The Art of Editing (Part 3) - To All Montage Editors

Now, this is a piece of advice to all editors out there. After each and every effect, angle, piece of 3D work, etc that you apply to a montage, ask yourself these questions. First and foremost, “Does this editing device take away from the footage?” Second, “Does this editing device have no purpose?” Third, “Is this editing device clichéd and overdone?” If you answered yes to 2 or more of these questions, take it out. If you answered yes to the first question, take it out no matter what.

For all of you new editors out there, remember that you have to start somewhere. Don’t try to jump ahead of the curve and just emulate the editing techniques and styles of your predecessors and slather on dozens of pointless, complicated effects because if you do, you are almost certainly doomed for failure. Start off simple. Start off with the concept, “Less is more.” Don’t go off creating 3D Spartans and bullets, just sync a couple moments here and there, applying effects and simple angles wherever they’re necessary. DO NOT stray from this path until you have mastered this simple style of editing. Then when you feel that you are ready, move on to the complicated stuff. But, also remember this. You can still establish yourself as a good editor without ever moving on to the complicated material. There are thousands of people out there who appreciate the beauty of an old school style video, and as long as you do this well and consistently, you will become known, I promise you. Some examples are Phurion (probably the best example), Kblocker, and Kampy.

You will never become great copying the great ideas of others. This is an undeniable fact. Newer editors seem to have the mentality that, “If they did it and became successful, then it should work for me too!” Wrong. To leave an impression on the viewer, you must do something different. And given the current burst of unoriginality, this is your time to shine. Instead of only following tutorials and doing things other people thought of, just sit down and try to think of something new. It’s really that simple. Start watching great montages not to copy them, but to analyze them. Look past the eye candy and focus on how the angles are shot, how they’re placed, the transitions, the effect usage, the syncing patterns and everything else that makes a montage great. Look past the technical successes (eye candy) and see the innovation. To end this part of the post, here are some editing trends to avoid like the plague.

Motion Blur – It was cool when passTHEword used it, but now it’s just getting annoying. I’m not saying that you should avoid using motion blur entirely, I’m saying that you should be VERY careful with it. If it flows with the music, by all means, add it in. But don’t just do it because it looks cool.

Robot-esque displays – These are those awkwardly slapped on phrases that make it seem like you’re watching the first person view of a Terminator or something. They usually come in the form of “Target located” or “Target eliminated.” The worst one is “beast mode on,” because of how incredibly moronic and unprofessional it sounds. Anyways these came back after the immense success of .exe, a Halo 3 montage edited by passTHEword, which was actually themed around these. Unlike motion blur, just stay away from these entirely guys. They died back in the Halo 2 days and after passTHEword took the extra step of theming an entire montage around them, all of their worth is completely gone. There’s nothing original you can do with these anymore; they’re just dumb, awkward, and clichéd. Just let them die again.

Color Correction – Pretty much the same thing I said for motion blur. Almost all of the motion blur I see nowadays is completely pointless and annoying. Again, be VERY careful when applying color correction, especially because it is, like I said in The Art of Editing Part 2, hard to figure out and disastrous to tone, feel, and flow when applied incorrectly.

By staying away from these annoyingly popular trends you are not only making your montage not suck, you are also decreasing the pressure for other editors to follow these trends. When I was reviewing a render of a montage from the editor I previously mentioned in this post, he told me that he applied color correction because almost every montage seems to have it nowadays. I want a world where people don’t do this, a world where new ideas are commonplace and appreciated, old ideas aren’t recycled, and trends don’t develop and pressure people to conform. Thomas Edison once said that genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. It’s clear to me that the next generation of the Halo montage community has the 99% perspiration down. Now all we need is that 1% inspiration. Get going guys.