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DEEP DIVE ARTICLE TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

Why do YouTubers Jump Cut?

While the depth and breadth of content that can be found on YouTube has grown immensely since the early days of wall to wall vloggers, it seems as though the jump cut will forever be considered synonymous with YouTube.

YouTubers use jump cuts to speed up the pace of the video, to hide mistakes and/or to keep you engaged for longer than just simple talking head videos. If you are moving around the screen it helps the video flow better and gives the viewer something new to focus on, preventing viewer fatigue. 

That being said, even today there are plenty of channels that make use of the technique, with perennial favourites like Philip DeFranco—who arguably helped push jump cutting to the forefront of YouTube consciousness—still doing their thing all these years later. But why do they do it? Or, for that matter, what is it?

We’re going to answer both of those questions and more, so settle in, and let’s get started.

What is a Jump Cut?

The proper definition of a jump cut is a sudden transition from one scene to another. That is, no fading in and out, no special effects, just one frame you are looking at one scene, and the next frame you are looking at a different one.

This is the definition of a jump cut as it applies to things like television and cinema, but the YouTube variant is a little different.

In the context of YouTube, a jump cut does not need to cut to a different scene, and often doesn’t. Jump cuts on YouTube are far more often used to cut from one part of a scene to a later part of a scene, essentially snipping out the intervening footage. This is possible because the idea of YouTube jump cuts is established. What would once have been considered messy, unprofessional editing is now a style, and viewers have become used to it and don’t wonder what’s gone wrong with the video when jump cuts happen and the YouTuber snaps from one position to another.

Of course, it is still a jump if it does cut from one scene to another—the established definition still applies when relevant—it is just that, on YouTube, it is more often used in this manner.

Do YouTubers Use Their Real Names?

Why do YouTubers Jump Cut?

So, now that you know what a jump cut is, why do YouTubers use them? There are a few reasons why this technique is so popular, so we’ve broken them up into the big ones.

Give the Video More “Punch”

You don’t need to be an expert in psychology to understand that the average attention span of a human being, shall we say, not what it used to be. Sure, the subject matter of a video can be enough to draw people in if they are interested enough, but on an online platform like YouTube, dry, slow content will not bring in the new viewers.

Jump cuts allow a YouTube to speed up the flow of their video so that the beats of the content hit closer together, leaving the viewer less time to become disinterested and click away to something else.

Reduce “Dead Air”

On a very similar note to the last one, jump cuts provide a handy method for cutting out some of the more awkward pauses, sniffles, sneezes, and mistakes that might otherwise have required a reshoot of a particular part of the video.

As we mentioned above, the fact that jump cuts are now something viewers are used to makes it possible to use jump cuts to edit out mistakes without having to worry about continuity between the remaining footage. If the YouTuber suddenly cuts from one position to another, that’s just the style of the video.

Keep the View Time Down

If you have a lot to get through, jump cuts can be a great way to keep the overall time of the video down, since excessively long runtimes can be off-putting in certain niches.

Keep the Editing Time Down

Jump cuts are quite possibly the lowest-effort method of cutting a video together, short of paying someone else to do it for you. Almost all YouTubers start out doing everything for themselves, including editing. And, when they are trying to upload multiple videos a week—often around a job or education—anything that saves time on the overall process of making the video will be welcomed. It is said that, on average, you will spend five hours editing for every one hour of footage you recorded, so this is certainly an area to focus on when trying to save time.

Fast Talking is More Persuasive

One way or another, you are trying to persuade your viewers of something. You might have a point you are trying to get across or the persuasion might just be that you want them to keep watching. Well, it turns out fast talkers are more persuasive and, while a jump cutting YouTube might not be a particularly fast talker in day to day life, jump cuts allow them to create the impression of fast speech by cutting out the gaps between sentences.

Comedy

A well-timed jump cut can be pretty funny. That’s all there is to this one.

Monologuing is Hard

Granted, scripting makes things a lot easier, but sitting in front of a camera and talking for three to ten minutes solid is no easy task. And, unless you are planning on hosting a late night show, it’s not a skill that has a great deal of use in mastering. With jump cuts you can dive into your monologues without worrying about getting through the whole thing in one take.

