12

Career Roles – What You Can Do with This Newfound Knowledge

You’ve made it! Before anything else, I’d like to congratulate you on getting this far in the book. In this chapter, I will talk to you about different career choices that are very popular in the current age and will give you a few helpful tips, including a small list of questions you can ask any clients you may have in the future!

We will begin our chapter by looking at three different career paths you may like that you can apply to everything we learned in this book. We will then continue to the next section, where I’ll tell you all-around good tips that can be applied to a lot of different video editing industries, and finally, will bid you farewell and allow you to create your own path with this newfound knowledge.

In this chapter, we will cover the following:

• Look at content creators and the process that comes with being a content creator
• Learn what a short film producer is and how to start
• How to freelance and what to ask your clients
• General tips that will help you in the future

Content creator

The first path I’d like to talk to you about is perhaps the most popular option in these current times, which is to become a content creator. The term “content creator” is nowadays usually used for YouTubers or streamers, but it can mean a lot of other things as well that are not connected with video editing in particular, but for our purposes, we will use the most popular definition as just mentioned. This means to make it easier, we will henceforth narrow down the classification of the term to mean someone who uses their video editing skills to create and share entertaining or educational videos.

So, how would you know whether being a content creator is a good fit for you? Well, you can ask yourselves these following two questions:

• Do I have a passion for a subject or topic?
• Do I have certain knowledge or skills that others would find interesting or even learn from?

If the answer to either of these questions is yes, then in combination with Wondershare Filmora 11 and a YouTube account, you have all the tools needed to start creating.

We will now look at three different categories of content creation and explain what they are and what you should aim for if that is the category you want to pursue.

Entertainment content

Videos created for the purpose of entertaining usually stick to a certain topic and communicate in a way that involves humor, satire, sarcasm, or action. For example, a popular video format today is reacting to different things whether that would be music, games, trailers, other YouTubers, or many other subjects, but you’ll notice that the most popular YouTubers that create reaction videos often make their reactions a bit silly and over the top, which is entertaining to watch. I mean, seeing a 28-year-old man jump up and down because of something shown in the video being reacted to is not only silly and funny but also extremely entertaining. Another example is people reacting to memes or dumb comments on the internet, which are inherently funny, so in order to take away the focus of the viewer from the meme and place it more on them, the reactor, they will usually start reviewing the meme they just watched with sarcasm and/or satire, which automatically places the spotlight back on the reactor. A great YouTube channel that does this extremely well is AngryJoeShow, which reviews movies and TV shows while sometimes either dressed as a character and acting them out or simply dissecting the movie in a very funny and entertaining way.

There are many other formats that can be classified as entertaining videos, such as the following:

• Comedy shorts (CalebCity)
• Gameplay videos (Markiplier)
• Travel vlogs (PewDiePie)
• Game reviews (videogamedunkey)
• Pop culture (ScreenCrush)
• Reaction videos (AngryJoeShow)
• Art (Jazza)
• Challenge videos (MrBeast)
• News (LastWeekTonight)
• Podcasts
• Gaming Streams (MoistCr1tikal)

In the brackets next to the mentioned formats, I added content creators from YouTube that I personally watch and know do a great job with their videos and editing. So please, if you are interested in any of these formats, I recommend you visit the channel to see and learn how they structure their videos in order to apply to our own. Remember, we’re not here to reinvent the wheel but to improve what already works!

So, we’ve now covered entertaining content; next we’ll look at educational content.

Educational content

As for education, we have quite a lot of different subjects that we can cover, which we will look at next. The main purpose of educational content is to deliver information in a clear and concise way while also keeping our viewers focused and entertained.

You may be wondering since these videos need to be entertaining, why separate these formats into a different category of content instead of adding them in the preceding section where we covered our entertainment content? Well, first of all, I love that you’re asking these kinds of questions (if you are) because that means you’re not just reading this book but also thinking about what is written! To answer the hypothetical question though, it has to do with the main purpose of the content. The formats mentioned in the entertainment content category have the main purpose of being... well, entertaining. They don’t necessarily need to teach anything or communicate a point; their job is to simply be fun to watch. On the other hand, content that is meant to be educational has the purpose of teaching you something in an efficient and easy way to understand. And we know due to various scientific studies that we as humans learn and focus better when we enjoy the subject or the way it’s being communicated to us. Think back to when you were in school: did you not tend to do better in subjects that you enjoyed or subjects that you had a “fun” teacher educating you? ‘Cause I certainly did!

