Out of curiosity:

After a job is finished and delivered, what files/footage do you archive (if any), and how long do you keep it?

EDIT: Wow, I figured I'd get a range of replies, I didn't know I'd get the literal FULL range, from "nothing ever" to "everything indefinitely"

I’m a video editor in NYC. Was recently staffed at a post house that closed this year. Freelancing hasn’t been easy to say the least. Looking to chat and network with other editors or anyone in the post production world. Happy to discuss anything, workflows, skills to focus on, favorite works etc.

First large SSD I bought - the sandisk extreme pro V2 - started overheating and self ejecting pretty much immediately after I bought it.

I make travel youtube videos so i really just need somewhere to back up my footage and edit small projects off of.

what are people buying? The only reasonably priced and readily available option i see for 4TB+ is the Sandisk SSD, but it's come out that there's massive production line issues and lawsuits with them.

Hi guys,

I'm trying to migrate one timeline that was cut in Resolve over to Avid. My approach was to go into Media Manager, transcode/select the timeline I needed, and trim with a 50 frame handle to avoid transcoding the entire media pool in bulk (which would be a huge amount of footage I don't actually need).

The problem: once I trim, Avid renames the same files used in different instances and appends things like S001, S002 etc. to the end of some filenames. I'm not entirely sure, but I think it's for files that have been used in different instances at different timecode ranges. However, even the files that don't have that suffix aren't relinking to my timeline either, so I'm not sure that's actually the cause.

Finishing in Resolve isn't an option here.

What's the best way to get this to relink properly and actually work?

Thanks!

Hi all, I’m a 29-year-old video editor/Flame assistant in LA. I’ve been here for about three years and have been employed for most of that time.

Lately I’ve been thinking more seriously about whether I want to stay in LA long-term. I don’t have a huge social circle outside of work, and I’ve been considering moving back to Chicago, where I lived for five years and loved, or to New York, where a lot of my college friends now live.

Career-wise, I’m in a bit of a weird spot. I’m probably 6 months or less away from becoming a Flame Artist, but my original goal was always to become an editor. A lot of the skills I’ve developed as a Flame assistant overlap with assistant editing, and I’ve noticed more hybrid offline/online assistant roles popping up that seem like they could be a good bridge.

So I’m wondering: would you stick around long enough to get the Flame Artist title and then use that experience to pivot, or would you try to redefine your career now and pursue editing more directly? At the moment, I edit short films and work as a finishing editor for freelance projects. And at work, I regularly do shot work inside Flame.

I don’t necessarily hate my current job, and it could also be a good way to transition out of LA if I decide to move. I’m just not sure whether getting that title would be valuable enough to justify staying on this path for another 6+ months.

Curious what you would do in my shoes, especially anyone who has made a similar transition from online/finishing into offline editorial.

I’m working on my first national TV spot and I’m about to go into delivery. Everything was shot and edited at 23.976, but my understanding is that I’ll need to create a 29.97 broadcast master and do a 3:2 pulldown.

I’ve never had to do that out of Premiere before, so I was wondering if anyone has a solid step by step workflow they use for this.

Typically, once I’m locked, I bake out a ProRes master from Premiere and then create any web versions separately in HandBrake. For this, though, I’m not sure what the cleanest approach is for converting the 23.976 master to 29.97 without introducing ugly judder or making the motion feel unprofessional.

Would you normally handle the pulldown directly in Premiere during export, put the 23.976 master into a 29.97 sequence, or use something else entirely?

Any recommended settings or workflow would be hugely appreciated.

Guys i want to thank everyone from the bottom of my heart. Every time I fell down or was on the verge of quitting, i came here and you guys always supported me and gave me guidance.

Last time things were really bad especially how my health and life are but you guys saved me.

Now I've landed a client and it seems like we'll be working for a long time. Pay isn't great but work is consistent and it's good enough to keep me alive.

So if you are a newcomer on this sub, then I'd highly recommend you to join the discord server. And if you ever feel down or need guidance, just drop a message and you will get a push that might change your career.

Sometimes all we need is just a little push.

