How to brief a video editor
One idea per beat, the hook, captions for the muted viewer, the cut process, the date, what a good brief contains and what a bad one does to the edit, written from the desk where we cut.
Most bad short videos were briefed badly, not cut badly. The editor received a folder of footage, a sentence that said make it pop, and a deadline that had already passed. What came back was exactly what was asked for, which is the problem. This is how to brief an editor so the first cut is close and the second is final. We cut in-house, so it is also the brief we write for ourselves.
What is the one-idea-per-beat rule?
A beat is a few seconds of video that carries one thing: one object, one claim, one movement, one line. A short video is three or four beats. The rule is that each beat carries one idea and no beat carries two. If a beat has to say the product is handmade and that it ships tomorrow, it is two beats, or one beat about whichever matters more.
The rule exists because a viewer on a phone decides to stay or go several times inside a single video, and each decision is made on whichever idea is in front of them. Two ideas in one beat means neither lands, and the viewer leaves on the confusion. The editor cannot fix this in the cut. The brief has to arrive already split into beats, each one a line, in order.
Write them as a list. Beat one: the overcoat, close, in the case. Beat two: the name on the collar. Beat three: the winter he wore it through. Beat four: the museum's name. An editor who receives that list knows what every shot is for before opening the footage.
What does the hook have to do?
Earn the second second. The first second of a short video is the whole audition; a viewer who is not held by it is already gone. So the hook is the single most interesting frame or line in the piece, and it goes first, before the logo, before the context, before anything that assumes the viewer has decided to watch.
The brief names the hook. Not something attention-grabbing, which asks the editor to guess what you find interesting, but the actual shot or line. Open on the hand turning the collar over to show the name. Open on the caption that says he wore this for the whole of that winter. If you cannot name the hook, you do not yet know what the video is about, and the editor is about to find that out the expensive way.
A logo is never the hook, nor a slow fade from black, nor a title card with the name of the series. Each tells the viewer the interesting part is later, and the viewer takes you at your word and leaves.
Why write the captions for a muted viewer?
Because most people watching on a phone have the sound off, in a queue, in a lift, in a meeting they are pretending to attend. If the idea is only in the voice, it did not reach them. The caption carries the idea; the sound is for the people who turned it on.
This changes what the brief contains. The caption text is written in the brief, word for word, per beat, before the edit starts. Short lines, one per beat, in the order the beats land. The editor's job is to place them and time them, not to write them, because the person who knows what the video is about is the person briefing it. A video briefed without caption text comes back with a transcript of the voice, which is the wrong thing: a transcript is what someone said; a caption is what the viewer needs to know.
Write the captions, read them with the sound off in your head, and ask whether the video still makes sense. If it does, the brief is nearly finished.
How does the cut process actually run?
The order we work in.
- Selects. The editor pulls the usable shots against the beat list and sets aside the rest. Nothing is cut yet; this is sorting.
- The assembly. Beats in order, roughly timed, no music, no captions. It is ugly on purpose. It exists to answer one question: does the footage cover the beats?
- The first cut. Timed properly, the hook in place, captions placed from the brief, music if the brief asked for it. This is the cut you give notes on.
- Notes, once. Everyone who has an opinion gives it in one document, in one round, in the order the video runs. The editor takes the document and makes the second cut.
- The second cut. This should be the final. If it is not, the brief was wrong, not the editor, and the fix is in the brief.
- Export, check, publish. The export is watched on a phone, once, with the sound off, before it goes anywhere.
The notes step is where most briefs fail: notes arrive as messages over three days from four people, and the editor cuts against a moving target. One document, one round, one person collecting it. That is the whole discipline.
Why does the date matter so much?
Because the edit is cut backwards from it. A publish date tells the editor when selects must be done, when the first cut must be ready and when notes must be in, and it tells everyone else that late notes are late. A brief without a date is a wish, and a wish is cut whenever there is a gap.
Put the date in the first line of the brief. Then put the date the notes are due, which is earlier than people like. A video that misses its date because the notes arrived the night before is not an editing failure, and the editor will remember who made it one.
What does a good brief contain?
One page. A brief that needs two pages is two videos.
| Line | What goes there | Why the editor needs it |
|---|---|---|
| The one line | What the video is about, in a sentence a stranger would understand | Every cut decision is made against it |
| The audience and the place | Who watches, and on which feed | Sets the ratio, the length and how loud the hook must be |
| The hook | The exact opening shot or line | The first second cannot be guessed |
| The beats | Three or four, one idea each, in order | The spine of the edit |
| The captions | The words on screen, per beat, as they will appear | Written by the person who knows the subject |
| Sound | Voice, music, neither, and the track if there is one | Changes the pacing of every cut |
| The close | The last frame: a name, a question, a place to go | The end is the second most watched moment |
| The reference | One video of the same kind that does what you want | A reference of a different kind is a trap |
| The date | When it publishes, and when notes are due | The edit is cut backwards from it |
| The do-nots | Anything that must not appear: a logo first, a slow fade, a face without consent | Cheaper to say than to re-cut |
A good brief fits on a phone screen. Everything the editor would otherwise have to ask is already answered, which is the only reason a first cut can be close.
What does a bad brief do?
It makes the editor the author, and the editor was not in the room. Four kinds come up over and over.
- The adjective brief. Make it pop, something fresh, more energy. None of those is a decision. The editor guesses, the guess is wrong, and the notes round becomes the brief that should have existed on day one.
- The everything brief. Everything the business does, in one video, because the footage was expensive. The result says nothing, because it says everything. Cut it into four videos with one idea each; the footage will go further.
- The late brief. Footage first, brief after. The editor makes selects against no beat list and half of them are useless. Write the brief before the shoot, so the shoot covers the beats.
- The wrong reference. A cinematic brand film sent as the reference for a product reel, or a comedian's cut sent for a museum's object series. The reference has to be the same kind of video, or it tells the editor to make a different thing.
Every one of those costs a round of notes, and a round of notes is a day. A bad brief does not save time at the start; it moves the time to the end, where it is more expensive and everyone is tired.
How do we cut in-house?
Khizer cuts our short video, and he is in the brief meeting before anything is filmed. That is the arrangement we would recommend to any brand that films regularly: the editor reads the beat list before the shoot, so the selects are quick. The brief is the contract between the person who films and the person who cuts, and it is written once, by the person who knows the subject, with the caption text in it.
The editor is not the author and should not have to be. Give the editor the idea, split into beats, with the hook named, the captions written, the reference right and the date on the first line. Then the first cut is close, the second is final, and the video goes out on the day it was meant to. That is not a trick. It is a page, written before the camera comes out.