IS society.” Was one of the pivot points to get me to actually start posting again and sending things to my friends and family. So thank you! (Oh - and as a Premiere user who switched to Resolve last summer (and now uses both depending on the project) I totally second your Resolve recommendation. Especially since it’s free. Very free. Thanks for putting together that cheatsheet too!)

speaking as a long-time dungeon master the whole "it doesn't matter how complicated or how much work goes into a think only what the audience sees" is soooooooooo true

With my very limited video making experience, i always thought i was "taking shortcuts" by just trimming and adding BG music- And i tried to improve by adding all these bells and whistles and flashy visuals- And now i know that editing isn't about a meta. Your video "You should Be a Youtuber" completely changed my view on creative projects, and gave me a burst of motivation, or more so courage to create, i hadn't felt for years. Thanks alot, Neat.

i never get bored just exhausted. all my worst videos are the ones where i was just obsessed with getting it done in one day. i had a 60 second trailer take me about 5 hours to fully edit one day and thought, yeah im never doing this in one day again no matter how motivated i am. once i did that i started sitting on projects for a couple days and going back and i notice all sorts of stuff i didnt before. never underestimate the fact that actually making decisions and thinking burns energy just like exercising does; its only natural that you have a finite amount of useful bandwidth per day. once you get to that point, sometimes even walking away for a bit isnt enough. put it down, think of something else, wind down for the day, then take a fresh look tomorrow. also, learn as many hotkeys as possible and try not to use a mouse too much. using hotkeys will make you feel more efficient if nothing else but it also WILL make you faster. setup the custom keyboard to what you think is comfortable i have no idea what BMD was thinking when they made some of these key combos so make your own keyboard layout! lastly, practice doesnt make perfect, perfect practice does. this means that if you wanna learn lets say the pEmitter node, dont throw that into an existing project and try to figure it out. no, make a practice composition so you can mess it up all day and it wont matter. my dashboard is FULL of mostly practice projects and i title them as such so i can easily go back and practice when i inevitably forget how to do something.

This is the type of video that I'll be revisiting when I burnt out in video editing. Thank you so much for creating this video Neat, it felt like therapy session for us Video Editors. p.s. I love your hand gestures while you articulate your thoughts.

I think my biggest issue with reaching "flow" in editing is that I'm constantly leaving the editing software to go find assets/clips/sfx to throw into the video at any given time. I don't mean importing from my files, I mean I leave the software entirely and go to youtube or google to find what I need. If I didn't do this for every single video I edit, I wouldn't feel unmotivated when thinking about editing

the sonic branding really catched me actually

I think the weirdest thing I do when editing is listen to YouTube videos in the background. But I also switch between drawing and editing while I'm in the sketch stage, so it's harder for me to get bored of either one and I can see what my final product might look like. I'm usually just too lazy to pause the video when I switch over, especially since I've heard the audio so many times by that point that I can recall it perfectly from memory. Editing like that is less like trudging through the same well-worn path and more like putting together a moving puzzle. I also take a few shortcuts, though they probably won't help anyone that isn't making animations. A good chunk of my editing is already done before I even start drawing. When I'm planning a video, I make a "timed script" that's just descriptions using the text generator. It blocks out where I want sections to begin and end so that I don't have to figure it out later... which helps when I'm too lazy to pause the video I was listening to while I was drawing. XD As a current Vegas user, I was surprised by the mention. I got it back when it was much cheaper but at some point MAGIX discontinued the affordable tiers (which were technically considered a separate product? apparently?) to encourage people to buy MAGIX Movie Studio instead. Up until they removed those, it was totally worth it because I used version 15 from 2018 to late 2023 without trouble. You definitely don't need the latest software to edit videos, but that doesn't save you from bad corporate decisions. Unfortunately, I'm locked in because I need a very specific set of features to make videos the way I do. :')

You're quickly turning into one of my favorite channels. I can tell this is all from the heart because I too am challenged by this stuff (More of a Switch/PS5 guy than a Steam guy though) Hopefully I'll be able to make something of myself in due time!

This is a really insightful video and I appreciate you making it. I'd definitely fallen into the trap of trying to overedit my videos, trying to cram every other second with some sort of new visual or joke, always trying to keep the audience engaged. Now, don't get me wrong, I do ENJOY editing like this! It's fun for me to do and a lot of the time, just cutting clips together is so boring. But it does catch up to you eventually... so I'm trying to cut back and find a good balance. Keeping enough interesting edits in there to satisfy myself while not overworking myself to hell and back. We'll see how it goes!

Been making videos for a while now, and as cliche as it may sound bigger is not always better. Overediting with Retention edits won’t work for everyone especially if you can’t match that energy. Not everyone needs to be a MrBeast clone in terms of editing. Some people just enjoy the chill person, who’s making the videos. And that’s you ;)

Hey, you're that guy that made that video with the Sonic footage. It's funny that this video popped up in the list, because I'm currently struggling with a massive video editing project. I thought it would take a week. It took two weeks just to get ~25% done. It looks like the video is going to be around four hours long. 🙀

Omg, I was looking for this EXACT video but YT kept giving me garbage and I was ready to give up... glad the algorithm finally delivered! This is what I needed to hear.

Man thanks for this I get overwhelmed easily with putting too much pressure on myself to be great at things that I am a novice at video editing has been my most recent and fun passion. Editing is a wonderful creative outlet and I even found someone I can work for and get paid, so I’m extremely motivated to do well and this gives me a lot of perspective