Editing Video Clips

This afternoon was spent doing something that was new to me.  I was editing video clips.  Or, rather, I was directing the process of editing video clips.

Some time back (I think I posted about it) I was involved in the recording of about 2 1/2 hours of testimonial video from one of our customers.  The recording, etc. was funded by one of our suppliers who then used that video to create promotional DVD's about what we do.  They recently gave us access to the raw footage so that we could use it for our own purposes.

I am trying to do a couple of things with the video.  The first is to make a brief testimonial video that we can hand out to prospective customers.  Secondly, I want to cut a number of very brief -- 10 to 30 second -- sound bites from it to use in presentations or on our website.

It was a very interesting exercise in listening.  I would listen to the video and then stop the technician when there was a sound bite that I wanted to keep.  There are plenty that are great illustrations of points that I use in presentations.  The problem was more in discarding rather than in keeping.  The DVD needs to be brief.  When our supplier made their original DVD, they reduced the 2 1/2 hours of material to about 22 minutes.  I wanted something in the neighborhood of 3 to 6 minutes.  I got it down to a little over 9 minutes.  I don't know what else to cut!

It was an interesting process watching Rick (the technician) clip the video snippets that I wanted to keep.  He even took out a single word that didn't belong at one point.  I was impressed.  It went much more quickly than I anticipated.

Now, Rick will send me a link to the file that I can further evaluate.  I probably will change the order of some of what was said and think about how we will insert voice-over transitions in a few spots.  All-in-all, it was a much better afternoon than I expected.  I honestly dreaded it.  Sometimes it's good to be wrong....

Chris