Level Up Your Video: A Step-by-Step Master Guide

1. Welcome to the class: If you have an idea, a story you want to share, there's no better way to do it than video. I painstakingly did videos for more than five years. I learned from books, from watching other creators, from courses. I learned a lot. This class condenses everything I learned from the past five years into just a few minutes, Boosting you to a much higher level of writing, editing vision, making your video that much better, much quicker. For this class project, I'll guide you through all the steps, starting from an idea in your mind to storytelling, the filming, choice of music, and the most important part, the editing. Having at the end your very best possible video. By the way, I firmly believe anyone can do it with a phone or a camera, doesn't matter. Free software editing, it's all okay. It's very powerful. I, myself have a master's in Physics, which is completely the opposite of filmmaking. With that said, let's go. 2. Ideas are overrated: Every video begins with an idea. And let me tell you immediately, ideas are overrated. They are over emphasized. And frankly, not that important. Because a great idea can be a garbage video, or a garbage idea can be a great video. Ideas can be our own experiences or bigger ideas like thoughts or completely insignificant, it does not matter. For example, one idea was, I was going to return to Portugal for Christmas. That's where I'm from. That was the idea. Nothing too mind blowing, nothing out of this world. That was it. But it is what you do with this idea that can transform it into a great video. Another idea would be, I found an old camera, does gear matter. Again, that's a good idea, but what we do with it can make or break the video. I would like you to think of an idea. Maybe it's something you really want to share. In the next chapter, we'll see what we can do with it for the class project. After each chapter, I'll guide you on what you need to do step by step to create your very own best video that you can actually share. If you're interested, I'm free to give feedback or answer any doubts, as well as other students can give feedback. Let's take our first step. What is something you would like to share? An idea you find interesting. This will be the starting point for your video. Good luck. 3. Story matters: Okay, great. Say you've got your idea. And for people to be interested in this video, this is really important. We have to turn these ideas into a story that can be shared as a video. Again, a video with no story is just an act, a viral video. But a video with a story. It's a movie. And to make our best possible videos, we want movies. The story is single handedly the most important part of our video. That's what makes us stick to a movie or any TV show. It is so important that everything we do around it, it is because of the story, the writing, the gear reviews, how we edit the music. We choose literally every chapter you see is space to help out the story. The story is the king and everything else is the servant. Every story, no matter how short or long it is, is divided into three parts. One, introduction to give context. Two, conflict facing a problem. And three, resolution to give conclusion. One introduction. Three little pigs leave their mother's house to build their own home. Straw sticks and bricks. Two, the conflict. The big bad wolf tries to blow up the pigs houses one by one, failing at the last brickhouse. And three, the surviving pigs seek refugee at the brickhouse, outsmarting the wolf who attempts to climb down the chimney and ends up in the pot of boiling water. They live happily after any three parts. Let's take that. I went to Portugal for Christmas idea. That sounds boring. To make it into a more interesting story, I decided to explore the idea, What is home? I gave it an introduction where I'm from and why I'm not in Portugal anymore. Home can be many things to us, but for a lot of people, home is the place where you were born. But for some it's not the case conflict. I don't know what home is. Let's explore a little bit. All the time in Germany made me feel this way. The room did not change at all. Why did it feel so unfamiliar? I want to feel something familiar. Today I'm going to a place I haven't been for ages in Portugal. And three Conclusion. Ah, I know what home is. It doesn't necessarily need to be the country where you were born. For me, it's Portugal. A bit of Germany, Chinese food and virtual gaming world. That is to me, my home. Let's go back to your project, your idea, and see how we can transform it into a story. One introduction. Is there any context you have to give? Maybe two is the conflict. What problems might arise? Is mental obstacle something you have to think about? You don't know the answer yet. Or a tough decision. You have to make three resolution. This part gives the conclusion. Without it, the story would feel incomplete. Think about these three points for the next chapter. It'll be very useful now that you learn that story is the single most important thing for video for the class project, I would like you to take your idea and think about what story you can create out of that idea. Thinking about the three parts of the story can be helpful. What do you need to introduce to people watching it? What obstacle you need to overcome? It could be a literal obstacle or a mental one, for example. And the conclusion, what is the outcome of your conflict? Think about it. It will be important for the next chapter. 4. Why and how to write a script: From the previous chapter. I hope you could understand how important story is and how everything around feeds into it. A messy story is a messy video. This is why we want to make the story clear, concise, no confusions. And that's why we're writing a script. A script is very important because it tells you exactly what we need to film. And it ends up saving us a lot of work and we have a bigger overview of the whole story. Maybe we can correct a few things, change a few things. It's better to change now in the script, in a piece of paper, than having to go back and reshoot again, maybe in a new place, or saying different things. It feels like the script gives us more constraints, but actually it gives us more room for creativity. Because you can change the dialogue, you have the overview of the whole story. Maybe you change this scenery. This works better. It actually helps a lot. But important to note is that there's no wrong or right way to go about this. Sometimes I go to a place and it's more spontaneous and I have to film stuff. But a tip I can really give you is think of the idea first, because once you know the idea, you'll shoot differently. An example is when I went to Amsterdam, there's 1 billion things I could film, but beforehand I had the idea. Oh, I want to explore how biking is. And all of a sudden, the whole day I was just filming stuff about bikes. It ended up saving a lot of unnecessary work because I could focus on what the film, if there's no idea, if there's no story, what would you actually film. And without further ado, let's take a look at our