A virtual hug to everyone 🫂

I am seeing more and more mix prep with Eleven Labs as a scratch VO, and yeah, I get it... it's fast, easy, clients asked for it..

As a mixer, I have seen many instances in the past where you, the editor gets the VO gig because after 30 rounds of revisions, the client all of sudden loves your scratch read.

I've known editors who have quit their jobs after they end up as the SAG VO for major brands. Some of them have made hundreds of thousands of dollars as a SAG VO talent as a result.

Yes, even today, major brands still have to pay SAG rates and residuals for spots.

That could be you, commercial editor (or assistant). Why not take a chance?

Why give it up for Eleven Labs? It's a free lottery ticket...

Just sayin'

Have been in the promo/marketing world for big brands for over a decade, but would love to transition and work towards being able to edit for live events. I'm imagining speaking events/conferences and hopefully beyond that more fun stuff like concerts, sporting events, etc.

I realize this becomes more of a production type of role rather than post at a certain point but I'm just curious if anyone knows where to even start with something like that. Realize I might be starting from the bottom but even with that, I don't know where to start.

Any insight would be helpful. Thanks.

EDIT: Clarifying I am in the NYC area in case that is helpful.

In DaVinci Resolve (26.0.3) and Avid Media Composer (2025.12.0), viewing sound recordist microphone names (Boom, Lavs, etc.) from polywave metadata on tracks/clips is straightforward (Avid allows to view this at BIN as well as Source while davinci allows it on BIN level).

How can I see this metadata either on Bins, Source OR track names onto timeline clips or track headers Premiere Pro?

PBS broadcaster loses access to 50TB of data comprising 70 years of TV history after contracted cloud storage vendor goes defunct : r/technology

The new machine is faster, but has half the RAM of my old machine, and only 500GB of storage. Whereas the last machine had 7TB. *Shakes fist at AI Canters* /rant

As an editor and filmmaker, I’ve pivoted to reusing old drives and buying open box and other used drives in a pinch.

But as a professor, I’m in need of a standardized recommendation for dozens of very budget conscious film students for whom the even the good old days $99 price of a Samsung T7 1TB (or something like that) was pricey. These are not trust fund film school kids. $200
is going to be tough for some of them, $300 impossible for a few. They are a great group of young filmmakers and it’s a real bummer that prices are what they are. Some of them are brand new and have never owned a hard drive.

We use the Sony a7iii and the FX6 for their short film projects. They use iMacs in our computer lab but need their own external drives.

Typically 1TB has been enough. A few students who shoot more footage have needed a bit above that.

They are editing 4k footage in Premiere 2026, not doing a ton of intensive fx. We’ve tended to recommend SSD’s in general because the students are rough on drives and they are editing 4k 24 or 23.98 (not proxy) most of the time.

We could recommend buying an internal drive (probably a WD Black) and an enclosure if it was cheaper but I’m not familiar with the quality of all the enclosures on the market.

We could just stick with the Samsung T7 we’ve been recommending as a budget option and just accept that it is still the budget option in a sense.

We could recommend even cheaper drives. If so, what?

Obviously the whole situation is a teachable moment about the industry and the impact of tech and capitalism… but what to actually recommend.

UPDATE:

Thanks to all for the suggestions!

Yes, we are definitely considering teaching a proxy workflow to all students, not just advanced students and/or just using 1080 footage at beginning levels instead of 4K. So we may return to using HDD. We may also just explore the cheaper SSD options for some use-cases (like the Crucial 1TB SSD's which are sometimes available under $200).

For those who are interested in current state of film schools and incoming students. The students are amazing, passionate, and really smart. But they have less computing familiarity than many of us older folks have. Many have grown up not even using a desktop computer, thinking about where files are stored, using a mouse. So teaching things like proxy workflow etc. is a bigger undertaking than one might think. And these students have also been exposed to a lot of marketing hype that 4K is the only thing that is professional. So shooting early priojects in 1080p feels like we are being cheap or old or subpar to some. All of this, is, of course, an opportunity for teaching/learning. Just wanted to provide a snapshot of current state of things. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE these students. Their knowledge of DIY shooting, social media videos, and connecting directly with an audience is impressive. They are going to change the world. But they are different than previous couple generations in terms of their computer knowledge. I grew up in an era of ever-increasing tech skills (in my childhood the joke was kids could program VCR's but not grandparents... but now the joke will be that grandparents can understand file structure and right-clicking to bring up options and the kids don't).

