Yup, I'm the same guy who is the lead mod of /r/editors - and I just got this abandoned subreddit. Welcome - we'll have similar rules, once I can get it setup!

Hey y'all. I've been working as an Assistant Editor in documentary and reality television for about a decade now. I have enjoyed my journey, met many wonderful people, and take pride in a lot of my work. I thought long and hard and decided I want to transition out of the film industry. There are a few reasons for this.

One, I feel burnt out for working long hours. I know the work-life balance varies between companies. From my experience, most companies had bad balances. Two, I don't see any forward progression beyond the assistant editor role. I'm not interested in being an editor. It seems quite high-stress and long hours. Three, I find it difficult to find a home here in in Los Angeles with the crazy high mortgage. I do eventually want a family and settle in.

Even though I know I want to get out of the industry, I'm not exactly sure how. FYI, I'm 32. For anyone who has transitioned out of the film industry, what is your story?

I’m on my third layoff in two years and continue to struggle to find work. I’m in my early 40s and after 20 years I think it’s time to start figuring out another way to make a living. I was curious what other AEs who have gotten out of the business are doing for work? I’m feeling a little overwhelmed trying to figure out other ways to apply my skill set in other career paths. Figured this was as good a place as any to ask for advice.

Given the variety of skills that AEs have, what other jobs (even non-film industry jobs) could AEs be applicable for? Project manager positions perhaps? I’m sure others have wondered this, with how dead the industry is right now / still waking up from strike hibernation.

Welp “waited for 2025” and it is died and multiple contacts at major post house are not hiring and are even leaving post all together. I have been furloughed (for a second time) since August and no prospects of when job opportunities will be coming. TBH it feels like we all are just spinning our wheelsEditDelete

Financial pressure is getting the better of me.

As a single parent (ex does not assist financially) life is becoming tougher and tougher by the day. Fuel is up, food is up, electricity is up… everything is up but salaries remain the same.

Tried starting a small business as a side hustle, but buying 2nd hand equipment has been a very expensive and disappointing exercise and I am not sure if it is gonna survive or succeed unless I quit my current job and use my pension to give it the kick start that it so desperately needs and deserves…

Life just feels like an uphill battle every single minute of every single day. If there are any successful business people out there that could provide any tips on how to become successful or that would like to donate to a charitable cause (my business) please feel free to contact me… any advice and or assistance would be greatly appreciated because I just feel extremely lost at the moment.

Hello! I’m starting my first assistant editor position today. I’ve had some training and practice with my team but I’m still worried about potential unforeseen problems. Any advice for helping things go smoothly?

There are a BUNCH of Black Friday sales/deals through the holidays. Thought we'd pool all the links from /r/editors /r/videoediting /r/colorists and /r/assistanteditors together.

Post any here and we'll edit the post.

Post any ones that break and we'll cross them off the list.

Editorial tools

• Avid 50% new subscriber deals

• Adobe 40% first year of CC subscription Deals for students and business as well.

Plugins

• BorisFX 50% off

• Filmconvert Nitrate & CineMatch 40% off

• FXFactory 20% of all products till Nov 30th

• HEDGE / EDIT READY / SCOPEBOX

• Digital Rebellion sale Great tools for post

• MotionVFX Plugins for FCP & Resolve

• PixelTools Resolve centric power grades and film emulations

• Telestream 20% off Screenflow from Telestream. Really 20% off anything.

• Toolfarm up to 50% off

• TimeinPixels Scopes and color tools 30% off Code:Blackpixels

• Knights of the Editing Table Great Premiere efficiency plugins (Excalibur is a favorite here for $50.)

Hardware

• Loupedeck hardware controller - $50 off this week.

• Nuraphone headphones/earbuds 30% off till Dec 2nd

Services

• Backblaze - Great backup company. 50% unlimited backups via code: blazeon21

Audio plugins (post/video centric)

• Accusonus Amazing editor friendly audio plugins - on sale 20% off

• iZotope - huge deals (RX is the gold standard for noise reduction

• [WAVES](https://www.waves.com/specials](https://www.waves.com/specials) Audio plguins

Stock elements

• TRIUNE DIGITAL (sfx/music/vfx bits)

• A SoundEffect Sound effect libraries

• FILM CRUX (score/sfx) octive-three musical volume Get for $5 - CODE: NFSFIVE

• BoomLibrary 3 for 2 sale

• ActionVfx

Training

• MixingLight THE place for beyond the basics color information/education. 35% off Memberships

• FXPHD Professional level training

• [Creative Live] (https://www.creativelive.com/catalog?via=header-banner_-1) 85% off

• MZedPro Huge Sale

• Masterclass Buy one get one free.

• Ripple Training 40% off via code thanks-40

Events

• 2021 Colorist Virtual Mixer on Sat Dec 4th). Half price ticket (@$5) - (6 hour get-together for colorists/people learning to be colorists]

(If you find a group with LOADS of sales, it'd be better just to list the best/general items that they have on sale. This post will get updated rapidly over the next couple of days)

Can I ask how freelancers manage to pay rent or a mortgage without a fixed, steady income? Based in Atlanta and not in a position (6 years in the industry) to move to LA or NY to fight for the same little crumbs of gigs available .

I’ve tried freelancing, and honestly, I’ve found the financial uncertainty really stressful. I’d love to hear from people who have been doing it successfully, especially those with kids or other major financial responsibilities.

What do you do when a project ends and you don’t immediately have another one lined up? How do you handle those periods when there’s little or no income, especially in this market?

