I was recently asked what kind of editor I was. It’s not the first time I have been asked and apart from hoping the answer is ‘good’, it most often seems to relate to what I work on most and/or like to work on most. Film, commercial, music video, fiction, non-fiction etc. The answer to that is often, yes, all of the above and more, a story is a story, a message is a message in my opinion and the challenge is to make it the best possible, a challenge I love.
On this occasion though what I was actually being asked came after I answered with some form of the above. The follow up question was, ‘are you a Premiere Pro editor'?’. To sum it up, essentially, what was my Non-Linear Editor (NLE) or software weapon of choice?
It came at a time when I had actually just agreed to do a couple of days editing a bit of non-fiction German TV with Avid. I hadn’t used Avid for nearly 2 years or so when I agreed and quite honestly, I was not feeling the most confident going in. When I found a very nice suite ready to go (although with an ergonomic mouse not made for a left hander), it was into the deep end on a software I could barely remember how to create a new sequence on.
But then I began looking through the rushes, trying to find in the back of my mind some hotkeys to help go a bit quicker, looking another couple up online and then remembering a way I used to like to log selects as subclips. Soon enough I had wrestled a couple of sequences together with one resembling some form of rough cut.
It made me realise that despite not having all the hotkeys in my mind and using that stupid mouse with my wrong hand making me a bit slower than I might have liked, what I was doing was what I was there to do - editing. Despite the software, I was using it in essentially the same way as I usually do. Find my selects, build a sequence and then start to tune it and cut it down or make it feel the way it needs to feel. It was at that point that I was using some of what is fairly unique to Avid and I was lost in the edit in the same way as always.
Once the job was done, I decided I should probably do a bit of work on Avid to really sure up my skills again. Then I was asked the above question about Premiere, Fired up some rushes at home on Final Cut and my mind had 3 NLE’s flinging themselves around in it so here I am to put down in writing what I think about the whole argument/debate about it.
It would be nice in an ideal world that there was just one system that we could perfect and then use. However, the fact that there are more underlines my 100% belief that it is not the software or machine that makes the editor, it is what they use it to produce that is important. A good editor is a good editor and ‘good’ is based on how they are able to build a story or message and create a feeling and shape the footage.
The question I would ask to press the point further is whether a sculptor is a better sculptor if they use marble instead of bronze?
Naturally, there is a question of speed and knowing the ins and outs of a software can help in speed a huge amount but then so can experience and speed of mind for things to do, try and succeed in doing whilst shaping the footage. Simply being an expert with a certain software does not make a good editor, at least in my opinion. I always think that when I am in a position to hire editors for the films I am making, I will be thinking first and foremost about the person, their ideas, their unique approach to the story being told, their connection to it and how it ‘clicks’. Secondary to that is what we will use to get there. Maybe it could be best for the project, finances and other considerations to use a tried and tested workflow/software we are happy with as individuals and maybe best would be to go for something neither one of us knows/loves. What is lost in speed knowing keyboard shortcuts will be countered by the speed of mind and willingness. And over the course of a good, long edit, speed of software knowledge always builds. After all, my first couple of hours driving that Avid with the right handed mouse probably looked like Bambi on ice but (hopefully) by the end of the day I looked like I knew what I was doing and it got done.
At this point, I’m very aware that a casual reader who has found this blog might be wondering if I actually give my opinion on the various tools and softwares editors use so I will. I will only point out what I believe to be the advantages of them. If I have left out certain things you are expecting to see here it will mean that I don’t actually see much difference between them and so just assume it is fairly similar across the board. So, in no order of preference:
AVID
This is what I learned on, way back when. I didn’t know any alternative for the first years of my career. It has had many facelifts, many improvements since but still seems to be the base standard for cutting long-form projects and also some shorter form. It (at least to me) seems to be designed to give a quite literally hands on approach with the keyboard being responsible for around 90% of the actual editing. Marking, lifting, extracting, trimming and more on a sequence can (and for speed probably should) all be done using the keyboard. I can fully see and feel why it is the weapon of choice for these longer form projects, its stable and the methods used really lend themselves to fine cutting after a bigger sequence build though it can lend itself to a perfect workflow short-form too. Of course however, it costs and is not at the cheaper end of the market and requires a subscription.