script. This is something you can take inspiration from. It doesn't need to be exactly like this. As long as you feel organized, you're doing the right thing at the beginning. I always like to remind myself, what is this video about? It's always there. It's also good to not veer off too much from it. For the script I prepare specially for this class, I marked down the colors of the beginning of each section. Introduction conflict resolution, I'm going to cover the essentials so you can write your very own script. The blue text means it's a voice over. It is. When I basically just talk over clips, it took me about five years to understand that gear, it doesn't really matter. Well, spoiler, it matters. But not in the way you think it does. Here I try to think of places where I would feel my scenes location and clothes play an important part to your video. It sends a subconscious message to the viewer about what kind of feelings they should be feeling. For example, this garage gives off a mysterious feeling, exactly what I wanted for this video. In contrast, this field gives off, at least for me, a pure and sincere vibe. A feeling that we are small. And to be specific, I don't even write what type of shots all do unless it's something really specific, like this flash transition. Otherwise, I just leave the filming aspects to when I'm actually filming. To prove that, let me switch to something that's way worse than a smartphone camera. The links terrible. Let's Ok somewhere else. However, what I say has to be specifically written. If you want to take a look at yourself, feel free to pause the video or it is also attached as a file. With each video you'll do, you'll get the hanger of it. Now it is your turn. Keep in mind the three parts of the story. Make it clear, concise, Don't diverge too much. And cut the redundant parts out. Good luck. I'm seeing the next chapters when we'll actually do the filming for the class project. I would like you to take your idea and thoughts about the story and write a script. Feel free to download and take a look at my script for inspiration. But remember, as long as you feel organized, know what shots you need to take and what to say, you're doing it right, and take your time. This is where your video can change a lot by only changing a few lines. 5. Why gear doens't matter: Before we go into filming, I want to remind everyone that gear matters way less than you think. When I started off, I didn't even have a camera. I used to draw pictures and paints and use them as images. And the beautiful thing about the evolution of technology is that basically everyone nowadays has a phone camera. This thing is amazing. Some even have ultra wide or macro, which is fantastic. Just know that great cinematography will never make up for a poorly told story. Good footage just helps us telling a more compelling story. For this course, I will not talk about gear, I will only use more conventional terms like wide, medium, close up shot. Focusing on those is way more important than the gear. Let's actually do this now that you understand that gear doesn't matter as much as you might think originally. For this class project, you'll need to prepare the gear you have, make sure your devices are charged, and that your SD cards have enough storage space. See you on the next one. 6. But let's talk about gear: Now, before we go into the filming part, there's quite the amount of questions I receive all the time in my YouTube channel about my gear. So in this chapter, I wanted to talk about it. You can do and practice so much with your phone camera. In fact, I think so many aspects more important than quality of video like scripting, storytelling through editing can be practiced using a phone camera. Don't ever let that be an excuse for not doing a video. This extra lesson is particularly useful for people who are then interested in upgrading their gear. I'll talk about what I recommend and what is not worth for the long term facilitating the process of choice and potentially steering you off from buying gear that you'll regret. It took me many years to refine the choice I have today, and I have bought and sold many cameras and lenses. Also, no, I'm not being paid. This is 100% my honest opinion, which cameras are the best for long term and what lenses are best for video. So rest assured that this is the only lesson that I'm going to use specific camera terms as this is needed only for this lesson. All the others do not have this. Just like I said in the last chapter. I have been asked a lot of times what my camera gear is, what specific brand it is, what model it is. And I can already tell you that the brand doesn't really matter. If the price range is about the same, then they probably have about the same features. The features, however, That's really important. The most common question I get is what type of camera should I buy? There are many like action cameras, point and shoot cameras, and interchangeable lens cameras. Action cameras are fun. They're tiny, they have amazing stabilization, but they have very limited use for sports or any action. Usually in small size, so I can hide them well. However, the video will never look cinematic. That's why it has a very limited use. But let's cut to the chase. The camera I specifically use right now all the time is the I don't know if you can even see this. It's the Sony Alpha $6,400. And it's not the best camera around that has, for example, a full frame sensor, but it's definitely not the worst. It's a pretty good camera for video. And as to why I chose Sony is because it pulled me with the really compact size for their performance and autofocus capabilities. So as long as the camera fits in this fanny pack, I'm good. There are two features a camera needs to last you a long time for video. The first one is that if you want the best long term camera that you'll use for many years, it has to be an interchangeable lens camera. Having the ability to change lenses, that makes you have the possibility to precisely buy what you exactly need. The second feature that a camera must have to be used for videos long term is a microphone jack. Eventually, you might want to upgrade your audio, and having it will only make your camera last longer for your needs. So now let's talk about lenses. There are two types of lenses, Zoom lenses and prime lenses. Zoom lenses, by the name, you can zoom in and out. The range depends on each zoom lens. Prime lenses have a fixed focal length, meaning that you cannot zoom in or out. You're stuck at that one. But the advantage of these lenses is that you can really open the aperture, meaning your shots have much more background blur and have the ability to shoot at darker places. There's actually something I wanted to teach you about the zoom range that actually a lot of people don't know. Right now, I'm at the wide zoom range. You see the objects over here, and this is where things will get interesting. If I zoom in and at the same time move my camera backwards, you see that the lenses, the subjects are still at the same size. But do you see the difference in the background? This is my max zoom