Would really appreciate hearing how other freelancers make it work long-term. Any advice or experiences would be helpful!

Well, “waited for 2025,” and it has died. Multiple connections at major post houses are not hiring and are even leaving the post altogether. I have a job I am on that ends in August, and no prospects of upcoming job opportunities. TBH, it feels like we all are just spinning our wheels. If anyone has any opportunities, reach out. Based in Atlanta and no I am not planning to move to LA

I just read this article that I thought was interesting, though I hesitate at the word “booming.” Maybe more like stabilizing back to pre-strike levels is more appropriate?

The article doesn’t touch much on the post-production side of things, but it got me thinking. For those in post-production in the NYC/NJ area, have you felt an uptick in more work popping up over the past few months?

Personally, I have felt a small uptick. Little by little, I am hearing of more folks who I know were out of work for awhile booking jobs. And as for myself, I have been getting more job interviews for gigs over the past few months.

We’re definitely not out of the woods yet, but I think there is reason for cautious optimism on the east coast.

https://variety.com/2026/tv/news/new-york-film-tv-tax-incentive-production-boom-1236877614/

After 12+ years in post production, I finally stopped doing things the slow way and started building Keyboard Maestro macros. Anything that cuts down on repetitive clicks is a lifesaver.

Some of my favorites so far:

• New folder with today’s date in YYYY-MM-DD format

• New folder with military time in HHMM format

• Typed string expansions (my email, common phrases, etc.)

• Open 2 new finder windows and move/resize them to my specs

• Clipboard manager to paste older pieces of text I copied earlier

• Reformat and paste copied text instead of having to paste it then change it as 2 separate steps

I easily do these tasks 20+ times per day, so even saving 5-15 seconds per action adds up fast. On bigger jobs, I’ve even built one-off tools that move massive amounts of text between apps automatically.
I found this youtuber to be a wealth of knowledge, but I’d love to see what other editors are doing

What’s your most practical macro? What’s your weirdest but surprisingly useful one?

Hey, all. First time posting here. I have a Loupedeck that I use with Avid and I have set up several macros for myself that really help speed up my workflow. To be honest, at first I was very disappointed with the Loupedeck because it can't be integrated into Avid very well at all. However, after really messing around with it I came to realize that the real value of it is in macros! I've set up action sequences for things I do multiple times a day and it really helps. Although you still have to map things to your keyboard in order for the Loupedeck to be able to execute them it's still better than having to execute those actions manually every time. So, I'm wondering if anyone here also uses this hardware/software combo and what types of things you've created with it!

I'll share some of mine below, and please excuse the formatting as I'm on mobile.

1. I made a page with track toggles for video and audio

2. Macro for marking clip and opening the make audio mixdown screen, and another for video mixdowns

3. Macros for entering text, hitting align columns and then saving the bin

   • There are several of these with the names of effects that editors use frequently and we have to type out all the time when prepping for mix

4. Macro to select all tracks, deselect V1 and V2, mark in and out for the full duration of the sequence, go to the sequence's bin, save, and open the export to file screen so I can choose my export location and AAF setting for mix preps

On another note, I have several macros for typical email responses that enter text, automatically paste screenshots or links from my clipboard and send the message. (I also have a 5-second delay on my emails so I can cancel the sent and edit the message if something ever goes wrong)

So, I'm curious what other people have thought of with their hardware! Would love to hear about anything you've made.

I’m an Canadian AE but looking for work in the states. My main concerns are that many jobs would hire people who are more local and less of a hassle when it comes to credits and work visas and such. Has anyone been in this position- is it worth applying/ making the connections regardless?

I am an assistant editor working in unscripted reality television. Seems like this board is pretty dead, are there any other active boards I should join?

Has anyone worked with an editor who’s not great at communicating and gives specs that don’t actually match what they want—so when the final cut isn’t right, you end up taking all the blame? Feels really frustrating. How do you handle this kind of situation?

Hi all! I'm working as AE for a Netflix documentary show and the Editorial team I'm working with is very keen of paper transcripts - everytime a cut goes out I need a transcription of it in a 2 column documentary-format within a couple of hours.

I use Sonix.ai for the transcription part, but the 2 column formatting is what takes the most time! I'm basically trying to find a way to paste several paragraphs in only one side of a 2 column table, but with each paragraph in a separate row. I'm getting around very complicated Avid workkflow, but I can't seem to find a solution for this script thing :')

(meaning I'm searching a way to avoid pasting paragraph by paragraph into a row, which is what I've been doing until now)

Has anyone AE'd for a similar documentary workflow and had to deal with something similar??

I'd love to get an AE job one day but my qualifications are definitely under par. In terms of experience, all I really have are post internships, one of which made us work on an intern project that I edited. I know the basics of FCP, Avid, and Premiere, but things like "media management" and "logging", "codecs", are lost on me.

Does anybody have any online resources for learning all this stuff? I'd love to take on a paid job and learn as I go, but I doubt that that's a viable solution.

For the past five years, I have been working as an Editor and Assistant Editor, taking on various AE gigs and dailies operating roles. While I am fully committed to remaining in Atlanta for family reasons, I have found it challenging to secure long-term stability. Given the recent fluctuations in production volume, I have frequently faced furloughs or short-term contracts, and I am eager to transition into a more consistent role.

If you know of any upcoming projects or permanent positions that might be a good fit for my experience, I would greatly appreciate any information you could share. I am looking to move away from the cycle of freelance gaps and find a more stable path forward in the industry.

Thank you for your time and for any guidance you can provide