How to learn all about video editing?

Question

I have been self learning about 3D art(especially using blender) and have reached a level where I can make some use of my skills on a productive scale. (Even though blender has an integrated VSE) I though have to learn to make my small footages produced from 3D art seamless and I realized the importance of video editing. But, learning video editing comes with also technical knowledge about codecs and encoding and all the technical stuff.

I am not really a programmer, and I have been practising 3D art in a very intuitive and practical process. How do I learn about these technical sides of video editing in order to ready myself for a more strong and production scale way?
It would be very helpful if some books and resources were also included as a recommendation.

Answer 1

The best resources I've seen for learning how to edit are on YouTube. A lot depends on what NLE you'll be using to edit, but most editing fundamentals translate well across all NLEs (which is what I believe you're asking for anyway).

One popular YouTube channel with a ton of videos on how to edit is Film Riot. They have 700+ videos on all aspects of production, but a search for "edit" on their channel shows they have a ton to offer on that subject as well. They typically stay in Adobe Premiere Pro, but they generally strive to make their tutorials work across any editing software.

Surfaced Studio is another channel I've discovered recently with a nice playlist of some beginner-level Premiere Pro tutorials. Unlike Film Riot, Surfaced Studio seems to be pretty specific to Premiere Pro - usually, explaining how to work within the PP interface.

Answer 2

On the technical side, I recommend the tutorials Lynda offers. It's not that expensive, and you get access to a lot of material. You'll learn how to use your editor of choice and gain some insights into the art of editing, which happens to be the toughest part.

To make it easier on yourself, find a professional editor and asks her or him if you could observe them working or even if you could start assisting them. Otherwise, you'll end up knowing the tech part (like thousands of people out there) but have no idea how to really tell a story and how editing actually works or not.

Also, watch films. Good films. Start with films that won editing awards. Start with classic films, made for cinema and not television.

Answer 3

I have collected the best editing books that I could find, like In the Blink of an Eye by Walter Murch, which is a brilliant breakdown of story telling and conceptual editing. To apply these ideas you need good pictures and some form of story to tell. It doesn't have to be complicated.

But honestly the best way to improve at editing is to do it. And do it and do it. The best way to do this is shoot a bunch of stuff on any camera you have access to, like a phone. Plug a handfull of shots into a timeline and try to cut a sequence, that is make the shots illustrate some action. Perhaps its a person climbing stairs or making a drink. Try to understand continuity of action.

After you have something that makes sense, try and condense the action. Fnid out what you don't really need to convey the same message. Often you don't need to see someone perform an entire action. For example a person can approach a door, they don't have to go through it as everyone understands what will happen next and walking is more dynamic to watch that pulling on a door handle.

Blender's VSE is great but not so cool for beginners.

Ideally you need to be able to load up and arrange your media (video clips) into some sort of searchable format. For the VSE I strongly suggest that you look at the Easy-Logging addon at http://easy-logging.net/ It allows you add semantic details to your media. But handling the clips is still a bit of a handful due to the way Blender splits audio and video into separate strips (you can loose sync to easily).