So after editing hundreds of videos for my own channel and my clients’ channels as well, and getting hundreds of thousands of subscribers and tens of millions of views on YouTube, I have been able to boil down my entire editing formula and process into 10 simple steps that you can follow as well as a complete beginner. Now, I remember when I was making my first YouTube videos, it was a very stressful and painful experience because I had zero clue about what the process is that I should actually follow, how to use the certain editing software, and so on. So I really hope that this video is going to be able to give you the guidance that you need to be able to turn your raw file that you have just recorded into a ready-to-publish masterpiece that’s going to get you thousands of views and subscribers and all the success that you create. So without any further ado, let’s jump right into the first step of editing your YouTube video.
Step number one is organization. So what you want to do after you get your raw files from your camera or from your phone is to actually create a folder on your computer. I usually like to name it the name of the video and also the date that it was recorded on. And then within that folder, you want to create more subfolders which are going to contain all your files. This is important so that if you ever need to access the project again, you will have all your files in one place, and it’s just a very good habit as well to stay organized.
Then step number two is to actually start a new project with the right settings. So you want to make sure that the project settings actually match what you have shot your video in. So whether it was done on your phone or on your camera, just make sure that your project settings are actually going to be matching ideally both the resolution and also the frame rate of whatever you have used to record the video. And then once you have done that, you can actually go ahead and import all your files into your editing software so that they are ready to be assembled.
Now step number three is putting everything that you have onto your timeline and then cutting out all the fluff. This is very important that you are very critical with what you leave in the video and what you don’t because a good editor is not necessarily someone who knows all the most fancy effects and all of that stuff; it’s someone who knows what to keep in the video and what can be left out. You want to make sure that, again, anything that you are repeating too many times or that can be boring to the viewer are ideally cut out. And try to get down the length of the video to as little as possible while still getting all the information or entertainment across to the viewer.
Step number four is adding some music to your video. This is a very important step because background music really adds a lot to how the video feels as a whole; it adds a lot to the pacing, so it is a crucial step. And you want to use this to your advantage. And that actually brings us to the sponsor of this video, Epidemic Sound. Epidemic Sound is a restriction-free music platform where you can get all of your sound effects from and also all of your music from for your videos. Now, the reason why this is important is because if you are not using restriction-free music in your videos, then you are not only going to get demonetized, but sometimes your videos can also get flagged or even taken down on YouTube. I have been using Epidemic Sound for over 5 years at this point for pretty much all of my personal projects and client projects as well, and I can always find the music there which really just fits the vibe that I’m trying to create in my videos. They have a huge catalog of different songs; they have over 40,000 sound effects and over 90,000 songs, which is insane, and they keep adding new songs and sound effects to it every single week. It’s neatly organized into different playlists and folders, and you can also use their advanced search options.
They also have now which is in their Premiere Pro plugin, which can literally analyze your clip and give you song suggestions based on that. So they have a really amazing software and platform, and if you want to, you can actually try it out for a 7-day free trial in the description below. So again, thank you to Epidemic Sound for sponsoring this video, and let’s get back into it. Now, a couple of things to keep in mind when it comes to using music in your videos is you want to make sure that it is not too loud. One of the most distracting things can be if your song is just super loud and it’s overpowering your voice. And also try to avoid songs with vocals in it because that can also be distracting if you’re talking to the camera and the viewer can also hear some singing in the background.
Now step number five is adding supplemental elements to your videos. So this can be things like B-roll to kind of show the thing that you are talking about on the screen, and you can get these from different royalty-free stock footage websites or even YouTube. You can also use text to explain what you are doing better. Right? So you can pop up little text effects here and there. You can even add some captions throughout some parts of the video to just really, again, emphasize the things that you are saying, or you can even pop up images to explain it, icons, whatever it is. Right? You want to add these little extra things to just make your video that much more engaging. But keep in mind that the goal of B-roll and all of these different things is not necessarily just to make your video look better; the main purpose is to get the story and the content across to the viewer better. So you should only include something, in my opinion, if it’s actually going to enhance the viewing experience by either, again, getting the story across better or making the video more entertaining while still getting the point across. I see a lot of people who just add in a bunch of effects here and there; they zoom in, zoom out, do all of this crazy stuff when they really shouldn’t be at that part of the video. So that’s something to keep in mind: sometimes less is more. I know it’s exciting when you start learning all of these effects because you just want to use them all of the time, but try to only use them when it really adds to your story and doesn’t take away from it.
Step number six is adding sound effects to your video. Now the reason why this is so important is because if you already added some B-roll clips to your video, some text pop-ups, maybe some transitions even or different effects, if you add some sound effects to go with it, it’s going to make your video just feel that much more rich and more alive. Right? So if you, let’s say I pop up a B-roll clip right now of a fireplace, you know that if you just look at it, yeah, you can get the point that I’m talking about a fireplace, but if I add some sound effects to it as well, now you can feel how much more alive that feels. Make sure that you are using some sound effects, and again, you can use Epidemic Sound like I’ve been using, and they have an incredible library of sound effects.
Then step number seven is color correcting and color grading. Color correcting is when you just really get your video to look like how it should in terms of its exposure, contrast, and all of that. That really only applies if you have used like a flat picture profile to shoot your video or whatever. Ideally, you know, if you’re a beginner, you probably shouldn’t really be using those; just use the regular settings of your camera. And as long as it’s exposed well, so your video is not overexposed or underexposed, it should be fine. And then the color grading part is where you can really get a bit more creative. So color grading is a technique used in films and even YouTube videos to make the viewer feel some type of way. So color grading can almost be looked at like using different filters on Instagram. Obviously, this is like a very dumbed-down way to say it, and probably someone who’s like a professional editor would hate me for saying this, but again, make sure that it’s just a very small amount. You don’t want to have too strong of a color grade in your video because, again, that can just look a bit tacky and just overdone. You know that you have done just the right amount of color grading when the viewer doesn’t really notice it that you have color grading on the video unless they specifically look for it, because that means that it’s a nice and natural look and you’re all good to go.
Then step number eight is watching your video back and looking for any mistakes. Now this is a crucial part as well. There’s nothing more embarrassing than uploading a video and then later on realizing that you have left in a bunch of mistakes, maybe some offline media screens, maybe you left in some mistakes you forgot to cut out, because again, it can be very embarrassing and just ruin an overall professional video.