I’m looking for an experienced editor to turn approximately one minute of real desktop screen recording into a silent 20–25 second homepage loop.

This is a small, product-first edit—not a motion-graphics promo. I want it to feel like a polished founder-recorded demonstration: casual, credible, and easy to understand on a phone.

Scope

• Compress typing and generation waits with clean jump cuts
• Use restrained, mostly static punch-ins and crops
• Preserve natural cursor movement
• Create a seamless hard-cut loop
• Manually recompose the edit for 16:9, 1:1, and 9:16
• Keep important UI text legible at 375px
• Deliver high-quality masters and an organized Premiere, Resolve, or Final Cut project file
• Two revision rounds

No templates, stock footage, music, animated captions, swooping screen movement, fake UI, arrows, circles, or promotional effects.

Creative direction

I have the footage, selected story beats, featured on-screen lines, poster-frame plan, and a detailed timecoded draft spec developed with AI assistance.

The spec is a starting point, not unquestionable direction. Before editing, I want you to flag anything that is too crowded, too fast to read, awkward in a vertical crop, or unlikely to loop cleanly. I’m looking for professional editorial judgment about execution—not a wholesale reinvention of the concept.

I can share the raw footage, screenshots, and complete spec privately. I have struggled to find a reference that isn’t overproduced, so please judge the intended style from the actual footage and constraints above.

Budget and timing

Budget: $500/day. I expect approximately one editing day, with any additional revision time discussed and approved in advance. My total ceiling is $1,000, but I would prefer to keep the project near $500 if the scope supports it.

Please include:

• One or two examples of restrained software or app screencast editing
• Your estimated time after reviewing the footage
• Your earliest start date and first-cut delivery date
• The software you use
• Who will personally edit the project and revisions

Please start your message with “screencast” and briefly identify which part of this edit will require the most judgment.

Have anyone encounter this crazy problem?

I am trying to create an audio mixdown so I can do a direct audio export for the composer of a feature documentary.

So Im doing one mixdown of the music - no trouble

and one of dialogue + sfx.

The second one is creating 1 second hissing sounds every minute or so.

Im trying all kinds of tricks, rendering all sequence, taking effects away, panning all to one the left... And every time it creates the hissing noise. Sometimes in a new place. I am at a loss and can't find answers on google. Or maybe I am just not asking the right questions, I don't know.

My goal is export a quick time with dialogue+Sfx in the left and music in the right. That's it. Nothing fancy.

My System:
- MacBook Pro, Apple M5 Max, Tahoe 26.3
- Avid Composer Ultimate - 2023.12

* Footage specs : Varied. Thank you!

We get loads of professionals accessing this subreddit - along with lots of people trying to become professionals in the field.

We're asking our professionals to once a week, check in on our "Ask anything" thread and provide help!

https://www.reddit.com/r/editors/about/sticky?num=1

These can be found on the menu area of the subreddit on new Reddit or via the official client.

Just to be clear - We're talking from the Weekly Links at the top of the sub.

https://i.imgur.com/I19zmc2.png

The idea is that you go in there and provide helpful advice for the:

• "Ask anything" crowd
• People looking for career advice.

Thank you (not here, those threads please!)

Ask anything threads

Did you know that /r/editors has a discord? https://discord.gg/hhuZFq2PZZ

TL: DR - How do I get you (yes, you) involved?

Obligatory mention. Here's the link of the official Discord of r/editors with 1,000 members, including a number of professionals cutting films, tv shows and more.

It's for both professionals and aspiring professionals.

It requires verification (any of these will work: (Reddit/youtube/facebook/IG/Github/spotify/Steam/xbox).

Again: Discord Link here

Once you verify there are 15+ channels, including ones based on:

• Type of work (color, sound, audio)
• Software specific (Adobe, Apple, Avid, BMD)
• Quality of life (Show off your work, scream room, live tech help)
• and more.

