How A Pro Editor Sound Designs A Video

The quickest way to level up as a video editor is to level up as a sound designer.

In this week's YouTube video, I invite you into my edit suite to show you my full process for sound designing a scene.  Read to the end for a sound editing tip I haven't seen anywhere else.

The scenes I use in the video are taken from a public service announcement (PSA) that I edited. The PSA demonstrates the impact of a car crash without wearing a seatbelt. Pretty powerful stuff. And the shots gives us the opportunity for some really cool sound design.

The first tip I'd like to share is a lot of time it makes sense to create two distinct versions simultaneously. To do this, I simply copy and paste the scene.  The end result is that instead of trying to find the perfect sound for one version, I can cut in my two favorite sounds.

 I like to use ArtList (affiliate link) to find sound effects, and on my monitor I open two finder windows—one for downloads, and the other is my SFX folder so I can quickly get the effects into my project.

I often start with adding in a background ambience to give some life to the overall scene, asking myself the following question: What is the sound of this scene? 

In my sample scene we're downtown, so the background ambience may be city traffic or perhaps just a light wind with some birds chirping.  Each version I create would then elicit a different emotion.  In ArtList I can easily search for "city traffic ambience", "city wind", and "birds chirping".

In the video I share other examples of sounds which may be heard as the crash-test dummies are ejected from a seat at the top of a downtown building, sending them falling (and subsequently crashing) to the ground.

This leads me to my next tip: get creative with your search terms when you get into more specific sounds. Sometimes the sound you’d least expect to work is the best for the shot.

Below is a list of the search terms I used to find effects for the two different versions.  You will see that though a couple of the searches are straightforward, sometimes you do have to get creative with the search terms used.

Button press sounds: "button"; "switch"

Ejection sounds: "machine"; "object moving"; "gears"; "hydraulics"

Falling sounds: "wind gust"; "flag" (for fabric flapping in the wind)

Crashing sounds: "crash"; "debris"; "impact"; "body fall"; "glass shatter"

In the scene there is a part where we see the same shot twice from a different angle. Since we have two different versions, we can always experiment in one of the versions with hearing a different sound from each hit.

Check out the video to see the final sounds I added in, and how I lined everything up and leveled things out.

My last tip—and one I haven’t seen much online—is to go into sub-frame mode on your video editor to line up your sounds.

For example, I might want to move a sound effect less than a single frame to get it exactly where I want it. If I go into sub-frame mode I can now move it exactly where I want.

These details can make a big difference.

Lastly, I want to give a huge shout-out to executive producer/director Scott Rice, who graciously allowed me to use the PSA footage for this lesson.

Austen is an ADDY award-winning film & commercial editor with over 20 years of experience. He has worked with global brands like Meta, KPMG, SAP, and Christianity Today. His PSA work has championed causes like school safety (with Matthew McConaughey), driving safety, and anti-tobacco. A thought leader in the editing field, his online lessons quickly amassed over 100K views after launch.