A Few Updates!

July 18, 2019August 7, 2015 by Josh Short

Hey! I just wanted to give you a couple updates on what’s going on here at EVF.

First off, I’m about to be busier than ever. I’m shooting every weekday until… August 29^th. Yep. The rest of the month. I’ll be shooting in four different cities and on top of that I’ll have to be editing a lot of what I shoot at night.

I can’t tell if all this is coming at a good time or not. I would like to get my mind off things but at the same time want to be around for everyone. Over the past month I have lost two people very close to me, one very unexpectedly. Myself, my friends and my family have been weathering the storm admirably and I’m extremely proud of them, proud to be part of my circle of friends and proud to be a Short.

Slating Videos in Your NLE

July 9, 2020July 29, 2015 by Josh Short

This article discusses the importance of slating your videos and how to properly do this and any NLE.

For me, most evenings revolve around eating dinner on the couch and catching up on TV. Since I try to be in bed before 10:00PM I miss pretty much every show that airs at 9:00PM or 10:00PM (I make exceptions for The Walking Dead).

Every now and then while ignoring the commercials you can’t fast forward through, a mistake is made. That mistake… Somehow a slate for a commercial makes it way into the On Demand stream. Each time I first laugh then actually take a look at it because, well, it interests the heck out of me.

23 Posts about Video Production, Post Production, Avid and More

July 18, 2019July 1, 2015 by Josh Short

I’ve been writing for my friends over at ScreenLight for…well…a long time. It’s been over two years and in the Internet world that’s a really long time. Over that time I’ve been able to stockpile a bunch of writings that I want to share with you today. 23 of them to be exact.

The posts range from Media Composer tips to the Pomodoro Technique for time management to Apps for Editors and so much more. I’ve broken them up into a couple of categories. At the very top are a few of my favorites and ones I think you should definitely read.

My Favorite Posts

The Edit Bay – A Romanticized View of One Editor’s Relationship With Four Walls

Video Editor is Not a Synonym for Motion Graphics Artist

Editor: The Amateur vs. The Professional

How to Setup a Video Company on a Realistic Budget

Giving Unconditional Help and Why I Nearly Cried on Set Last Week

July 18, 2019June 18, 2015 by Josh Short

Today is a huge day. A monumental day! Do you know what today is?

It is the one-year anniversary of Edit Video Faster. My blog birthday! 365 days ago I was up late one night and decided to stop waiting and just go after it. Here’s how it all started.

I’m not going to spend the rest of this post recapping what happened over the past year. Basically I can sum it up in that I wrote a bunch of posts and made a ton of tutorials with the goal of helping video editors or creative professionals like me. The results came in the form of overwhelming support from my readers, people actually bought products I created, new friends were made, I created a course for Tuts+, I started a podcast, I got new freelance clients and I pushed my abilities further than I ever thought I could. Oh, and last week just to top it all off… I got to write a post for Avid!

Read my post for Avid here!

Okay, okay. No more bragging. I promise. I feel very vain at the moment.

Being on Avid’s site seriously means so much to me. I was legit nearly brought to tears. However I was in the middle of a shoot when the article went live and thought it’d be a little inappropriate to start tearing up so I tried to keep my joy and excitement to a minimum, at least externally.

In today’s post I want to touch on what happens when you attempt to help people without expecting anything in return. Let’s call this unconditional help.

Over the Editor’s Shoulder: Part IV

July 18, 2019June 3, 2015 by Josh Short

This is Part IV and the final chapter in a series called Over the Editor’s Shoulder where I document my daily progress on a freelance editing project I’m working on. I chronicle what I do in the edit bay, what I learn, my struggles, failures, successes and more.

Play Composition in After Effects

June 3, 2020May 17, 2015 by Josh Short

This video tutorial and article is on the different options to play (preview or playback) your composition in Adobe After Effects.

One-On-One Video Editing Coaching

January 11, 2016April 22, 2015 by Josh Short

I want to make you a better video editor. That’s what I’ve been doing through my site, YouTube channel and other avenues for the past year. Pretty much this entire time I’ve been helping a faceless audience. I’ve been guessing at what you want to learn and hoping I’m using something relatable to be able to teach you. I know it’s working for a lot of you (I love the thank you emails I get!). However a lot of the time I still don’t know what you are struggling with. You, the one reading my words right now, I want to help you. That’s why I want to be your coach.

Recently I’ve had a huge problem. I have had several requests come in for complex custom tutorials that can’t be reused for everyone. I want to help these individuals out but I have such limited time after my 9-5, creating content for this site, walking Peyton, another new secret project I’m announcing soon (!!!) and trying to have something close to a social life. I have two options. I can:

Spend several hours creating these custom tutorials, which results in lost time either with my family or creating content for this site or
I can keep my family time and EVF content creation time but not be able to help these individuals in the way that they want/need help since email and screen shots aren’t enough sometimes.

Neither option works for me.

I cannot justify helping one individual person at the expense of not being able to create content for this site (and thus helping many). It isn’t fair to everyone else…that means you! My family time will always come first and with my limited free time I need some grounds for cutting out on one of them. That justification comes in the form of private, one-on-one premium coaching.

When You Have Enough Tools and It’s Time to Start Building

July 18, 2019April 15, 2015 by Josh Short

Me, and a lot of other editors, like to say that knowing an NLE is just another tool in your tool belt. I like to take that analogy and go a step further. Every effect you learn to apply, software trick you implement, skill you acquire, connection you make, value you create for others and anything else you can think of that works towards improving yourself is a tool. Your tool belt consists of all of these. Each tool preforms a certain action whenever you are working on a project.

With your fully loaded tool belt you can build all sorts of things. The majority of time we tackle two types of projects. The first project is something simple, let’s say a chair if we can turn my analogy into something physical. We know there are four legs, a seat and a back to it. We have at least a rough blueprint we can follow or can easily find someone (or a YouTube video) to guide us. The other type of project is to build more tools! We build ourselves another screwdriver or a hammer or drill bit. These two types of projects pay our bills (barely) and (we hope) make our bosses happy. Are you happy though? If you are anything like me then you might not always be satisfied with the things you are building and their outcomes. Do they have enough reach? Do they improve my life or someone else’s life substantially?

Sure, we’re content after we sell off our chair or put away our screwdriver. We sold enough to pay off the mortgage this month or make ourselves more valuable candidates for a future job by having more tools. What we built was average. Deep down that’s not what we want. That’s not why we do what we do. We want incredible. As I lay here at 11:00PM drafting this on my phone in bed with my wife and dog already asleep long ago I’m reminded about how much incredible I want in my life and how little I am doing about it. For now…

Every Safari Keyboard Shortcut I Know

December 7, 2020April 1, 2015 by Josh Short

This article shares with you every Safari keyboard shortcut I know. I love keyboard shortcuts. Somewhere between 4% and 14% of all browser usage is through Safari. I’m in the small minority of the world that uses it as their main browser. However I absolutely love Safari’s bookmarks bar and reading list features. I love how they both transfer over automatically to my iPhone too. So that’s why we’re here today.

I believe in learning shortcuts not only in your NLE but also in every program you use. I bet you probably spend as much time clicking around the web as you do editing (you’re reading this right now, right??). So why not get faster with your browsing skills?

Reflections and My Big Secret Project Announcement

July 17, 2019March 11, 2015 by Josh Short

For someone who loves to write about time management, I’ve sure had a heck of a time doing it well lately. I started writing this post at exactly 9:07 on Saturday night. I had been working on my big secret project since about 1:00 that afternoon. Let’s pick it up from there…

By the way, I finally announce my project so keep reading!