How to Practice Video Editing for Emotion Like Professional Editors

How do you practice editing for specific emotions?

Use the same footage to create two different scenes targeting completely different emotions. This exercise forces you to make different decisions on story, rhythm, sound, and action — training you to edit like a therapist rather than just cutting shots together.

Why Professional Editors Focus on Audience Emotion First

The best editors will tell you that the single most important criteria for successful video editing is emotion, but none of them are telling you how to practice it.

In his book "In the Blink of an Eye," legendary editor Walter Murch states his six criteria for successful editing, and at the top of the list is emotion. Not only is it first on the list, but he gives it a weighting of 51%. We're not talking about the emotion of the characters in the scene, but rather the emotion of the audience.

This is where most editors get stuck. When I started editing, I had a very limited vocabulary when it came to emotions. Even though I had read Murch's book and was trying to target specific emotions, it was pretty much limited to making the audience feel sad, happy, excited, or maybe anxious.

The Problem with Basic Emotional Vocabulary

That's a good place to start, but progressing in your edits means being able to name and even feel more nuanced emotions.

What if instead of trying to make your audience feel happy, you aimed to make them feel calm, peaceful, satisfied, or safe? Instead of trying to make them feel sad, you tried to make them feel heartbroken, lonely, or empty? Instead of excited, you aimed for confident, energized, or playful? Instead of anxious, you aimed for irritated, agitated, or overwhelmed?

Zeroing in on specific emotions will lead to a better result in your edits. I think we need to learn to edit like therapists.

Think Like A Broadcast Editor guide breaks down the 5 criteria top editors use to craft emotionally-impactful edits — including how to expand your emotional vocabulary beyond the basics.

The Same-Footage Exercise That Changes Everything

Here's the exercise. Use the same shots to create two different scenes that target two different emotions.

You might be asking: how do I target different emotions if I'm using the same shots? It's by making different decisions on the other editing criteria. The other criteria I like to use are:

• Story (shot order)
• Rhythm (shot length)
• Sound (music and sound effects for each shot)
• Action (the in-and-out points for each shot)

For each edit, I'll have the target emotion in mind, and I'll make all those other decisions to try to support that emotion.

Scene 1: Targeting Inspiration

For the first scene, I targeted the emotion of inspired or inspiration. I wanted to tell the story of an architect building a really impressive model.

I started on a shot of the architect and then slowly revealed his handiwork. The music choice added some nice gravity to the scene, and the few sound effects I cut in were really to give a sense of the space.

The story structure here follows a traditional reveal — we meet the person, then discover what they've created. This builds anticipation and pays it off with the impressive model.

Scene 2: Targeting Playfulness

For the second version, I targeted the emotion of playfulness. I wanted to focus on the model as if it's coming to life.

I started on the main character in the model and then revealed the architect at the very end. That's a pretty different story just by changing the shot order.

In terms of overall rhythm, these have a pretty similar feel. They're both about the same length, though I did allow each individual music track to guide my edits. The sound and music is quite different, and the action or the in-and-out points of each shot are also very different.

I think all these small changes have a cumulative effect.

How Different Editorial Decisions Support Different Emotions

The key insight is that professional video editors think about emotion first, then make every other decision to support that emotional target.

Same footage. Different story order. Different music. Different cut points. Completely different emotional impact.

This is what separates professional editors from everyone else — the ability to reverse-engineer an emotional response and then use every tool at your disposal to achieve it.

Whether you're just starting out or you're a seasoned pro, this exercise will help you get better at targeting specific emotions, and as you get better at that, your edits will improve greatly.

Start practicing this technique and you'll develop the same emotional precision that makes Edit Like A Broadcast Pro so effective at training editors to create emotionally-impactful work that wins serious clients.