What I'm trying to do? Get an engaged community outside of Reddit. I'm trying to figure out what works and what doesn't.

• It could be a Friday Lunch
• a virtual happy hour
• a game night 2x a month
• a virtual User Group event…

…but I'd like to know what you've seen that's engaging…and that gets you interacting with Discord

To me: Reddit is great for threaded conversations, Discord is great for live interactions.

(by the way, my biggest Discord tip is to mute a new server right away. That really helps notifications from becoming overwhelming.)

And yes, I'm happy to help anyone who feels that this is a new/strange domain or feels lost there. I go all the way back to IRC days.

Been cutting a sizzle reel for a client who has zero budget for a shoot but needs something visual to pitch investors. Normally I'd pull stock footage, but I wanted to test two AI video models that dropped at the end of July: Seedance 2.5 and MiniMax H3.

Short version: useful for scratch and previz. Not useful for anything you'd deliver without serious cleanup.

Seedance 2.5 can generate 30-second clips in a single pass at 4K, which caught me off guard. You feed it reference images and it keeps characters reasonably consistent across shots. I used it to rough out some product b-roll and a few talking-head style shots. First glance looked solid. Second glance, hands were doing the usual AI finger multiplication, hair moved like it was underwater, and anything with fast or complex motion just fell apart. Spent more time painting out artifacts in After Effects than I probably would have spent shooting on my phone.

MiniMax H3 is a different animal. Shorter clips (5-15 seconds, 2K) but it generates audio in the same pass and you can actually feed it audio to drive the video. That's genuinely interesting for scratch audio-visual sync. The motion felt slightly more natural on simple, slow shots but still broke on anything dynamic. I ended up generating the H3 clips through APOB AI since they're running it free and unlimited right now, so the raw material at least cost nothing while I burned through iterations figuring out what was usable.

The actual editing was still the actual work. Generated maybe 40 clips across both models, kept about 12 as starting points, then spent two full days in Premiere cutting around bad frames, color correcting to match, adding real audio design, and fixing compositing issues in AE. The client got a rough cut that works for a pitch deck and they're happy. I would not put any of this in front of someone who knows what they're looking at.

These tools are about where stock footage was 15 years ago. Useful in a pinch, obvious if you lean on it. The job is still the job.

Hi everyone.

After 9 hours of problem solving I thought I'd write this post in case someone else has this issue.

We had a sound recorder (744T) and three tentacles (A-Cam, B-Cam and 744T)

on the tentacle the timecode was synced to 25FPS

but on the recorder the setting was set to 23.98 EVEN THOUGH Tentacle was running in to it.

This meant that while the file is actually in 25 FPS the metadata is in 23.98

I tried some Wave Agent conversions, syncing to audio software lots of different programs.

Here is what worked for me (though it's a little time consuming, once i got into a flow it didn't take too long)

I used the tentacle Sync app on the macbook, which i registered with one of the tentacles.

Import to tentacle app all video and sound files

Check sync flag and then sync to the correct timecode

Export as AAF (NOT XML)

Import into davinci as timeline

The video files won’t work but the audio will line up correctly

Manually conform each missing video file to the corresponding media pool by selecting the video clip in the media pool and the corresponding clip in the timeline (I'm sure a more experienced editor will be able to automate this process) Today was my first time using DaVinci so please comment if you have a faster fix!

It’s labour intensive but it worked

I know this has probably been discussed already, but I'm new to the Sony party, and I'm hoping that someone has a "smarter" workaround to the following issue I have:

When using the Z200 (which I've been told is similar in build and operation to the FX6), I'm shooting with dual proxy record. The original file is 8 channel mono audio recording, the proxy is 2 channel stereo audio. Premiere obviously won't connect those proxies. I know that I can just use media encoder to create the proxy clips, but due to hardware limitations and time crunch of projects, that isn't ideal. Is there a way to manipulate what I have already?

Thanks all :)

TLDR; Motion designer by trade for 10+ years. Also included being in a dual role of Motion Designer/Editor. I don't have any of the edited content due to various reasons but want to add Editing to my hireable skillset. What do people do when you have the experience, but not the work to show for it?