range, and you see the background is so compressed, you cannot see most of the background. Again, if I zoom out and move the camera at the same time, All of a sudden, you see most of the background. So different Zoom ranges have different feelings. Right now, I'm at 18 millimeters, the wide zoom range. It really gives the overall perspective. The subjects with the background, 35 would be a medium. It gives a little more focus to the subject, and the 50 feels the most compressed. Here. All of a sudden, the subjects really feel alone right here, and you don't know much of the context. It really gives focus to the subjects. Now, for our purposes, for video, I basically always use a Zoom lens. Even though prime lenses look more cinematic, when you're going out somewhere, you don't want to carry around two or three lenses. This zoom lens includes most of the ranges. And in my personal opinion, when you're shooting video, having to change lenses really takes the moment away. It's less spontaneous and multiply this process thousands of times. It just isn't fun. Prime lenses do have their place for maybe interviews or a classic YouTube studio setup. Where you are always at the same place. Then having only one focal length is optimal. The flexibility in being in the darker place and more background blur to put a focus on the subject. That makes a lot more sense for these types of situations. For me, what makes shooting fun isn't setting up the lights, lenses, or camera. That is fun for 10 minutes. Then it gets really tedious. I just use a Zoom lenses, especially because I like to go out sometimes and shoot something more spontaneous. Now, my lens choices are the Sigma 18 to 50 millimeters f 2.8. This covers most of the normal ranges. And I also have the Sony ten to 18 millimeters, which is useful for when I go out to places that are really tight. I also have the Sony 35 millimeter prime lenses F 1.8. But being honest with you, I only use it for photography. Again, camera quality only covers a small percentage of the Pi for a good video. Story matters much more how you organize, shoot, and edit. That is what makes a good video. If all it took to make good videos was good gear, then only the richest people could make them. And that is definitely not the case. Phone cameras evolve so much, there's absolutely no excuse to not ever do any video with a phone. And I hope you got to learn what to avoid in future purchases, and let's prepare your camera to film in the next chapter. See you then. 7. The only filming techniques you need: Wow, this is a completely new scene. So I'm moving myself into the garage because I'm going to film the scene right here. I want to the dark place, a mysterious place. This is a good controlled space. Now if you're shooting in a place that's more spontaneous, for example, in the new city or something, I would really recommend to always look for interestingness. For example, in Netherlands, I would always try and look out for interesting things according to my story. The bike, something that might add to the story. In this case, this is a more controlled area. But the tips I'm going to give you apply for both situations. There's actually two things I want you to take with you next time you shoot a video. The first one is for you to understand that right now this is a two D video you're looking at. Generally speaking, you only look at what I actually point at. Whereas in the real world, you're looking around where you want to look at. So you can change views anytime you want. This is important for video because if you're shooting just at one angle without changing anything, no text or any zoom in any angles, it becomes very still very quickly. This is why it's important to shoot with detail at various different angles where you think the viewer might want to see. If you think about it next time you see a movie or a new TV series, notice how there's no long shots. Every shot is at most of them, at least less than 10 seconds. They always cut to something. There's a character they cut. They always cut to different angles, different zooms. That's how they keep it interesting, and that's where you're going to do. The second thing I want you to know before you go shoot it is to know the three types of shots. There's the wide, medium, and close up shot. Wide shots are used to establish context. Medium shots are used to focus on subject. Close up shots are used to show something in detail, intensifying scenes, or show something specific that is significant. If you mix these two points, the different angles detail than the wide mid range and close up shots. When you go edit, you're more than enough prepared to have a really nice interesting segment. I want you to compare these two scenes. This first one just includes one shot right here. Actually, it took me about five years to understand that gear, it doesn't really matter. Well, spoiler, It kind of matters, but not in the way you think it does. You see what I mean, It gets boring very quickly. You see no movies or TV series doing this. But let's now take a look at the better version. It took me about five years to understand that gear doesn't really matter. Well, spoiler, it kind of matters, but not in the way you think it does. I hope I got to change your perspective a little bit about shooting. For the next chapter, I'll shoot this scene exactly and what I keep in mind and important things to know. Now that you learn the two crucial techniques for filming for this class project, I want you to prepare yourself in advance for your shoot. Imagine which shots you can do and think of what the viewer might want to see. Think about different angles, high to low, and different zoom ranges. The camera could be anywhere. It is up to you to think where it could be placed. Good luck. 8. Applying filming techniques: So before you go to shooting, I hope you get to understand how many times I'll repeat the same actions. That's something that's very normal. It takes more work. Yes, it's true. But if you think about it, actors are in a way, specifically trained to repeat actions over and over again. So let's go. I don't know if you can hear that, but I think that's the heating system. This is not good for the shooting. This is why I will not incorporate the sounds from the actual camera. I will actually add fake sounds. This will be fine for the first shot. I always like to shoot a wide shot. It gives the viewer the chance to know where your surroundings are. If you have a phone, don't worry, you can always stand a little further behind or just use your ultra Wt and a tripod. I really recommend you to have one. It gives a lot of flexibility, but if you don't have one, it's okay. You can always use any kind of objects like here, the bike, a chair, whatever, Because I'm going in this direction. I will put the door a little to the left. This is what you see around here, especially when I turn on my flashlight, you'll be able to see and discover more as you go. I'll just turn off the light because I want it dark. Let's do this. So it's really important to actually do the same actions. So I'll have to remember which foot I use. O