PREMIERE PRO
I came to Premiere Pro via wanting to use After Effects. I have worked a lot as a compositor/Visual Effects Artist and, after using things like Smoke & Flame, wanted to turn my attention to AE. The major reason forit was that I wanted to work more as an editor and have that advantage of being able to do the VFX too. The dynamic link across the Adobe Creative Suite means that you can easily share between Premiere, Photoshop, After Effects, Audition etc and keep going. I’m not writing that this is not possible elsewhere (and of course, Final Cut has Motion and Resolve has Fusion) but I like it. I have also found that there is work to be done for many companies who are newer to video and ‘content’ creation such as marketing companies who encourage Adobe use as they have the licenses across their firms. I have also found that there is nothing you can not edit via Premiere. For me personally, it would be a weapon of choice for short form projects, particularly those that will integrate multiple After Effects compositions etc in it down the line, music videos, some commercials etc. However, I am editing a 15 minute short in it without any issue and would be happy taking it on another very long-form spin. As Avid, it is a paid subscription model but you do get other apps such as AE, photoshop etc for what I think is not too dissimilar from Avid monthly.
FINAL CUT PRO
Talking of cost, FCP is (at least at the moment) based on a one-time purchase method of I think €300. You can top it up with Motion and Compressor for around €50 each. With that package you have an NLE in FCP, a VFX package and compressor which is Apples answer to Adobe’s Media Encoder for what I hope is for life. There is no denying that it works a little differently to those above but what many see as a problem actually can become an ally. The magnetic timeline can take some getting used to as can the media management, labelling, keywording, logging and general way of navigating an NLE. Some (many) hate it. Some (sadly fewer) love it. However, I have really found a love for it over recent months. Sadly, it is not necessarily found everywhere (yet) but Apple have however committed to an effort to support it in the wider post-production industry after an open letter (to which I was a signatory to) was met with a positive response. In my humble belief, I feel that it has a huge future at the very least within long and shorter form documentary. The way in which media is organised and logged really does allow for a unique look at what can often be countless hours and hours of footage.
DAVINCI RESOLVE
Born from the (mainly) colour grading software, some still don’t realise that Resolve has within it not just a very powerful colour unit but also an integrated edit tab, a finer cutting ‘cut’ tab, Fusion (which is a node based compositing/VFX tool) and also Fairlight, an audio tool. In many ways it is the Adobe video creating suite under one roof, no needing to open up various software using a dynamic link, just tab between the different tools. Even better, it’s free. Kind of. The ‘lite’ version is free and has within it many of the functions but not some of the heavier tools such as the dynamic resizing (to up-res footage to higher resolutions), de-noise and more. However you can edit, fine-cut, colour, key, make many VFX and export all within the free version. The ‘studio’ or paid version comes in at around the same one-off price as Final Cut Pro and has everything within it. It also reads Linear Time Code (LTC) which may be hidden in an audio track (when using something like a tentacle sync unit for synchronised timecode), something only Avid of the above does within it with FCP, for example, requiring an inexpensive third party software to do.
SONY VEGAS
Yes, there really are more than the above 4. However, I haven’t used it so I will link to the main page to find out more. It looks interesting and, despite there being countless others out there which can do a job (although within limits), will leave these here as the 5 I have encountered within professional circles and conversations.
To conclude, editing is about so much more than the NLE you know best or prefer to use. If you were to ask what I have ready to go within my own set-up, I would have to answer with Premiere, FCP and Resolve Studio. But I’d be happy to sort out an Avid license (I do have the free Avid Media Composer First) to work on my own system if the workflow required it. Going in to a company, I’d be open to anything and am secretly hoping for an invitation to do something for someone on Sony Vegas some time. Would that make me a ‘Vegas editor’?
Whatever it makes me, I’ll just get on with it but, yeah, do give me a shout for any of the above.