Thunder is the 3rd story on my Editor of the Year entry.  This is an effects driven story.  You just don’t really see the effect.  That’s what you want when you use effects, to have the viewer not see them.  When you go to a movie and the effects aren’t believable the effects become a distraction and the audience isn’t watching the story, they are saying to themselves “That’s not real.”  Effects affect viewers.  Think about that next time you want to go overboard with effects.

I’m a big fan of NFL films.  The stories they create are simply visual candy.  I wanted to create a film effect for the story on Thunder in the spirit of NFL films.  I  wanted to create my own look and feel as well.  I have an effect on every clip in this story.  It’s not flying boxes.  It’s not crazy wipes.  It’s not picture in picture.  It’s something WAY more subtle.  I’m creating an entire feel for the story.  What I’m doing is never distracting to the viewer which is what editing is all about.  I created a feel for the story.  A simple feel.

Our story for this post is Thunder, which can be found on my Youtube page (http://www.youtube.com/shawnmontano)

The story starts off with shots you would see at the beginning of a Bronco game.

Fireworks going off.

Cheerleaders.

Fans Cheering.

The Broncos running onto the field.

You’ll see the first 14 shots in the story I applied a motion effect.  All these shot are at 50% speed.  Now when you motion affect a shot it tends to create a film effect all by itself.  I didn’t want to apply a motion effect to every clip, I needed to do something else to the video.

At [:22] Thunder and the video is moving at 100% speed. This shot is is a screen-grab in the finished story.

This shot is of the original video.

I suggest you click and open each picture to see the difference in the two screen-grabs.  Toggle back and forth between these two shots.  Notice the differences?

I’ve done several things here.  The one most noticeable is I ‘crushed’ the blacks, meaning I darkened areas more than they originally were.  See the blue on Thunder’s face mask and the blue on the rider?  They are a rich blue deep blue in the original video.  In my treated video they are a very deep blue almost to the point to being black.  Look at the NFL films logo, same thing there. Original video is that rich deep blue.  The affected video is still blue but closer to black than in the original video.

Now look at the whites like on the banner in the background or the whites around Thunder’s exposed head.  Notice how much richer the quality of the whites are. Look at the smoke from behind Thunder in the upper left.  It has a slight blue tint to it in the original video.  My affected video it’s much whiter.

It took me a while to achieve the exact look I wanted for this story.  Just ‘crushing’ the black wasn’t enough for me.  I wanted to enrich the whites as well.  It was mostly trial and error.  If you’re going to create a look like this I suggest you play around with how I’m about to explain how I did this.   From what I did you could create an infinite amount of looks for your video.

So how did I create this look.  First of all I’m sure there are many more ways to do this.  This is simply one way, my way. The first thing I did was create two video layers for this story.  The second layer being identical to the first layer as you see here is this screen-grab, click on it to see it bigger.

Here is what the first layer looks like all alone.

I’m currently editing on Final Cut.  But the way I did this can be achieved on other non-linear systems as well.  I applied a 3-way color corrector to video layer one.  I color corrected the shot like I would normally do.  Then AFTER I color corrected I turned the saturation ALL the way down so the shot turned black and white.  You’ll notice my screen-grab is not entirely black and white.  I’ll explain that in a minute. Here’s a screen-grab of what my color corrector looks like with levels if you want to try an imitate the look.

You’ll want to play with your black levels, the midrange levels, and your highlight levels.  That’s the 3 slider bars below the color wheels.  Notice my black levels are slightly lowered, my midrange levels are up significantly and my highlight levels are lowered slightly.

Then I moved to the identical clip on video layer two.

The first thing I did with the identical video on layer two is drop the opacity to 50% so the I could see through video layer two and down into video layer one.  Now it can see both clips together but manipulate each layer independently.  Doing this allows for greater control of your final look.

The clip I have on video layer two I add the 3 way color corrector onto that clip. Again I color correct like I normally do.  Once I get the shot color corrected the way I like, I started to drop the blacks levels on this clip.  Then, I played with the highlight levels (that’s the slider bar underneath the white color correction wheel). Here’s a screen-grab of what that color-correction looks like.

I went back to the clip on video layer one and started increasing the saturation on video layer one so just a hint of color appears.  This really brought out the flesh tones on people. You don’t need to increase the saturation too much as you can see here.

As I went clip by clip I made several adjustments.  Depending on the video I often decreased midrange highlight levels where as on other clips I increased levels.  This is really just how I did it on a few clips.  Once I got my look I needed to tweak each clip and I’m sure you will too.

So in review.

• Create your story.
• Copy all of your clips on video layer one and paste them on video layer two
• Add a color corrector 3-way onto the clips on video layer one
• Color correct to your desire
• Using the slider bar lower your black levels slowly, you won’t need to move the slider much
• Increase your midrange levels using the slider bar below the mids color wheel
• Drop opacity on the clips on video layer two
• Add a color corrector 3-way onto the clips on video layer two
• Color correct to your desire
• Lower your black levels
• Increase/decrease your mid levels
• Increase/decrease you highlight levels

I hope you can take what I did for this story and apply it to something you do.  I love to take a look at what you do with this idea.  Send me a link Shawnmontano@gmail.com I’d love to see your work.  Thanks for reading.

