Editing is both the last and one of the most powerful opportunities the producer has to influence whether a program will communicate the information it was meant to convey successfully, and whether it will affect the emotions and moods of the audience as the producer wished. The editing process is also a difficult and demanding craft, and presents many opportunities for the unprepared to go astray. Indeed, the failure to communicate effectively in many beginners’ television programs is much more often a failure of the editor to develop a coherent conception of the flow of the program than of any problem with other technical aspects of the art of television, such as camera work or sound recording.
- remove what is flawed
- remove what is useless to the story
- assemble what is left in a way which communicates a story
Edward Dmytryk
- Never make a cut without a positive reason
- When undecided about the exact frame to cut on, cut long rather than short
- Whenever possible cut ‘in movement’
- The fresh is preferable to the stale
- All scenes should begin and end with continuing action
- Cut for proper values rather than proper matches
- Substance first – then form
Walter Murch
- Emotion – does the cut reflect what the editor believes the audience should be feeling at that moment?
- Story – does the cut advance the story?
- Rhytm – does the cut occur at a moment that is rhythmically interesting and ‘right’?
- Eye trace – does the cut pay resoect to the location and movement on the storys focus of interest?
- 2 dimensional factor – does the cut respect the 180 degree rule?
- 3 dimensional factor – is the cut true to the ohysical/spatial relationships within the diegesis