When Not to Use Jump Cuts

As long as that list of reasons why YouTubers use jump cuts is, they are not perfect in all situations, as most things aren’t. Here are a few reasons to steer clear of using jump cuts in your YouTube videos.

You Want the Viewer to Digest What You’re Saying

Jump cuts are fine for getting relatively light information across. The aforementioned Philip DeFranco makes good use of them, but DeFranco covers daily news and entertainment stories. He occasionally dives into big topics, but there’s rarely anything you need to fully engage your brain on.

For something like a VSauce or a PBS Spacetime, a jump cut format would be wholly inappropriate, because the presenters want the information to get across in a methodical, thorough way, and bombarding you with key points on something like the physics of a black hole will likely overwhelm you (unless you happen to be an astrophysicist of course).

Why do YouTubers Jump Cut?

You’re a Slow Talker

All the notes about how fast talkers are persuasive and how “dead air” can be a turn off for the viewer aside, some people are just slow talkers, and it’s not always something you can do anything about. This isn’t a death knell in your YouTube dream’s coffin, of course, but you need to play to your strengths. If you can string fast sentences together, jump cutting works. But if you speak slowly, jump cuts will look awkward and stilted.

It Reduces Your Watch Time

Now, let’s be clear, we are not suggesting you stuff your videos with awkward silences and drawn out sentences just to increase the watch time, but if your content sits well without the jump cuts, this could be a reason not to add them.

As most of you probably know, watch time is one of the most important metrics to improve when you are looking at boosting your visibility in the YouTube algorithm, not to mention increasing the revenue you get from the YouTube Partner Programme. The more time people spend watching your content, the more ads YouTube can show and the more likely they are to promote your videos in the future.

Just remember, this only works if people watch your videos. Having a thirty-minute video will do you no good if viewers click away after two minutes because the content is boring.

The Non Sequitur Jump Cut

All the talk so far has assumed the jump cuts being used are done so in a linear fashion, such as would be the case if someone recorded a five-minute monologue and then used jump cuts to edit out all the “uhm”’s and “ah”’s.

A well established convention on YouTube is the non sequitur jump cut, which is almost like a regular jump cut, only instead of cutting from scene to scene, it is cutting from one train of thought to another. This is often used to interject small asides, almost like footnotes in a book, and allows the YouTuber to add more context to a topic, or interject their personal take on something they are talking about in otherwise neutral tones.

Final Thoughts

The jump cut, like many techniques and tools at a YouTubers disposal, is a powerfully useful thing when used correctly. And, like most useful things, it can be overdone. If you cut too often, you can very easily give your video a white noise feel, where the information is coming at the viewer so fast that it is hard to absorb.

Used correctly, however, it can make a video punchier, more entertaining, and better-flowing. And, like all things on YouTube and in life, you can learn how best to utilise jump cuts with practice… but looking at other YouTubers who do it well won’t hurt, either.

Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube

Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.

1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search

I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.

Within 12 months I tripled the size of my channel and very quickly learnt the power of thumbnails, click through rate and proper search optimization. Best of all, they are FREE!

2. Adobe Creative Suite helps me craft amazing looking thumbnails and eye-catching videos

I have been making youtube videos on and off since 2013.

When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.

Big mistake!

I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.

That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.

Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.

3. Rev.com helps people read my videos

You can’t always listen to a video.

Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.

This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.

Rev.com can help you translate your videos, transcribe your videos, add subtitles and even convert those subtitles into other languages – all from just $1.50 per minute.

A GREAT way to find an audience and keep them hooked no matter where they are watching your content.

4. PlaceIT can help you STAND OUT on YouTube

I SUCK at making anything flashy or arty.

I have every intention in the world to make something that looks cool but im about as artistic as a dropped ice-cream cone on the web windy day.

That is why I could not live on YouTube without someone like PlaceIT. They offer custom YouTube Banners, Avatars, YouTube Video Intros and YouTube End Screen Templates that are easy to edit with simple click, upload wizard to help you make amazing professional graphics in minutes.

Best of all, some of their templates are FREE! or you can pay a small fee if you want to go for their slightly more premium designs (pst – I always used the free ones).

5. StoryBlocks helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways

I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.

And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.

I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.

