by Cliff Roth
When you're shopping for a camcorder, comparisons of features and prices may be swirling through your head. But once you actually get the camcorder home and start shooting with it, you become more focused on learning how to use it as a communications tool -- learning how to speak in the language of video.
Editing is like the grammar of this language -- the language of the moving image. Editing concerns itself with the connection of shots. Each shot is like a word in a sentence, and editing is the structural "glue" that holds them together.
If you're thinking, "editing isn't for me -- it's too complicated," you're wrong. The fact is, once you get a camcorder you'll be editing whether you intend to or not. Every time you stop and start the camcorder, that's editing. When you operate a camcorder, you have to edit -- otherwise the camcorder would be running all the time.
Now whether you do a good job of in-camera editing, or a poor job -- that's a different story. And if you've already got a pile of tapes sitting on a closet shelf, waiting to be edited, then you've probably already lost half the battle with video editing -- since they weren't well-edited in the camera, you've got a much bigger post-production editing project on your hands.
IN-CAMERA VS. POST-PRODUCTION EDITING
There are two basic video editing strategies: in-camera editing, and post-production editing. In-camera editing is by far the easiest and fastest, but it can tend to be sloppy. Post-production editing can be more precise, and offers more flexibility with re-arranging things and shooting out of sequence, but it tends to be much more time consuming.
The way you shoot video will be vastly different, depending on which strategy you pick. If you're editing in the camcorder, you'll want to shoot very short scenes, with frequent changes in camera angles. If you're shooting with post-production in mind -- called "shooting to edit" -- you'll want to let the camera linger longer than necessary, and provide yourself with maximum "coverage" -- that is, lengthy shots from different angles looking upon the same subject. (In dramatic films, it is common to shoot wide, medium, and close-up shots of the complete scene, leaving the final decision of which shot to use when to the editing room.)
Unfortunately, the vast majority of camcorder users don't choose either of these strategies. Instead, they just shoot whatever they feel like. The result: Tapes that run on way too long to be considered edited in the camcorder, yet offer too few camera angles and "cutaway shots" to provide the necessary raw ingredients (coverage) to facilitate doing a good job of post-production editing.
So the first rule of editing is quite simple: Editing may be magic, but don't expect it to perform magic on footage you've already shot. For learning the basics about editing, you're best off starting with in-camera editing techniques, and then -- if you're up to it -- doing a shoot-to-edit project. Then, with these experiences under your belt, go back to that old footage and see what you can sew.
EDITING TECHNIQUES
Sewing is actually a very good analogy for video editing, because in many respects your main goal is to hide the seams -- to make the edits look invisible. In the aesthetic of traditional, Hollywood-style editing (as opposed to experimental/avant garde editing, which often takes the opposite direction), anything that makes the viewer more aware that an edit occurred is considered bad, while anything that distracts the viewers from the edit by getting them interested in the new shot is considered good.
That's why "jump cuts" are considered such a taboo in professional editing. A jump cut occurs when two very similar shots are edited together. This happens all the time in amateur video -- suppose you're taping someone speaking, and you pause the tape for a few moments, and then start the camcorder running again with the same shot. You'll have a jump cut.
How can you avoid jump cuts? The trick is to significantly change the shot before you start recording again. Look through the viewfinder when you pause the tape -- if you're showing someone in a medium shot (from the waist up) change the shot to a close-up before you start taping again. If it already was a close-up, then change it to a wide shot.
Suppose you've already recorded a jump cut. Using in-camera editing techniques, you can still get rid of it -- assuming your camcorder has a flying erase head. In this case, you'll want to insert a "cut away" shot to cover over the exact point where the jump cut occurs. Cut away shots typically last about two seconds, so you'll want to start this new shot at a point about one second before the jump cut occurs, and you'll end the shot two seconds later.
You've seen cutaway shots zillions of times watching TV news broadcasts -- the best examples are the "reaction shots" of reporters nodding their heads or taking notes while doing an interview. If you're shooting someone speaking and someone else is listening, then you can use the same reaction shot technique.
You can also just cutaway to something vaguely relevant to whatever the person is speaking about. If your jump cut occurs at a party, while someone is speaking about how good the cake is, then it makes sense to insert a cutaway shot of the cake.
Even if there's nothing relevant to cutaway to, however, you can always opt for something humorous -- like a dog, or something generic -- like a wide shot showing the location where this event is taking place.