yeah, that was basically it. That was the wide shot. And this is where it actually gets fun because, for example, I can add other shots. I took out my phone. I want to do a medium shot or a close up shot here. When I take off my phone, I can cut to that, maybe other angles when I come in. Maybe a camera from there inside. This medium shot here. These are just ideas you can think about. The more work it actually takes, the more creative shots going to look like. I hope you get to understand that like a simple scene does take more work, but at the end, when you edit it, it's really worth it. Now you have to set up the tripod. Again, different heights like this actually clear up stuff so it doesn't get into shot. I'll zoom in more. It's becomes a close up of just my pants, press record, see if I'm in frame. Good. And from there, take the phone. I like to repeat it twice, three times because sometimes I might not do it as nice. That was it for the next shot. I'll get a close up of my feet. I think I'll be really creative. Slowly going in step by step. I'll take the camera off the tripod and then actually put it on the floor here. Actually, to get the angle, I'll use this plastic piece from the tripod to angle a little upwards and maybe like this. Remember I think I stepped with my right foot first inside. That's important to know for this shot, for example, turn off the lights. I'm repeating the whole thing again with a flash light And step, step, step. That's it for my next shot. I wanted a different angle, maybe somewhere inside here. For this, I changed lenses to an ultra wide, let's see, let me take out these shoes. Then I literally would just come up with the flashlights. Again, something like, I'm trying to look for something like this, looking for the camera and that would be the shot. Turn off the light, do this small steps and slowly. So I'll do it again because I wasn't happy with that one. I looked at the camera I shouldn't have done. I should look where? Somewhere outside the camera. Okay. I think that was good. Okay. So I hope you got to understand my thought process behind my shots, how I think about the different angles. Different shots, medium wide, close up shots. I hope you also got to understand how much work it is to set up the tripod and different angles here just for a few seconds of footage. For me, I think it's a lot of fun. This process repeats itself for another place. For example, where I go up the stairs and reach a new place. I choose different angles and also sometimes in public. But depending on my time in public, it's more limited. For example, in Amsterdam, I was more limited to time. But here I have all the freedom in the controlled area where I can put my camera wherever I want. It's fun. I think it's fun. It takes a lot of work. Yes, it, but after you go edit it, which is the next chapter, it all sticks together and the story comes alive. And I think that's the best and most rewarding part. Now that you learned about the whole process of filming in one location for this class project, it's time for you to go and shoot. If you only have one camera, like me, prepare to shoot the same actions over and over again with different angles. This will be later on very useful in the editing. 9. [Bonus] The reality of filming yourself: Oh well, sometimes it just feels right. Okay, To explain this, let me use an analogy. Let's say that this is time. This is the time spent thinking about the shot, setting up the camera, filming, running to the action, doing the action, running back to the camera, and then finally pressing stop. Now this is the amount that you actually see this. Let the temperature rise up here in the moonlight in for the sun, in for the sun, baby. Don't leave me to stays and believe it, It get on, get on a pain, you'll get it, get on, get on pain, you'll get it, get on. They even come on, let's get it on. Please show you up all of that time just for some sweet sweet footage. Just a few seconds. So I'm right sometimes. Just let it sometimes just let it do. My father son to my father son, baby on. Leave me to stays being. Get on, get on the you'll get it. Get on, babe. You'll get it. Get come on. Let's carry on please. Show you how show you, babe. I've learned that for video, it takes a lot of work for every single shot just to squeeze out a few drops. A few seconds of good footage, Baby, let's get it on. Please show you how. Of course, no one cares about it because that's the most boring part. 10. Voiceover secrets: Personally, I really like voiceovers, but that really depends on your video style. So I'm going to share with you some quick tips, how to do better voiceovers. This is actually the secret. Yeah, that's true, this is actually the secret. A nice bed with maybe a few pillows here next to me because all of the surrounding material really observes the sound well and doesn't make it echoy. Yeah, that's basically the trick. I speak maybe 5 centimeters from the microphone to make it sound nicer. And that's it. I just read the script out of this like this, in the good setting. Good distance. Yeah. I thought I'd be honest and show you my secret sound studio, which is the bed for the class project. If you've never done a voice over, I want you to experiment your microphone at the bed and outside the bed. Try different places and distances between your mouth and the microphone and see what sounds best. You'll be surprised how much of a difference that makes. If your video has voice overlines, do record them at the place and distance you prefer the most. 11. Why editing software doesn't matter: When I first started editing videos was actually with Windows Movie Maker. I can tell you that the tools I use then is basically the same tools I use now 99% of the time I made the mistake that good transitions are key for really good editing, I was completely wrong. All they do is make you feel dizzy and makes your video more corny. You don't need all these fancy Schmanzi transitions. They don't serve you anything. All you need is two things, The cut tool and the way to make music fade or video fade. That's all these two things. And guess what, all free editing video software contains these two tools. With that said, let's go to the next chapter and focus on music. For this class project, I want you to familiarize with your editing software. Make sure you know how to cut a clip and how to fade music in or out. Basically making the sound slowly appear or disappear. These two techniques are used 99% of my edits, so knowing them is key. 12. When you control music and when music controls you: Before we dive into editing, the choice of music we want to use in our video is very important. Let me give you some examples, opposite, I am from the city and now I'm here. I could never settle down too far away from pretty good. Did it feel harder to move away as a kid or as an adult? That's hard. Every time I try something new, I always think it's completely pointless. But that's what hobbies are for music makes or breaks the video. And it can be very hard sometimes to find the song. We control music, but music can also control us. Let me explain. We control