How do you order your clips?

[white guy in a durag]

As someone who's never edited a skate video before, I've always been curious about how you guys structure your videos. I'm familiar with some of the basic ideas: hammers at the end, lines in the verse and single tricks in the chorus; but I was wondering if anyone could explain in more detail how they decide which clips go where?

a couple of follow up questions:

does your clip order change significantly after you pick a song?
do you approach edits without music differently?
do you approach montages with multiple skaters differently than a single person's part?
do you try to narrativize your editing or is purely aesthetic?
does b-roll have a deeper purpose or is it just to help align subsequent tricks with the music?
In videos with multiple single skater parts, how do you decide the order of the parts in the middle?

Thanks for any of the answers, and I hope that this can help some baby editors out.

[pedro_mayn]

I tend to edit to the song, certain parts where the songs may breakdown or change pace is where tricks can go in a particular order to fit with those parts or I might have a particular part of the track to keep the guest tricks or b-roll in etc.

On my main video I'm working on I've kept B-roll to really fit in with the surrounding footage, rather than it being an after thought and being put in there to just 'break stuff up'. I find some videos try too hard to make it fit in, rather than have a purpose. There might not be much in the final product, but I want it to really be there for a reason.

I've only ever worked on edits and I haven't put out a full length, however for the video I'm working on at the moment I've kept my montage in the middle and break up the parts with a particular 'beat' to them. It's just so it doesn't start clashing with the way the songs piece together in it or how the skaters may skate in the same way. Someone else might answer differently, but I think the video has to flow a certain way and not sound or look too similar in each part.

Keep an aesthetic you want to go with. That's 100% something that you may work on or could really come naturally through whatever's influenced you, really. Your video is your own thing and all. I have majority fisheye footage and not so much long lens, which isn't so much a conscious thing as opposed to just how I tend to film a lot of people I skate with and how some of the spots will look vs a long lens angle. Not so much that's my thing, but more a product of how the video's come along.

Hope that helps. It's definitely something I've been learning about more as I've been working on my video in the past year and something I try to look out for in my favourite vids. Also don't try to bite trends and do what you really want to do as well, which is probably already something you might know but yeah I find it's an important thing.

[OnSlapAtWork]

Just a few things that I will typically do.

If your playing fisheye single clips back to back, try to have one go from left to right and then the next clip right to left.  It makes the clips seem a bit more dynamic and also your eye is naturally on that side of the screen at the end of the clip, so starting with the action on the same side as where it ended is easier to watch.

I like to have night footage versus day footage grouped together.  I feel like the transition between night to night to night or day to day to day is easier to follow.  Also if there is early morning, dusk shots, I like grouping those together.

Try having b-roll/lifestyles that support a trick, as mentioned above.  Like a b-roll of a certain aspect of the spot, or statue in the background of the spot, then the clip itself.  Feels like it ties things together this way.

For montage, I like to have all of a persons clips together in one place, not spread out.  I think it makes it easier to have a persons skating grouped in one section.

Use markers on audio waveforms of the trick and markers on the audio waveform of the track to match skating to music.  Using markers on the audio track to start/end a clip or make a cut.  Doesn't always have to be exactly on the beat, sometimes I feel like this is to robotic/perfect.

Parts in the middle of the video could be ordered based on music selection.  I like if one song starts/ends similar to the next song, to put them together.  Makes it easier on the ears to transition between.

[el chino]

From ebay

[cosmicgypsies]

does your clip order change significantly after you pick a song?

to be fair i don't really consider the order of tricks until i've picked a song and have all the footage on the timeline. obviously certain tricks will be standouts and that's clear from the onset, but generally all my ordering takes place after i've picked a track. i will sometimes juggle certain tricks around, say if there's an "emptier" part of the song i'd probably move something like a manual to that section, and sync the landing up with when the song kicks back in. i'd imagine everyone juggles stuff around on the timeline like that.

do you approach edits without music differently?

can't say i've ever edited without music so i cant speak on that.

do you approach montages with multiple skaters differently than a single person's part?

not particularly, still run it with the same formula/trick progression as i would a single person.

do you try to narrativize your editing or is purely aesthetic?

no narrative per say, just trying to fit footage well to songs they work with.

does b-roll have a deeper purpose or is it just to help align subsequent tricks with the music?

b-roll can be whatever you want it to be. personally i will film absolutely anything on the off chance it comes in useful, always good to have extra footage for credits. i like b-roll that gives context of the spot/environment - sabo5 is a good example of that.