If your camcorder is VHS or Super-VHS or VHS-C or S-VHS-C format, you may have a slight advantage over 8mm and Hi8 gear for these insert edits. That's because many VHS-family camcorders -- including JVC's top-of-the-line GR-SZ7 and the new GR-SZ9 -- can do video dub insert edits, in which the original sound remains and only the new picture gets inserted. With 8mm and Hi8 camcorders, you'll always be recording new sound when you shoot a new picture. So with 8mm and Hi8 you must be careful not to put your inserts in spots where you won't miss the sound.
VHS-family equipment also generally lets you replace the sound, while leaving the picture intact -- audio dubbing. This can be especially useful when you've shot a lot of travel footage outdoors, in which the soundtrack consists of wind noise and car sounds. Just replace the whole thing with music.
Of course, inserting both new picture and new sound simultaneously can be fun, too. This is what 8mm and Hi8 equipment excels at. It's an especially fun in-camera editing technique if you find you've recorded a chunk of tape that's kind of boring. For example, if someone is speaking, and gets boring, and then gets interesting again, you can insert new material over the boring part -- such as someone else commenting on what the first person is saying. Best of all, since the inserts are done later, the second person can predict and parody things that the first person is about to say. A ViewCam style camcorder makes it easy to show the tape to other people.
ELECTRONIC EDITING
When most people think of home video editing, deleting such boring parts the more obvious way - by just getting rid of them -- usually comes to mind.
You can't physically splice videotape. This is an absolute, rigid rule that applies to all videocassette formats. A spliced tape can damage your VCR or camcorder, and the splice itself will look like a massive glitch on the TV screen.
So all post-production video editing is done by selective copying, called electronic editing. The basic setup is quite simple, and works with any formats. Just locate the video and audio output jacks on your camcorder, and use standard phono-plug cables to connect these jacks to the A/V inputs on your VCR. A standard yellow (video) red (left audio) and white (right audio) color scheme is usually used to identify these jacks -- just connect the matching colors.
Next, start copying the camcorder tape by putting a fresh tape in the VCR, pressing the record button on the VCR (be sure to tape at the SP speed for best quality), and pressing play on the camcorder. Copy everything up to the first point you want to delete, and then pause the VCR. Keep it in pause until the part you want to deleted is about to end (the camcorder is still playing), and then release the VCR from pause to continue recording. Keep pausing the VCR whenever you want to eliminate something.
OUT-OF-SEQUENCE EDITING
Using the same basic technique but working at a higher level of editing sophistication, you can re-arrange material from the original camcorder tape. After pausing the VCR, simply fast forward or rewind the camcorder tape to the next point you wish to transfer (but work fast -- if this takes more than five minutes, though, the VCR pause mode will disengage and you'll have to pause it again.)
You can thus shoot the beginning and end of a story at the same time -- this is how TV news reports are commonly created. You can also shoot dramatic scenes the way Hollywood does it -- with a "master shot" (a very wide shot) and close-ups of each actor. Later, in editing, you'll piece them together as you see fit.
You can also re-use the same shot over and over again. Suppose you went to Disney World and your kid really liked Space Mountain and you have a shot of the kid saying, "I wanna go on Space Mountain again." If you're doing post-production editing on the tape, you can repeat this same statement every few minutes -- it will take on a comedic quality by the third repetition.
But the more you work with this "release the VCR from pause" technique, the more frustrated you'll eventually become. It's just not all that accurate, and it's very tedious. That's why edit controllers were invented.
EDIT CONTROLLERS
An editing controller is like a master remote control for both the camcorder and VCR. You just pause each machine (at separate times) at the points where you want the edit to begin, and the editing controller does the rest -- the better controllers automatically rewind the tapes a bit so they can "pre-roll", in synchronization, to the selected edit points.
Some camcorders and VCRs offer a "synchro-edit" feature that works similarly -- but they usually work only with same-brand equipment. Besides more universal compatibility, most edit controllers offer another advantage -- the ability to memorize an "edit decision list". This means the edit controller can automatically execute a whole series of edits. You can look at the edited tape, decide where changes need to be made, go back and revise the decision list, and have the edit controller re-perform all the edits. (You don't want to edit an edited tape, because each copy of a copy looks worse. So revisions must be made by going back to the originals and re-copying them according to the new editing plan.)
Videonics' Thumbs Up editing controller is probably the best overall value in a super low-budget (under $200) edit controller. It works with Hi8 and 8mm camcorders that have a Control-L (LANC) remote control jack, and with practically any VCR (it uses wireless infrared signals for the VCR.) Thumbs Up can also read two types of time code, and can even add time code to copies of tapes. Decision lists of up to 128 editing events can be kept in its memory.