music by choosing it. And to do this, we first have to identify what emotion we want to portray. For this entrance scene, I wanted something calm but mysterious, so this is what I'm looking for as to where I get my music For ages, I've always use Youtube studio. It is a great free platform. It has a lot of music moods genres, but recently I've switched to a paid subscription because the quality of songs are generally higher. You also get more flexibility. For example, you get tracks for the voice, only the instrumentals, or just the drums. But no matter your choice, if you look hard enough, you'll always find a really good song after we choose the music. How music controls us is by the rhythm, how it feels, how it flows. And we edit depending on that. But this I'll show you in more detail in the next chapter of editing. But for now, let's only focus on what emotions you're looking for in the music for this class project, I want you to look at your script again and identify what emotions you want to portray. Once you know it, take your time finding the right song. This decision impacts your video a lot, and it can be hard sometimes to find the song, but once you nail it, it's absolutely magical and satisfying when editing later on. Good luck. 13. The power of music: Hey, this is Eddie from the future actually about one year after this course was made. And it has been more than one year that I have been using epidemic sound. And yes, the choice of music has made a big bump in improvement. The choice does make or break a video. If chosen right, it sets the specific mood you're looking out for, and it makes the viewers have the same feelings you want them to feel. And the purpose of this class is for you to hear some excellent examples. Your attention and time are the most valuable resources in your life. Reality is that we live in a world that is highly optimized to distract you. You give a little shadow, for example, to the table. A. With a fixed end date in mind, it helps us internalize the time and with each day is a step closer to seeing each other again. Yes, long distance is hard, but with the right amount of effort, it's definitely possible. But staying consistent is key. I've been doing almost weekly videos for years. The easy part is starting, but the hard part is staying consistent, showing up even when the excitement fades from time to time. Part of the progress and part of the success comes from not doing it once, but doing it for years. He Okay. I guess I'll mess it up. And I don't want to talk about it. I just want beam What's going on, big Dom All you do is hang out with your friends. For everyone. As the sun was setting, I carefully planned the final spot to be in the perfect sunset place I know in the speech. Well, here we are. Se Oh Oh three M, Amber, Mochi, and this old Mercedes. 20 years. Las It's the sum of these big and small moments that define you. Don't let them escape. You oh watching through them has definitely made me emotional. And 80% of that was purely due to the music choice. I really hope this has made you realize the true power of music. Next time you're looking out for songs, make sure to first, identify the emotion you want to portray. And second, find a good song that matches that emotion. Sometimes it takes me no time at all. Sometimes I change the music multiple times, simply because it didn't feel right. That is the reality, but one properly chosen, it makes all the effort worth it. Trust me on that and best of luck. Hm 14. About sound effects: Let's listen to this fundamental exercise. There are two cups with a microphone in the middle. I will fill them up with water with the same shaped bottle. Can you hear the difference? So, did you hear the difference? Let's hear it again, but this time with the respective video, On the left side, we're pouring hot water, and on the right side, we're pouring cold water. Isn't it incredible our brains can hear the difference between pouring hot and cold water? This exercise highlights the deep purpose of sound effects. While music is fundamentally more important, we covered last class that music makes or breaks a video. Sound effects serve to elevate your story. Hence, your video. Well placed sound effects make the video more tangible. Good background noises make you feel the environment and capture your attention that much more deeply. Let's take the example of this shot. Did you hear how underwhelming that sounded? Let's carefully add some sound effect. There. Much, much better. It's like I can feel the impact, and I'm ready to see the next shot. Now, you can find a library of sound effects in the YouTube studio or you can take copyright free sound effects from YouTube. I didn't always use sound effects at the beginning, but once I started, I never stopped as I noticed the quality increase in the videos. Best and most easy way is to use epidemic sound, as they are huge library of sound effects covers for practically all situations. To end this class, I will show you what happens when you combine both excellent music and well placed sound effects and what they can do to elevate your video. I visited China and found the lives of the people so fascinating that I decided that that would be the story. I will add extra subtitles to explain everything where it came from. Here we go. But it's called y'all my so. But it's called y'all my o. Yeah. Oh. I hope you got a good feeling too how much difference a well placed sound effect can make. Now, if you are beginning to make videos, I would say practice some. But don't bother too much. Focus more on the story and music that is of much higher importance. After you have the hang of it, come back to this lesson and notice the importance again, or try and incorporate some sound effects here or there that could highlight the important things or make the viewer feel something specific you want. Best of luck and see you in the next lesson. 15. The best edits are the ones you don't notice: This first part of the editing chapter, I will show you mostly tips and tricks. I use, techniques I use all the time with examples for you to understand. And for the second part of the editing, I will showcase the whole video with the script and all my thoughts throughout the whole editing process. Okay, so immediately I want you to again, notice that there are zero transitions. Everything you see right now is edited with cuts. And by changing the volume of the audio tracks, that is it. This can be basically made with any software. Knowing the mechanics of the software is just part of the process. It is how you use it that makes it into a story. The best edits are the ones you don't even notice. Let me show you a technique I use a lot to make the viewing experience that much more pleasant is that I cut to the music right at the beginning. I start the music only when the sound of the door begins. The cuts I make to other angles are also to the music. It just makes it flow so much better. It took me about five years to understand that gear doesn't really matter. Well, you don't notice these things when you're actually viewing a video. But your brain somehow notices and they