Shawn Montano

After Sex Offender is the 2nd story on my editor of the year tape.

It’s a general news story I edited in just over an hour. The photographer was invited to follow the Adam Walsh task force as they try and round up as many sex offenders as possible on this day.

What to learn from this post

• Watch for movement in selecting In points

• Select an edit point after a movement/motion has started

• Pay attention to Eye Movement when possible

• Sometimes you make an edit decision because it’s cool 

For this story I’m going to take you thru many edits and explain my edit decisions.

I start with a medium shot of a Marshall knocking on a door.  I want to start with a good piece of natural sound and I didn’t have it in any other shot I liked.  That is pretty much the only reason I start with this shot.

The 2nd shot [:03] of the story is this wide shot of a resident and the marshall opening the screen door.  Notice how I wait until the marshall has already started opening the door.  You are going to see edits on motion A LOT throughout this story.  I’m a big fan of editing on motion

• I’m a big fan of editing on motion

Editing on motion does several things.  When you edit on a motion the feeling the viewer gets is they are watching something un-staged.  If we start the edit and then he opens the door the act feels more staged.  Like someone saying action and then it happening.  You want edits to hide as much of any staging a possible (None of this story was staged and I never want the viewer to even remotely think that).  Speaking of staging, watch reality TV for a real good example of this.  Most of you reading this already understand much of reality TV isn’t all that real.  How else could the camera be in the right places unless they knew what was going to happen.  It’s the editing that makes reality TV seem so, well real.   By editing on movement and starting the edit after an action has started they hide (which is what editing is supposed to do) a lot.

The third shot [:05] we’ve moved inside a residence.  I use a J cut to help with the transition inside.  The sound of the marshall before the video of the marshall inside blends the edits together better.

The 4th shot [:08] is also inside.  I don’t let movement stop in the previous shot (they are walking in and the photographer following them is moving).  I take the edit on this 4th shot just before the photographer walks into this bedroom.  I use the movement of the photographer to help with my edit.  Please notice a theme here.  There is movement/motion at the beginning of each shot. Something I also pay attention to is eye trace and eye movement.  Notice the last frame of shot 3 and the first frame of shot 4 (previous two stills) the Marshalls are in the center of the frame.  I’m placing the viewer’s eye exactly where I want it.  In this case in the center of the frame.

• There is movement/motion at the beginning of each shot

Here is the last frame of shot 4.

Here is the first frame [:12] of the next shot I chose.

Both gentlemen are in the frame at the exact same spot.  That’s no accident.  When I get an opportunity to place the viewer’s eye exactly where I want them to be I do it in an edit.

Again in this shot I’m taking the edit mid-motion.  If there is one thing that can improve your editing on ANY type of program its this.  Take edits on motion instead of making an edit and then having a motion start in the frame. 

This is a “I think it’s cool edit.”  I take the edit mid-motion just like I done before.  I chose to start the edit on this frame not because of eye movement but because the Marshall looks ‘cool.’  Coming out of the vehicle he’s got this drivin look on his face.  He looks around while putting a piece of paper in his pocket.  I think he just looks cool.

The next shot [:17] taken mid-movement and I utilize a J-cut here.  Why?  If we were following we wouldn’t be constantly looking at him. But once we heard him say something we would turn our heads and look at him.  The J-cut imitates that.

The next 7 edits are all taken mid-motion or mid-movement.  I don’t do that on this shot [:44] however.

Why?  Well he have a caught criminal.  He is just sitting there.  The action of him sitting in handcuffs would draw your eye alone.

Another J-cut [:46] here.  Why?  Well you would be looking at the arrested individuals wouldn’t you.  You would hear the Marshall speak and then turn to look at him.  That’s why a J-cut is here.

For this edit [:50] notice I time the edit so that he puts head down just as the Marshall is saying they admitted to being here illegally.

The next 4 shots there is not much going on so my emphasis on movement isn’t as important.  The Marshall is also doing some interviewing so I let those shots play out.

The final six shots there isn’t an emphasis on movement as well.  The Marshalls have wrapped up todays work.  I’m simply looking for shot to help convey that as much as possible.  I’m also looking for shots that look ‘cool.’  I particularly like this one.

I like the rack focus [1:05] from the back of the vest to the Marshall.

It really is the simple things that make you a better editor.

Thanks for reading.  Next post will be up August 29th.

This blog primary job is to focus on the editing of stories.  But I would like to point out a few things about the videography.

1.  The photographer stayed with either a medium or wide shot whenever an opportunity to catch an apprehension on camera.  A very good idea.

2. Only when the environment was under control, like after an apprehension did the photographer shoot tight shots or try to get sequences. 

On may 9th I was chosen as the 2011 National Press Photographers Association Television Video Editor of the Year.