If you've already got a computer, an inexpensive hardware/software product called Video Director, from Gold Disk, offers a similar LANC and infrared control setup, with the added bonus that you can re-arrange the sequence of shots and save edit lists on floppy disks. It costs about $125, and is available for IBM, Mac, and Amiga computers.
But Thumbs Up and Video Director's infrared VCR control systems don't offer the full range of editing options that some advanced editing VCRs offer. The best Super-VHS editing VCRs, such as Panasonic's AG-1970, offer selectable video dubs and audio dubs. To take full advantage of what these VCRs can do, a wired remote control system is preferable.
FutureVideo's EditLink line of computer based and stand alone edit controllers allow you to more fully utilize all the editing features in advanced VCRs. They are compatible with both Sony's LANC remote control jacks, and the Panasonic wired remote jacks -- thus making it a cinch to edit from a Hi8 camcorder to a Super-VHS VCR. The computer based systems can store decision lists of up to a thousand edits on floppy disk. Prices start around $600, and run up to about $2000 depending on features -- such as ability to read SMPTE time code, and to perform complex "A/B roll" edits to dissolve between two tapes.
Sony also offers two computerized edit controllers that work with its camcorders and editing VCRs -- if they're equipped with LANC remote jacks. The RME-700 is the more basic controller -- it reads RC time code, and can handle up to 99 edits in a
decision list. The RME-1000T adds A/B-roll control and floppy disk memory to the picture. Videonics recently introduced a low-priced A/B roll edit controller, too.
A/V MIXERS and TITLES
An A/B-roll edit requires three camcorders or VCRs (or any combination) -- two to play tapes back, and one to record the edited sequence onto. With A/B-roll editing you can dissolve from one tape to another, or create split-screen wipes and other special effects. An edit controller capable of doing A/B roll edits provides the coordination of the camcorders/VCRs, but it doesn't actually combine the images. That's what an image mixer does.
Panasonic has the most extensive line of image mixers -- beginning with the WJ-AVE3 (about $1,000), and extending up to the WJ-MX75 (about $5,000). The intermediate WJ-AVE5 and the very sophisticated WJ-AVE7 (about $2,000) are the most popular models with low budget video producers. They can dissolve (fade) between two different video sources (such as two camcorders playing simultaneously), and offer a variety of other special effects (the WJ-AVE7 has dual-PIP, letting you combine three images in one frame.)
Sony's XV-D1000 special effects generator< (about $3,000) provides similar functions.
The MX-1, from Videonics (about $1200), boasts very stable video signal timing, and similar image mixing abilities.
These A/V mixers also include basic audio facilities, along with the image mixing. So as you dissolve from one picture to another, the sound also cross-fades from one to the other.
You can also use these image mixers to add special effects to a single tape -- such as strobe or paint art. And most offer titling accessories that let you superimpose typed in character generator) credits.
For adding titles on a stand-alone basis, Videonics' Titlemaker 2000 offers an excellent selection of font sizes and options (like scrolling and crawling), as well as very sharp picture quality, for under $300.
Titles can also be edited in while you're shooting, of course -- this takes a bit of preparation, but like just about all in-camera editing techniques, it can save time in post-production.
NON-LINEAR EDITING
Everything described so far is based on using videotape as an essential part of the editing process. The newest development in video editing is called "non-linear editing", and involves transferring all the raw video to a computer hard drive, and then editing the video with computer software in much the same way that a word processor edits text. At the professional level, the most well known systems are the Avid, Data Translation, and Video Toaster Flyer -- but these cost upwards of $15,000.
You can experiment with non-linear editing on a lower budget, using software such as Adobe Premiere (available for both Windows and Mac) along with a video input board (such as the Video Spigot), but note that the picture quality won't be nearly as good, using low-budget non-linear editing, as if you used traditional videotape-based editing equipment.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Most semi-pro video producers wind up using an in-camera editing strategy for their more casual (non-paid) projects like family events and vacations; and revert to the safer, though more tedious post-production strategy for paid work such as weddings, bar mitzvahs, corporate parties, etc.
My advice to beginners is to edit in-camera to learn the ropes, then start shooting to edit as projects get more serious. Here's an exercise that may help you get started: Try shooting a short visual essay of a person, place, or thing, using in-camera editing technique. For this exercise, never zoom, pan or tilt the camera while tape is rolling. The essay should consist of a series of static (non moving) wide, medium, and close-up shots -- each carefully framed. Create two or three of these visual essays, and you'll be in an editing frame of mind.
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