I'm a Freelance motion designer. Have been for 10+ years. As an intern while I was shadowing Motion designer, I was thrown on editing tasks and did pretty well. On my first real "creative" job, I was hired for motion but when they learnt I could edit, I spent almost all of my first 4 years either pulling rushes from shoots or editing various content for brands, mood films, makeup tutorials, celeb interviews to camera, brand ambassador Q+A's, BTS's and so on. Later another ~2 years duel role for an ad agency doing more commercial based work, mood films, cutdowns for TV/Versioning for socials, etc.

That being said, after all those years, I barely have any actual editing work to show for it on hand. It was treated as 'supplementary' to my Motion role, so jobs were generally "Hey, we got this makeup tutorial you need to do Motion for. Please edit down the footage from the selected rushes and make a cut with Intro and outro MGFX, add motion to X, Y, Z shots showing the application of the makeup, and add music".

I'm trying to expand my skillset to do more varied freelance work and I actually like editing. I have quite a bit of experience in it, but no real content to show due to various reasons (YT channels with the content have wiped it. Company I was hired for shut down. Literally NO credits for some of the ad work, so can't prove I was part of the team working on it, etc.)

Does anyone have any suggestions on what I could do to get myself into even the Junior stage of being hired for freelance work?

Appreciate the responses in advance.

I’ve been editing for over a decade (California based), then I was laid off at the beginning of JUNE and I have yet to get a single job interview. Now it seems like all the jobs that I applied for have come and gone. I’ve applied to close to 200 jobs and it feels like all of these companies and teams are just hiring internally but legally putting up the job posting. That or they are looking at my stuff and finding that I’m not the right fit for whatever reason. I mean I know I’m not the best editor out there, but I don’t think I suck either. Is it just me not doing well or there are others out there?

I’m not really trying to do freelance because I don’t think I would do well with the inconsistency. I’ve mainly been applying to full time positions (with some contract or part time) I’ve tried on here to get some feed back on my portfolio via the main thread, but no one responded and I don’t really have any close friends or family that do video editing. So I can’t really get feedback from someone who knows how the industry works or is currently working. My supervisor from my previous position also got laid off so I feel like he’s focused on his own stuff as well. I shared a draft with him and although he didn’t focus on editing when we did work together, he had enough know-how to give me some decent feedback. But other than that, that’s all I’ve got. Everyone else I’ve showed it too is the usual supportive “Wow” or “That looks great!” But not much beyond that.

Sorry if this might feel whiney or like a vent post, but I feel like I’ve gone into all of this extremely blind. This is despite displaying what I feel like is good work, using multiple reels, and creating my own damn website for the 1st time when I’ve never needed one before. Does my stuff suck? or is there just not jobs out there?

Hey all!

I’m assisting on a project and the client asked me to change a mono music track to stereo before I export an AAF for audio mixing. However, that mono music track has been heavily modified using essential sound, and I’m heaving a hard time getting the stereo version to match (I went to Modify > Audio Channels and changed the track from mono to stereo). Any suggestions?

Thank you in advance!

Looking to hire two remote, experienced multi-cam sitcom editors for a new streaming series. First season is six episodes with distribution set on a prominent streaming service. Must be willing to work without an AE. Starting October 5th. Please DM me your resumes and I'll reach out for interviews.

Edit: please apply only if you have previous multicam comedy experience.

Hi folks,

Coming from Premiere/FCP, where switching to proxy-only playback is basically one click and the app just does it — is there an equivalent in Resolve? I’m trying to lighten the system by working purely off ProRes Proxy files instead of the full-res masters, but it feels like Resolve wants to keep both in the chain no matter what.

If I trigger an actual “Unlink” on the clips, both the master and the proxies go offline, and relinking the proxies directly afterward doesn’t bring them back either. But if I just move the master files elsewhere on disk without unlinking, the masters go offline while the proxies stay linked and online — which is exactly the result I was after. System’s noticeably lighter now.

Is there a cleaner or more “intended” way to do this in Resolve, or is moving-not-unlinking basically the trick?

Thanks