feel satisfied and that's what we want. Spoiler. It matters, but not in the way you think it does. Another thing that most people don't notice is continuity. For example, here the arm is going to the phone. As I cut it continues the movement seamlessly, making the whole thing buttery smooth. It took me about five years to understand that gear doesn't really matter. The same here with the steps. I start by going with 1 ft and the next cut, it continues with the same foot spoiler. It matters, but not in the way you think it does when I'm not talking. The music is controlling me. Previously, we controlled the music by choosing it, but right now it's the music that controls you. The pacing, the energy, how it feels. This all plays a huge role into the edit. Cameras this old can take decent pictures that are comparable to smartphones, but their biggest weakness is video. You ya, my voice. That's how much I'm going to tell you very now that I want to go back to speaking. The singing goes down and I speak up, I regain control, gay voice. That's how much I'm going to tell you, it's horrible for low light situations, it is like a dance between you and the music. And when you stop the music, you wanted to stop it at the right moment to be satisfying. So there's two situations. When you hear a loud sound, that's usually when you can stop or start the music regardless of where it is. Here are some examples. This is another example. When you can stop the music, why do you waste it on gaming these things? I plan them beforehand. When I go put my arms, it gives more opportunity for flexibility. When I put down my arms, I can stop the music or start depending on how the editing goes and how I feel like it. A second way is to manipulate the music. If you ever learn how to play music, you know it repeats itself. There are specific moments where you can cut and make it shorter depending on the length you want. For example here, 1234, 1234. 1234, 1234. Basically everyone here I can cut. It's a possibility to cut in each one and then make it shorter. Slap them together and make it shorter. Let's see. Let's see, this is a 1234. 1234. 1234, 1234. And here before this one. Yeah, this one I cut on one and then one here. Let's make them together and let's see how it sounds. That was great. Imagine you had an action and it would end exactly here. This would be a great way to manipulate the music to be a little shorter, so that it would end at the perfect moment. Go back to the. Yeah, Much better. Much better. But for video only the technique. You can also manipulate it by playing around with the audio track. For example. If there's a person singing, you can remove it to make yourself talk over it. If you're not even talking, you can put the person singing again to make it sound better and more entertaining. The reason why I still use this camera nowadays in my videos is the story. These are the main things I think about when I'm editing to make it more concise, more satisfying. That's the point. You want to be satisfied and have fun when you're watching the video. And that's exactly what I'm trying to do. It doesn't happen this seamlessly, by the way. Sometimes I have to really think about the story, what makes sense. And sometimes I have to remove the music, substitute it with something else completely different or the worst case scenario. Sometimes I even have to reshoot it. But you know, if you had a good script, you don't need to do that in the next chapter. I'll really go into detail throughout the whole video so you can see it for this class project. Open your editing software program of choice. I want you to prepare all your footage and voiceover lines by having them all organized in the folder. If you have a voiceover, start by having that in your editing software and cut all the bits and pieces that are empty or the ones you made a mistake and had to repeat. This streamlines your project and allows you to focus more on the editing and less on finding the right file. 16. Too many fall for this editing mistake: This editing lesson was actually added a few months after this was posted. Just because I thought as editing is the most important part, this is something that should really be in your mind when editing. And it's all about this term that all editors use and most beginners do this mistake and is kill your babies. So this usually happens for videos without a script, but it can also happen for videos with a script. All that means that the precious footage that you shot are your babies. You went through all the work to get those shots you needed, but sometimes ideas change or you realize later on it really doesn't fit into the story. Let me give you a more recent example. It's a video about my childhood memories and how it affects what I. In this trip in Portugal, I shot quite the amount, but only approximately 10% of the footage was actually used because the other 90% Bacon and shrimp. Only Portuguese bank card. Physical space. It has no correlation. If I were to use this, it would make the viewer and me confused. Any confusion to the story is met with frustration or being bored. Even though this shot is beautiful and it took so much work. I have to kill this one. If it doesn't make sense in the story, just cut it out, even though you heard sometimes. Make sure that footage has a purpose. It's there to show some specific process or the scenario that you are at, not too short that it becomes confusing. With you all these shiny s. And also, not too long, that it becomes too boring. My one degrees sunny. Way You can know this by reviewing your footage, slide a little back, play and see what it feels like. Degrees sunny. Day So with this weather. What do you want to do? So I got Editing goes a lot by feelings. There's no specific rules to that. So test it out, feel if it's too boring or too quick. So keep this in mind when you're editing. In the next chapter, you'll get all my notes and all my thoughts as the video is playing. See you then. 17. Applying editing techniques: Welcome to editing part two. I will add the comments on the left about all my thoughts on this edit. This video is meant to be seen multiple times. And feel free to pause the video as many times as you need. You'll see that I edited only with cuts and fades. Let's start. It took me about five years to understand that gear doesn't really matter. Well, spoiler, it matters, but not in the way you think it does. To prove that, let me switch to something that's way worse than a smartphone camera. The links terrible. Let's look somewhere else. Cameras this old can take decent pictures that are comparable to smartphones. But their biggest weakness is video. Get tired of my voice. That's how much I'm going to tell you, it's horrible for low light situations and even for sunny days, the tiny sensor cannot handle that much light. For bright light shining directly at the sensor, it can't handle so many photons it spills vertically throughout the sensor. About, I really love the reason that I showed so many other clips was for you to understand that video, although it has to look good, isn't as important as it s, this is much, much