In videos with multiple single skater parts, how do you decide the order of the parts in the middle?

bit of a hard one to answer, all pretty situational. for example im currently editing a homie video with 3 single skater parts, one of em did a noseslide down some 8 or 9 flat 9 ledge, 3/4 trips back to get it and it was unanimous group decision that he gets last part. another parts this kid who's been skating maybe 2 years, but his progressions been absolutely insane to see, so i decided to give him first part. current ordering is intro > group skate part 1 > single skater part 1 > single skater part 2 > group skate part 2 > single skater part 3 > outro. in hindsight maybe i should swap group part 1 and skater part 1 around but eh i like the way it flows.

really 99% of it comes down to you and what kind of footage you have

[mostlyslappies]

does your clip order change significantly after you pick a song?

I think I do this in an odd way, a lot of times I'll get bored or antsy before I have music picked out and edit an entire part without music, which admittedly can be sort of painting myself into a corner.  But, after I pick a song I definitely start to switch some clips around and edit to the music. A lot of the time, for me, this approach leads to some interesting editing that I might not have consciously chosen to do, had I started from scratch with a song already picked out.

But definitely try to edit to the general mood and rhythm of the song, without over-editing to the beat, as that can get old pretty quickly. Hit the big accents and the broad crescendos/decrescendos of the song but avoid putting a make on every backbeat.

do you approach edits without music differently?

I feel like clips without music generally want a little more "space." Slower cuts, longer pauses between tricks.

do you approach montages with multiple skaters differently than a single person's part? do you try to narrativize your editing or is purely aesthetic?

I love editing montages, way more than single parts. Transitioning between different skaters' footage is always fun to figure out, and there's more opportunity to create a sense of narrative or place instead of simply structuring the part around a single person's tricks.

So yeah, I do like nice narrative curve, especially for more montage-oriented videos. For example, for the last one I did (a 9-minute edit with 4-5 months worth of footage, no full parts) I started with local clips and went out from there, through a couple midwest road trips, then back to a minute or two of good local footage to close it out.

Just depends on the kind of video you want to make. Personally, I'd rather watch a video that feels like more of a skate session or a trip, than just a straight part-for-part thing.

does b-roll have a deeper purpose or is it just to help align subsequent tricks with the music?

In going with the whole narrative thing, I think b-roll is very important. I try and always take some sort of b-roll at most of the spots we skate, and then use bits of that footage, sparingly, as a sort of signpost to create a sense of setting. Using afterthought B-roll that doesn't relate to the footage surrounding it is always where b-roll starts to feel contrived or "too artsy."

In videos with multiple single skater parts, how do you decide the order of the parts in the middle?

Depends on the skating around it. Some contrast, but not too much. So if you have a last part full of hammers, maybe the second to last one is a nice mix of bigger and also tech stuff, but also not like a purely ledge-tech-guy -type part.

But also, like cosmicgypsies mentioned above, you may already know the order before you even start editing, just because of context throughout the process of filming.

If your playing fisheye single clips back to back, try to have one go from left to right and then the next clip right to left.  It makes the clips seem a bit more dynamic and also your eye is naturally on that side of the screen at the end of the clip, so starting with the action on the same side as where it ended is easier to watch.

I like to have night footage versus day footage grouped together.  I feel like the transition between night to night to night or day to day to day is easier to follow.  Also if there is early morning, dusk shots, I like grouping those together.

^These are also both great points.

[Easy Slider]

Excellent thread.

How do you guys « group » the tricks in a part? I habe a tendency to work with batches of sinilar tricks, e.g. a few grinds, then some flips, then some slides. How do you feel about that?

 Another tendency is to edit all tricks done on one spot and then the next spot etc.

[cosmicgypsies]

Excellent thread.

How do you guys « group » the tricks in a part? I habe a tendency to work with batches of sinilar tricks, e.g. a few grinds, then some flips, then some slides. How do you feel about that?

 Another tendency is to edit all tricks done on one spot and then the next spot etc.

really depends on whos skating, i personally like some variance and i dont like having two of the same tricks or two of the same spot right after eachother (unless both tricks are from the same session).

[white guy in a durag]

Thanks for the responses guys. This is one of the most interesting sides of editing for me, but also one of the least written about.