Basic Video Editing, Part 2

Today, I'm in a bit of a hurry, so I'll just pass along these two basic tips:

Basic Video Editing Tip #1:
Keep Notes for Organizing Your Footage On small shoots this will seem irrelevant, but it's a very good habit to get into. This might be as simple as a sheet of paper that says "Monday, the Louvre, dinner with Sean and Cole, cruise on the Seine - Disk 3." Later, when you're looking for that footage of Grandpa sneezing on the Mona Lisa, you'll know which disk it's on. This is also excellent for when you archive your footage - storing boxes of DVDs with no accompanying text is a guaranteed headache down the road.

Basic Video Editing Tip #2:
Plan the Story You're Going to Tell One of the reasons you're editing is to tell a story or make a point. Leaving people with superfluous footage muddles your tale. Just like any story, your video should have a beginning, a middle and an end. This can be very simple: "We're going to the zoo, we're at the zoo, we sure had a great time at the zoo." In fact, if you're a famous Hollywood director, you still do the same thing: "Giant shark menaces New England town, men chase shark, men blow shark up." Every once in a while, someone will throw a subtle curve, as Orson Wells did in Citizen Kane, which starts out with the hero's death, then immediately leaps back in time to his boyhood. "Wealthy man dies uttering inexplicable last words, reporters search through his biography, audience learns a lesson about wealth, power, success and happiness." But, for the most part, everything follows this formula.

SOURCE: http://www.videomaker.com/article/14223/