better. I would argue that if you're talking to a camera, the most important upgrade is an external microphone. Something that's a better than this because it has something to do with the human brain being able to tolerate bad video, but bad sound. On the other hand, that's go back to the. Yeah, much better. Much better. But for video only the techniques you use matter way more than what you're using. Shaky videos are definitely, no, I don't think anyone in this world likes to watch this kind of footage. Holding it, study, or placing the camera in creative places elevates your video so much more than you could ever do with an upgrade. More important than sound or video, that everyone seems to be really focused on. The reason why I still use this camera nowadays in my videos is the story tell you tell, tell. I'm going to store 100 times a day guitar. My that's much they want to. Story is what glues everything together. Without an introduction, you're left confused to what everything is. Without a conclusion, you're left frustrated. Story always comes first. Everything else. Video Sound Music Comes only after to help to better tell a story, I still use this camera because the footage that comes out of it gives me a sense of nostalgia or pure pair this with the right story. It's a very powerful tool. Every other video in my channel contains a story I find interesting. I recommend for you to subscribe and I hope you learn something. Thank you for watching for this class project. Take a few points you learned in this chapter and apply them to your edit. If you never edited by cutting to the music, Now it's a good opportunity to try for more advanced editors. Maybe applying music manipulation is a good point to focus on to make your video that much more satisfying. Once you're done editing your video, take out your headphones and listen to it. Again, with your computer built in speakers, this gives you a different perspective on how loud sound should be or not. Since most people that watch your videos don't use headphones, I wish you all the best. Feel free to upload your own creation in the class projects to interact with other students and receive feedback. Good luck. 18. (1/3) Analyzing edit - Introduction: Since editing is so important, it is what makes the video. I added an extra part. And for this more recent video, I'm taking a different approach. Instead of commenting every single little cut to the music, I will explain you the crucial parts of the edit and reveal how some shots were made. I will play the video and pause throughout for you to better to understand. This video is about me going to Portugal where I was born and exploring this idea of how these positive childhood experiences affect our likings later on in life. And I filmed a lot during this trip, but only about 10% I use in this video because it had to fit the story. With that said, let's start playing. I strongly believe that a lot of our likings are in some way or another, tied down to where you grew up. Okay. First, we immediately see the album. That's something I do. I do the album shot, and then because it's too slow, I add other clips to make it more interesting. I strongly like the beach. I believe or me here. It gives a little more context on what's to give in the future. And also, it doesn't make the clip 10 seconds longer. And then I'll probably come back to the album here and open. So let's watch from the beginning. I strongly believe that a lot of our likings are in Also here, you see this audio clip, you can hear it. This is just the beach. It's a fake audio of the beach. It's such a small detail, but it gives that extra mph. And also here for the music, you see that I cut the music, how I taught you on the other lesson. And I manipulated the music here for to hit exactly here this beat when I actually opened the album. You'll see. I strongly believe that a lot of our likings are in some way or another tied down to where you grew up. You see that? I edited the music, so this beat here, exactly here would really coincide with me opening the album. Also, small detail. These are two different shots. This is a wide shot, and when I open, I cut to the same movement and a little closer. It just makes it that slightly more interesting. I was born and raised in Portugal. I could have used a lot of things. I could have used a map, a digital map, a picture, but I feel like taking that extra step of filming a globe and then pointing my finger to it just makes the video that much more interesting. And there is where I collected most of my experiences. Again, no clip is longer than 10 seconds, and here, I cut the music to manipulate it for it to coincide exactly here so that the crescendo would really feel satisfying. So it's satisfying to watch. Experiences. And of course, the clips are just baby clips of me because it fits in with the story. And living outside of it, being in Germany or Belgium, really made me realize some things are truly irreplaceable. Again, this sound here, I'm going to play it for you. And the rain sound combined. These are not straight up from when I recorded, because I recorded here inside my house with my phone, actually, because that's the best camera I had. It's a small detail. You can always add. Now many people do it, and if you do it, it instantly elevates your video. Also, a little secret. When I filmed this clip, originally, it was the clouds were going out. So I just reversed the video so it makes more sense. By irreplaceable. 19. (2/3) Analyzing edit - Conflict: Okay. Also notice how I slowly add the noise of the plane, which is also fake because the real plane noises while I was recording, it just did not sound nice. Okay, so several things here. This beep here. This is also fake. I wanted to put a title of Brussels in the time. I had nothing to hook on. So I decided to put these two fake beeps for each part of the text, so it really coincide nicely. And the next beep by luck was actually there from the actual footage. Oh. Now, does this mean that what you like is universal, or is it something small, and particular to where you grew up. Only specific to you or me. So for this shot, I actually had to ask the passenger next to me on the other row to just hold the camera because I wanted a cool shot with a light on me. You can actually see my partner, my girlfriend here. She did not want to be part of this. She was like, Why are you asking him? Why are you asking him? And like, he just holds the camera. It's fine. That's why she did not want to be part of it. So she faced left. Here, I just put the camera on the ground with the maximum Zoom. And manually focused on this place, so I'd go here and point to the screen. This shot took a while. I barely almost didn't use this, but I found the place. Small. And particular to where you grew up. Only specific to you or me. Again, a small detail. The train sound is fake, but it fades in. So if you see in Adobe Premiere, if you see something like this, this is a fade. So instead of just cutting it? Me. Like this, fading it just makes everything nicer. So it's cuts and fades. Everyone can do this, and it just makes the video