I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the StoryBlocks website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.

They have a wide library of videos, graphics, images and even a video maker tool and it wont break the bank with plans starting from as little as £8.25 ($9) per month.

Categories
TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

How to Edit YouTube Videos for Free

Editing your videos is a significant part of a successful YouTube channel, and one that is often neglected by channels that ultimately do not find success. The problem with editing is that it is very time-consuming. Indeed, a rough guide for how long it will take to edit a video will tell you to expect to spend five times as long editing as you did recording.

Think about that for a second. If you record two hours of footage, you’re probably going to be spending around ten hours editing. And you might end up with fifteen or twenty minutes-worth of video when you’re done.

Of course, there are several ways to make the editing process a little less painful, but they all involve spending money, something that many YouTubers—especially new YouTubers—might be reluctant or can’t afford to do.

We’ve put together a little guide on how to edit YouTube videos for free, but fair warning; there are no easy shortcuts.

Give up on the Idea of an Editor

Many YouTubers, once they start to find a bit of success with their channel, find it worth their while to hire an editor to take care of their editing needs. It is often possible to find an editor quite cheap, especially if that editor is taking on multiple YouTuber’s work.

However, we are not looking for cheap here, we are looking for free.

It is not impossible that you could find someone prepared to take on your editing for free—especially if you are a well-known YouTuber, and they are looking to build experience—but it is unlikely that any such arrangement would last for long.

Unfortunately, the only way to get your editing done for the low price of free is to do it yourself. Your other option, of course, is to work on your initial recording to the point that it doesn’t need editing, although you can easily find yourself in a situation where you spend as much time preparing for a video as you would have editing it.

How to Edit YouTube Videos for Free

Plan Your Time

There’s no way around it; you can’t save money on editing without spending time in its place, and, as we mentioned earlier, editing takes quite a bit of time, so you’re going to need to plan your time accordingly.

If you don’t make allowances for the time you will need to spend editing, you will soon find yourself with delayed videos, or sitting up editing until the early hours of the morning because you underestimated how long it would take.

It may take a few videos to get a sense of how much time you need, but set aside enough time to edit your videos in your schedule.

Pick a Free Editing Solution

Most YouTubers will tell you they use something like Adobe Premiere, but professional software means professional prices, and that’s off the table for our free editing guide.

There are plenty of free alternatives, including YouTube Studio itself, although they generally have fewer features and less powerful functionality. Still, you don’t need a great deal to get basic editing done, and if you’re not planning on adding Hollywood-grade effects, you can probably get by with one of the following free options;

  • YouTube Studio
  • Windows Movie Maker
  • Apple iMovie
  • Videoshop – Video Editor
  • Windows Photo App
  • Videorama

Learn the Ropes

Once you’ve picked an application or service to edit your videos in, you need to know how to use it. Fortunately, there are generally plenty of helpful resources and tutorials for free video editing software.

Take a little time to familiarise yourself with the software you intend to use so that you don’t have to learn “on the job” when you’re editing your videos.

How to Edit YouTube Videos for Free 1

Is Editing Really That Important?

As hinted at above, it’s not editing that is important as such, but the quality of the final videoThat is the thing that makes the difference between a slick video and a stilted mess. You can achieve that by working to make sure your video is free of mistakes and awkward silences, but the chances of you achieving that goal are pretty slim—there will always something that needs editing out.

Exceptions to this are live format videos, such as live streams, and recordings of podcasts. It’s not that the video wouldn’t benefit from editing in these cases—indeed, many streamers produce edited highlight videos from their streams—but the raw, unedited nature of these formats is more accepted by the viewer.

What Should be Edited Out?

This question can’t really be answered definitively, since editing is in large part a creative process, but there are a few things you can assume should be cut out in most cases.

Mistakes are the obvious one, especially mistakes that you then repeat to correct yourself. Long, awkward pauses are another thing that should be removed, as they are generally uncomfortable to listen to. Finally, any unintended noises, such as coughing and sneezing, drinking, or animals making noises in the background can be very grating to your viewers.

If there is a significant mistake that you deem necessary to edit out, try to make sure the video remains consistent. If the part you have edited out ends up making part of your video not make sense, you will need to reconsider your edit, or re-record the part that you removed.

