1) Too flipping long!
Get to the point. Nobody except you knows what media you left on the cutting-room floor (unused footage). Spend an extra day coming back to your project and watch it; take out the parts that don’t illicit emotion, entertainment, or information value. Realistically, this is hard, but imagine what the end user is thinking as they watch.
2) Frantic timing
A popular technique is cutting out all spaces and pauses. Videos created using this ridiculous fad end up frantic, unemotional, and jerky. Leave this technique back in your adolescence; elevate yourself out of this horrible fad.
3) Be objective
The internet (particularly Youtube) has become a vapid wasteland of opinionated garbage. It’s time to mature past the “grab your camera and babble” phase. Prepare an outline and do research on your video topic. Call out sources and make sure they are reputable. Make your video worth the time to watch.
4) Music
Musicians have a special knack for choosing the right music better than non-musicians. Emotions can be stoked with the right music. Music is 100% content-reliant which means make sure it sets the right tone! Make sure not too loud, also!
BONUS TIP 1: Don’t settle for cliche piano/guitar music for your emotional videos – you can find better.
BONUS TIP 2: Sometimes you don’t need music, or you don’t music over the entire video. Experiment!
5) Sizing
With 2019 came non-standard sizings. In the past we editors only dealt with 4:3 aspect ratio at 720×480 non-square pixels. Now we deal with square pixels at tons of sizes. Here is a list of common sizes and their uses:
720×720 pixels (or any square size)
Use this for any social media
1080 wide x 1920 tall pixels
Use this less for social media, but more for TikTok or other full-screen vertical applications
1920 wide x 1080 tall pixels
Youtube, Vimeo, or longform (at least 60 seconds) social media
“4K” or 3840 wide x 2160 tall pixels
Youtube or Vimeo: super high quality only!
160 wide x 140 tall pixels
This probably won’t be used since it’s for the 1989 Nintendo Gameboy…
STEAM Digital 