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Acceptable practice in editing interviews?
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The bottom line for me is that if the interviewee has something to say – it really doesn’t matter much which of the “save the jump cut” things you do – just pick one the feels right and stick to it.
In the end, you’ll quickly train the audience that that particular transition just covers two adjacent scenes.
Same with leaving in the jump cut. If the audience, topic or tonality of the piece supports a very modern look – then the audience – weaned on MTV will accept almost anything.
The problem comes when the content is weak and the audience is subconsciously looking for a reason to disengage with the content (think 80% of corporate training videos (some of which I’ve been forced to make by clients with healthy checking accounts but an underdeveloped ability to listen) in that circumstance a jump cut or a glowing 3D cube spin or whatever is a sure way to send their brains off to never-never land.
Unfortunately when it comes to strictly informational programming – you have to do a BETTER job of editing crap than you do editing interesting content.
My experience, anyway.
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2008 was a bad year for the cutaway – news editors at the BBC decided they were dishonest and banned them, many other stations are following suit.
Then Martin Scorsese makes a 2 hour Rolling Stones live concert movie without a single audience cutaway – Scorsese seemed to be set on avoiding video cliches altogether. Apart from Mick and Keith of course.
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The first time I became aware of editing was watching news cameramen shooting interviews – first the interviewee, then turning around and shooting the questions – and how sometimes the q&a got confused in the editing room. Good old CP 16’s, single system.
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It’s kind of ironic, really. Nothing is broadcast more than news and outside of used car commercials, nothing has worse production value. From harsh lighting to underpaid talent to post-production not quite worthy of calling production at all, man it’s always been hard for me to watch the news.
I dunno who the first to think a viewer wants to see an anchor nod as somebody speaks but it’s grounds for a national donkey-punch day.
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agreed.
Whether to use a fade to black/white, a dissolve or a jumpcut depends on style. But to my eye blah cutaways increasingly have a stale, ponderous feel.
A hangover from the days when filmmakers were more concerned about not confusing the viewers, rather than not boring them.
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Better to shoot with two cameras, one wide, one medium, then you can cut your edits without an effect. Or shoot HD but edit SD, so you can zoom at the cut point without degradation. Inside Edition, the toilet of “news” changes the meaning of interview subjects with cuts and DVE zooms, which looks terrible, but this is a tabloid show, so they are not worried about aesthetics.
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Thanks all for your helpful comments. Mark’s comment about the history of dissolves was a good reminder for me-for some reason I’ve always shied away from straight cuts and leaned towards dissolves without any justification for doing so. Your comment was a good reminder of the original intent for dissolves.
The video I’m working on that inspired this question in the first place can be seen here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygvSbRd52l4
It’s going through a little tweaking, and all your comments have been helpful in that regard.
Thanks,
Ford Seeuws
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