nicer. Me. See how much nicer that was. You fade slowly, and you slowly hear the train, and then it cuts to the song, and it's nice. Me. And also, it slowly fades out here. And you'll notice that the song here, since I'm showcasing in the future, so many clips with a lot of sun, I wanted something happy and calm. 21 degrees sunny. Weather. So with this sather What do you want to do? To. Just like the album, I added the clip here first. You see me going to the stairs. It creates this curiosity. Like, what am I doing? And then I added some clips in the middle, and then I come back. It's like a string that attaches two clips and I add something in the middle. It just adds this another layer of depth to the video. Sony Swea. So with this sather What do you want to do? To So here, I added this short part of me talking between the lady singing, so it really stand out. And we had basically in this clip a full on conversation. I just actually used one single line and cut immediately to the car because first, it doesn't reveal everything. It reveals that, what do you want to do? And then it cuts to the car, and then you think, Oh, what is he going to do? And it creates this curiosity. And also just having the conversation would have been really boring. What do you want to do? To but I got it. Do upside. One of the things I missed a lot was the sun. Again, the importance of sound here, the car completely fake and the nature completely fake added in. The blue birds. But sun is something everyone likes, right? I talk here between the lady singing and also the nature sound fades. So it's nice and smooth. M. But sun is something everyone likes, right? You see, every country has their own thing. America has in some place huge malls and diverse cultures in some places. Germany has beautiful mountains and lakes to hike and swim. But I introduce something the car shot, and I add something in between that gives a little hint of what's coming and also curiosity. And then in the future, I'll come back when I regain my thoughts to the car shot. Here, you'll see, with another angle, which also took a lot of work for me to get out and put the tripod in the camera and then film again. This is something that I didn't think when I wrote the script. This was purely when I was editing, and I just felt like it would be best like this. And sometimes I write a script, and when I edit, I change a little the script or sometimes I need to add a little more voice lines. And sometimes I have to remove them. Everything goes into the editing. That's why it is so important in this part. You create the story during the editing. Every country has their own thing. I'm not adding the shots of me turning on this camera, this recorder for nothing. If it would be here for nothing, it would have been incomplete. So it's here for a reason. Notice, again, the angle changes. It just makes it interesting. Close ups. I really like the song. Honestly, I really liked the song. Take. No, baby, I punched. Actually. Of course, I'm biased. That is. So you see how I cut the music. Actually, I faded out, so we would go smoothly. It's not just a random cut. It's faded out, and immediately, you hear the sounds of the night, which is also fake. Exactly point. And this is the way I chose to do it to switch from Act two, me experiencing the beach to act three realizing after the beach what all of these experiences and memories shaped me. 20. (3/3) Analyzing edit - Resolution: Ally. Of course, I'm biased. That is the exact point I'm trying to reach. And this is the start of Act three, the conclusion. So I added here a low pass filter. It gives this feeling of memories, the nostalgia, and combine this with this song. It gives this nice vibe for this third act. So I'll play again. B. Just the power of the music and the power of manipulation of the sounds. It makes you immediately also feel nostalgic. So let's listen to the song. So my thought process was like, I was editing this and I saw I was listening to the music, and I was like, Oh, here's a good part to stop. So what I did was, I edited, I added here a few clips. Okay. Things I thought were insignificant at first. Here, all of this is a little filler for me to cut there. So what is happening right now is that the music is controlling me because I want to cut here. At the moment, I just decided to fill a little here with listening to the music and a little clips here and there and adding a little pause in between my sentences. So that's how the music is controlling me for me to end it nicely. Let's listen to it again. Insignificant at first. But now coming back with a new perspective, I've missed this honestly. The dogs barking. So this is just me reflecting on what's happening, and what happened and what I think. Here where I am in this world. Okay. So at the end of this section, I decided to not use any sock because already here it finished very nicely. Okay. And meanwhile using any song also shifts the focus on what I'm saying, making it sound a little more serious. And since this is a very personal moment, so hear me in the balcony, just talking to myself or the camera. It created this nice vibe. No matter where I am in this world, I always keep wanting to come back. The positive experiences during my childhood shaped immensely who I am. And that's it. You see, now after going through the whole video, I hope you got to understand how much thought I put into only about 4 minutes of video. And how a lot of the editing goes unnoticed. Just as I said before, the best editings are the ones that you don't notice. Here, a lot of the editing goes unnoticed with the audio clips and the smooth transitions and how the music ends. So again, thank you for watching this. I hope you got to understand a lot of the editing parts and how I thought about the music, the cuts, everything, every aspect. And if you'd like to watch the whole video, continuously, you can do so in my YouTube channel titled, why do we keep Chasing Childhood echoes. With that set see you in the final chapter. 21. Final thoughts: Thank you so much for coming along this trip. I hope you'll learn new techniques, other ways to improve your videos, new ways to think and organize. Maybe it might seem a lot, but as you keep doing videos, you'll catch up on these new things and soon enough you'll get the hang of it. I've been doing this for years. I do have something I want to share with you, creating videos. Just like any creative form, you always have people who've been doing it way longer than you and are better than me or you, and thinking about it can be devastating. Understand that your videos are only comparable to past videos you've made. You cannot compare yourself to anyone else. Even if you didn't start making videos. You're comparing yourself to past, which is nothing. Any videos that you do will only be an improvement. You have nothing to lose. Keep doing, keep watching, keep practicing, keep analyzing. That's how you really improve if you follow this course. Chances are you really like the kind of videos I do. I have my own Youtube channel, Mr. Chops, and feel free to check out some of my stories. Legs included.