The Art of Editing (Part 1) - Definitions

Editing is a beautiful art form with limitless possibilities. There’s a lot of controversy over what editing truly is, but here’s my definition. Editing is anything done with footage to make it more impressive and/or enjoyable to the viewer. Editing’s main purpose in a Halo video is to make the game footage flow with the music. Editing that doesn’t do this is called eye candy, effects that are there merely because of visual appeal (in other words, they do nothing except look cool). Speaking of effects, there is a vital difference between effects and editing which many people don't seem to understand. All effects count as editing. However, editing is more than just effects. An effect is something that alters video footage. Some examples are slow motion and color correction (basic effects) and the clichéd bullet and shattering glass (complicated effects). Editing, like I said before, is anything done with video footage to make it more impressive and/or enjoyable. Anything. An example of editing which isn’t an effect is simply placing a clip in a certain place on a timeline to sync it.

Now let’s lay out exactly how I judge editing. This should give you a slightly better understanding of the grades I give in my montage reviews and what I look for in a Halo montage editing-wise. For me, there are 5 main levels: Amazing, good, average, bad, and horrible. Amazing gets an A in a montage review, good gets a B, average gets a C, bad gets a D, and horrible gets an F. Naturally, some editing jobs fall in between these levels. Now here are the definitions of each.

NOTE: I will use several videos as examples, and after the 5 definitions will be a list of all of those videos and their respective reviews unless noted otherwise.

Amazing editing is heavy editing that harmoniously melds game footage and music into one with little to no flaws. In order for this to happen, almost all of it must add to the video in some way, shape, or form. Amazing editing rarely makes the footage hard to see or understand meaning that most of it should be clean and smooth. Syncing should be on point and the video should match the overall tone of the music used. But most importantly, amazing editing is creative. Amazing editing goes above and beyond the call of duty and works hard to bring something new to the table while rarely succumbing to overdone and clichéd effects. Amazing editing may resort to eye candy, but most of it should be original and of course, fulfill the purpose of eye candy by looking really fucking cool (like the two sides of a helmet coming together in Dualtality's introduction). Amazing editing also uses a vast spectrum of techniques and devices to keep the video from becoming stale. For me, there are very, very few Halo 3 montages in existence (just 2) that meet this definition. They are Dualtality (a no-brainer) and Dutchy’s Lag Warrior (a bit questionable. Also, the review for this montage should be coming soon). The Str8 Tage’s editing comes in third, but it’s still quite far from amazing status.

Good editing can range in terms of amount, but it usually falls in the middle. It’s essentially amazing editing minus the creativity and lesser in amount with few more flaws here and there. But, there are exceptions. Good editing can also be pretty heavy. However, one thing that good editing has to do is overall, add something to the video. Syncing should almost always be on point and there should be a substantial amount of it to provide the video with a noticeable flow. There may be a small variety of devices used, but the effects are generally pretty basic. This goes the same for originality. Good editing may have a few original components, but none of them are ground-breakingly amazing and/or revolutionary. Some good editing jobs also use recycled effects, but they’re well done enough to balance out the penalty of resorting to them.

To sum up everything I’ve said about good editing, good editing can be described in one word: solid. For some examples of good editing and an explanation of why they’re good, check out Good Morning and Scratch It Up plus their respective reviews. However, those are on the higher end of good editing (B+), so for a more accurate example of good editing, check out Kblocker’s and OutCold’s For the Love of the Game 2.

Average editing is editing that overall adds to the video but not by much. There’s syncing, but not very much of it, and some of it’s usually off/not noticeable resulting in little to no flow. Average editing is on the light side and is a result of not a lot of effort being put into the video. There are very, very few exceptions to this rule. If you want a good idea of what average editing is, envision a montage that’s just game footage slapped on to a song. That’s a C-. You might be asking, “Shouldn’t absolutely no effort be given an automatic F?” Well, a complete lack of editing neither takes away or adds to the gameplay, meaning that it could be worse. How? By taking away from the gameplay of course.

Bad editing is editing that overall takes away from the gameplay and is usually pretty heavy. Bad editing will not only resort to unoriginal effects, it will also execute them poorly. Bad editing may sometimes try to be original, but it always ends up creating a stupid, awkward mess in the end. In order for editing to qualify as bad, most of it has to be visually unimpressive, pointless, and make the game footage hard to understand and see. Instead of adding to the gameplay, bad editing tries to take it over, killing flow and forgetting its original purpose. I’ve seen my share of bad editing, but I’m not going to name any names to avoid offending anybody.

Horrible editing is editing that essentially fucks the game footage in the ass, making it an incomprehensible mess and a gigantic pain for the eyes. A good way to describe it is bad editing on steroids. Almost none of it adds to the gameplay and the clear majority of it will be over the top while not fulfilling any sort of purpose. Horrible editing completely takes over the game footage and turns the video into a monster trying to stab your eyes out. Luckily, like amazing editing, terrible editing is very, very rare. I don’t think I’ve seen more than 10 montages with editing I would deem horrible. If you want to see some examples of horrible editing, I’m sorry because I can’t provide you with any (shit like that needs to be erased from my mind). However, YouTube is a pretty damn good place to start looking.