Final Thoughts

Even when you are paying for your YouTube videos to be edited, it doesn’t need to be expensive. There are many affordable editors in the market for reliable work, and many affordable software solutions if you want to learn yourself.

That being said, editing your own videos—even if it is only a temporary affair until your channel grows—is a valuable experience. It not only teaches you things to look out for when making your videos, things that can make the editing process much quicker, but it also makes you appreciate the editing process a little more, since you’ll know what is involved. It can also just be fun to learn new things!

Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube

Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.

1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search

I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.

Within 12 months I tripled the size of my channel and very quickly learnt the power of thumbnails, click through rate and proper search optimization. Best of all, they are FREE!

2. Adobe Creative Suite helps me craft amazing looking thumbnails and eye-catching videos

I have been making youtube videos on and off since 2013.

When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.

Big mistake!

I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.

That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.

Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.

3. Rev.com helps people read my videos

You can’t always listen to a video.

Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.

This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.

Rev.com can help you translate your videos, transcribe your videos, add subtitles and even convert those subtitles into other languages – all from just $1.50 per minute.

A GREAT way to find an audience and keep them hooked no matter where they are watching your content.

4. PlaceIT can help you STAND OUT on YouTube

I SUCK at making anything flashy or arty.

I have every intention in the world to make something that looks cool but im about as artistic as a dropped ice-cream cone on the web windy day.

That is why I could not live on YouTube without someone like PlaceIT. They offer custom YouTube Banners, Avatars, YouTube Video Intros and YouTube End Screen Templates that are easy to edit with simple click, upload wizard to help you make amazing professional graphics in minutes.

Best of all, some of their templates are FREE! or you can pay a small fee if you want to go for their slightly more premium designs (pst – I always used the free ones).

5. StoryBlocks helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways

I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.

And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.

I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.

I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the StoryBlocks website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.

They have a wide library of videos, graphics, images and even a video maker tool and it wont break the bank with plans starting from as little as £8.25 ($9) per month.

Categories
TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

All You Need to Know About Hiring YouTube Video Editors

By far one of the most time-consuming parts of being a one-person YouTuber is the editing process. Most seasoned video editors will tell you to expect anywhere from 5x to 10x the amount of time editing as you spent recording. That means that, in the worst cases, four hours of footage could take as much as thirty hours to edit.

That’s nearly a full time job for one weekly video!

Needless to say, many YouTubers, once they start making good money from their channel, decide it would be a worthwhile expense to hire an editor to take this particular time sink off of their plate.

But for newer YouTubers, there are a lot of questions surrounding using a YouTube video editor. Should you outsource video editing? How to hire a video editor? And so on. And we’re going try and answer those questions here!

Do I Need a Video Editor?

In the vast majority of cases, the answer to this problem can be a resounding “yes”. Some YouTubers will always prefer to edit their own videos, of course, but for the rest of us, having someone else to handle the editing easily takes half—or more—of the workload involved in running a YouTube channel off of your plate. And, for most of us, it’s not fun work, like filming the video often is.

Reducing the amount of things you have to do that aren’t enjoyable is a great way to ensure you don’t burn out and stop wanting to make YouTube channels. Hiring an editor will certainly do that, but the “do I need a video editor” is not the right question…

Should I Hire a Video Editor?

Things are a little more complex than simply musing over whether you would be better off with an editor. An editor needs paying, which means you need to be able to pay them. If money was no object, you could hire an editor, a special effects expert, voice over artists, animators… but money is an object. Especially for smaller YouTubers who are not making a lot of money from their channel.

If your YouTube channel is not your main income—which is a polite way of saying it is currently, technically, a hobby—then you need to look at it as a recreational expense. If you can afford to hire an editor as a disposable income expense, like you might budget for a gym membership or other non-essential expenses, then you could consider hiring an editor as it will definitely make your life easier in those earlier days of getting your channel up and running.

However, if money is a little tighter than that, and you can’t comfortably afford to hire an editor, then the answer is a resounding no—you shouldn’t hire one.

It may make your life easier as a YouTuber, but you don’t want to find yourself in a situation where you have to choose between eating and your YouTube channel.