I’m honored to win this award for the 4th time in my career.  I also want to use this moment in the spotlight to teach as I always do.  I’m very proud of the stories that were on my tape this year.  I decided to right a blog post on each story.

The first story on my tape was Gratitude is a Common Denominator. This was a deadline edit, meaning I edited it in just 1 hour.

Here are some tips for editing under deadline.

• Lay down all your narration to the timeline
• Create a raw sequence
  
• Lay down all your SOTS to the timeline
• Lay down as many natural sound breaks and you are aware of (more on this later)
• Don’t worry about these edits being clean just yet

The first thing I do is lay down the narration in it’s entirety.  I DO NOT place narration in the preview window.  I load straight to the timeline.  Then I’ll go through the narration and delete what I need to, meaning I delete the 3,2,1s and the pauses, etc.

Next I create a raw sequence.  This is one of my holdovers from the linear world.  I’m a visual guy.  I like to see my entire raw in one place.  So I will make a new sequence, call it Raw and drop every piece of raw into this sequence.  Remember when we would shuttle back and forth on a raw tape? This is my raw tape linear style.  Yes, I know this totally goes against the true power of an NLE but when I’m under deadline what I’ve been doing for 14 years works faster for me.  I use both this Raw sequence and the clips in my browser.  If I know what I want and where its at I go to the original clip in the browser and load in the preview window.  If I don’t know what I want and I  shuttle through my raw sequence.  I tab back and forth from the Raw sequence the sequence I building the story in.  I always have scrubbing on when I edit this way.  Why?  I may hear something I want want to use in the story while I’m shuttling through my Raw sequence.

Next I place my SOTS in the preview window.  I mark ins and outs and drop to to the timeline.  I’m editing for speed and I know I’m going to trim and clean up final edit as I go so I’m not entirely worried about clean mark Ins and Outs. I just want to get them down on the timeline.

Next I’ll place as many natural sound breaks into the timeline as I immediately know.   Did I look at the video first?  Did the writer note natural sound moments?  Are there obvious ones?  I don’t waste time searching for natural sound breaks now.  As I scroll through the video I know I’ll find more.

So, here is the final product.

I started with a tight shot in this story.

Everyone knows the red bucket.  When you see money being put in the red bucket combined with the sound of bells.  Your mind immediately evokes the memory of A Salvation Army volunteer in front of some store.  Good natural sound selection is a great way to put the viewer mind into the subject matter

• Good natural sound selection is a great way to put the viewer mind into the subject matter

The next 3 shot are of musicians playing Christmas Carols and the natural sound of them doing so.

I’ve established the story and what’s it is about and set the mood in 4 seconds.  Pacing is often a very hard thing to set up early.  Often stories start fast and then slow down or do just the opposite.  When I’m under deadline I like to discover my pace as early as possible.  I’m also going to go back to these gentlemen playing at the end as you’ll see.  This is my bookends to this story.  If you can find some element of a story and place it in the beginning of the story and have enough video and the ability to return to that element it’s a great and easy way to bookend you story.

At [:06] into the story I establish my central character with a visual introduction as well as natural sound of him saying “Here we go, help Salvation Army right here.”

Another thing I am constantly thinking about is my shot selection.  I like to keep up the variety as best as possible.  The next shot in the story at [:10] is a tight shot.

In deadline mode I can’t always pick the optimum shot.  But I can constantly be thinking wide, medium, tight.

• In deadline mode I’m constantly thinking wide, medium, tight

If your thinking shot variety along the way it will eliminate problems as you edit.

Another element of editing I have constantly on my mind is match action.  Here is an entire blog post about match action for more detail about that.

Match Action and Hiding the Edit

Notice the next three edits. I start wide here

Then a medium shot taking the edit right as he turns his head (trying to hide the edit).

Follow by a wide shot starting the edit right on his movement (again trying to hide the edit).

Watch the story again

Notice how often I use his head movements to help me with selection edit points.  It’s a great trick to keep in you back pocket to help keeps edits clean and hide the edit.

I’m very proud of this deadline edit.  It’s simple and clean.  However I do want to point out two things that bugged me.  I simply ran out of time to change/fix before it aired.

The first one is here.

Notice that gentlemen looking at the camera?  So did I but not until it was too late.  When someone acknowlegdes the awarness of a camera it’s called breaking the 4th wall.  You don’t want the viewer aware this is a story being recorded.  You just want them to watch with no conscious elements to make them realize anything other than that.  Well this gentlemen looking at the camera and then moving out of the way is a distraction to the story.  I would suggest you avoid this as much as possible.  Silly me!

The other one is at [1:14]

My photographer was hand held at this point.  The camera shakes.  It subtle but still noticeable.  You want to do everything you can to keep the viewer from realizing their watching something being captured on a camera.  Camera shake is one of them.

Thank for reading.  Over the next 14 weeks (one every other week) I’ll have a new post discussing a story from my Editor of the Year Entry.  Look for the next one August 15th.  Part 2, my general news entry.