All You Need to Know About Hiring YouTube Video Editors 2

How Much do YouTube Editors Charge?

Let’s start with the obvious caveat—every job is different, and different editors will charge different rates. There is no fixed rate that is consistent across all editors.

That being said, you can typically expect to see prices between $50 and $100 per minute of finished video. That means that, at the top end of that scale, you can expect to pay around $300 for a three-minute video.

As you can see, things can start to get exorbitantly expensive if your videos are over ten minutes long.

The quality of work will be a factor, as well. You may find an editor willing to work for closer to $25 per minute of finished video, but there will probably be a reason for that. In the best case scenario, it might be a talented editor who is just getting started is trying to build up a portfolio. That being said, it could also be an editor who is not very good and is charging very low rates because it’s the only way they can get work.

In very rare occasions, you may find someone who is prepared to edit your videos for free for the exposure and experience. While we won’t say you should avoid these relationships, you should certainly exercise a little caution. Firstly be clear about what the terms of your arrangement are, and what your editor is allowed to do regarding promoting their work. Secondly, don’t get comfortable with the arrangement, as your editor will almost certainly want to be paid for their work eventually.

Finding an Editor

If you decide to hire an editor for your channel, you should do plenty of research on any potential candidate before hiring them. Remember, the content that gets put out is ultimately yours, and it will be under your name. You need to be happy with the editors style.

Are you comfortable with them interjecting funny asides into the videos? If not, make sure they know. If there are no examples of their work publicly available, ask for some.

It’s also good to get to know the editor as well as you can. Remember, this person is going to be looking at hours of footage of you, fluffing words, forgetting lines, and generally doing things that you wouldn’t necessarily want people to see. You need to be comfortable with your new editor seeing those things.

Make it Formal (Legal)

If you use a freelance service like Upwork to find your editor, the legal stipulations should be in place by default. However, if you are going directly to an editor, you should have the terms of their hiring in writing—even if it’s only an informal email. Specifically, you want to stipulate that they cannot use any of the footage they are sent unless given express permission by you. This help to prevent any unfortunate footage being leaked by a jaded former-editor.

Just bear in mind that, if the editor breaks the terms of your agreement—even if you have an official contract drawn up by a lawyer or solicitor—you will need to actually take them to court for anything to happen.

Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube

Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.

1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search

I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.

Within 12 months I tripled the size of my channel and very quickly learnt the power of thumbnails, click through rate and proper search optimization. Best of all, they are FREE!

2. Adobe Creative Suite helps me craft amazing looking thumbnails and eye-catching videos

I have been making youtube videos on and off since 2013.

When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.

Big mistake!

I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.

That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.

Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.

3. Rev.com helps people read my videos

You can’t always listen to a video.

Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.

This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.

Rev.com can help you translate your videos, transcribe your videos, add subtitles and even convert those subtitles into other languages – all from just $1.50 per minute.

A GREAT way to find an audience and keep them hooked no matter where they are watching your content.

4. PlaceIT can help you STAND OUT on YouTube

I SUCK at making anything flashy or arty.

I have every intention in the world to make something that looks cool but im about as artistic as a dropped ice-cream cone on the web windy day.

That is why I could not live on YouTube without someone like PlaceIT. They offer custom YouTube Banners, Avatars, YouTube Video Intros and YouTube End Screen Templates that are easy to edit with simple click, upload wizard to help you make amazing professional graphics in minutes.

Best of all, some of their templates are FREE! or you can pay a small fee if you want to go for their slightly more premium designs (pst – I always used the free ones).

5. StoryBlocks helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways

I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.

And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.

I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.

I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the StoryBlocks website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.

They have a wide library of videos, graphics, images and even a video maker tool and it wont break the bank with plans starting from as little as £8.25 ($9) per month.

Categories
SOCIAL MEDIA TIPS & TRICKS VIDEO YOUTUBE

How To Trim YouTube Videos Online with NEW YouTube Studio in 2019

How To Trim YouTube Videos Online with NEW YouTube Studio in 2019 // Need to edit a live youtube video? Trim YouTube videos to remove mistakes or make them shorter? This tool has been updated in the new YouTube Studio and this step by step tutorial shows you how to trim videos on YouTube using the trim tool.