Some formats that can be a great asset when trying to be educational are as follows:

• Animation
• Slideshow
• Lecture
• Voiceover
• Tutorials/practical how-to videos

Now that’s not to say that you can’t mix and match formats, but these are ones that I personally have found work extremely well, so please keep these in mind but feel free to experiment. At the end of the day, experimenting is how new formats and genres are innovated and created.

So, in this section, we’ve talked about content creation and the different categories and subcategories that it includes pertaining to YouTube and streaming as those are the most popular forms of this career path, but everything that was said here can be applied to any other platforms or careers that include content creation in the form of small to medium videos.

Film maker

The next form of content creation we’ll look at is film production and, to be more precise, short indie film production.

We live in a time where it’s so easy to create different forms of videos and movies thanks to the advancement of technology and the genuine low price of decent or even good hardware such as smartphones and cameras. Not only that, but with Filmora 11, you don’t need to have the highest quality camera as with the features we’ve seen throughout the book, we can easily modify the appearance of clips to fit the style of the movie we are trying to make.

Film production is great fun, and you can create a short film with a few friends or even just yourself; all you need is a good and interesting concept to grab the viewers’ attention.

The easiest way to get your work seen by people is to upload it to YouTube and share it on social media, but there are also other ways such as entering short film competitions, negotiating with popular influencers to promote it, start selling it on your own website, and many other ways that I’m sure you’ll be able to think of.

The gameplan

I will now guide you through the “gameplan,” but this is not the only way of creating short films, this is just the way that I found works best for me. With enough practice and commitment, I’m sure you’ll find the perfect way that works best for you. So let’s get started:

1. Fill in the information about your film
2. Write the script
3. Find and examine all filming locations
4. Speak to and gather all the people that will be part of the film
5. Start filming
6. Publish and/or promote your film

Now that we’ve listed all the steps, let us take a closer look at them in more detail.

Write the script and choose filming locations

This is where you are going to decide where the filming locations are and also the dialogue that will be used during the film. This is also where you should start thinking about possible actors/people that will be acting in your movie.

Organize and contact everyone working on the film

The next thing you need to do is find all the people that will be acting in your short film and negotiate payment and/or anything else you decide to offer. Make sure to choose responsible and reliable people as most projects fail due to people not being reliable.

Start filming

This one’s pretty self-explanatory: start filming your movie.

Edit and publish

The last thing we need to do is edit our film using all the features and tools we’ve learned about within Filmora 11 to make it look cohesive and good so you can publish it!

That is everything you need in order to create a short film; it is a simple process, but each step takes quite a bit of time to organize and execute. That is how to start creating short films! We will now take a look at being a freelancer.

Freelancer

Being a freelancer is actually a great way to get your name out there. There are a lot of people and companies out there that require people with these kinds of video editing skills and will pay a lot of money for a quality product.

We’ve seen some of the few projects that might be asked of you in some of the previous chapters, but they aren’t limited to only those. There are a plethora of different projects a video editor can help with and the better you get at using the software, the easier it will be to negotiate with the client and deliver much better products.

The one thing that all freelancers need to get started is a portfolio, which is a small group of different projects that you have made in order to show people your skillset. It is very unlikely that any client will hire you before seeing your portfolio, so you must create a portfolio of projects as soon as you decide you want to freelance.

I’ve created a graphic that explains the process of freelancing in an easy-to-understand way. Make sure you memorize it:

Figure 12.1: Freelancer-client relationship diagram

The preceding diagram is assuming that you have already found a client. If you have not found a client, the easiest way to get one is to ask around if anyone requires what you can offer. This could include friends and family, local businesses, other content creators, and so on.

Nonetheless, if you have paid attention throughout the book and learned about the features and tools that I’ve taught, and also listened to my advice, there is no doubt in my mind that you’ll be able to find a client.

In summary, the takeaways from this section are to always have a portfolio that you can show potential clients, make sure to ask the right questions and finally, make sure you have fun!

A few helpful tips

In this final and extremely short section, I’ll give you a list of a few tips that apply to all creative career paths, not just video editing, in order to make your practical application of all the skills you’ve learned much more interesting and exciting:

• Take breaks and stay positive. Usually, some parts of video editing (when doing them for a long time) can get tedious; it’s okay to take breaks as long as you always return to finish the job.
• When working with clients, stay in touch. An easy mistake to make is to accidentally let a long time pass before communicating with the client, which puts a strain both on yourself and the project, so make sure you stay in contact!
• If you ever forget something, it will cost you less time to come back to this book and look it up rather than trying to figure it out yourself. The same goes for when creating projects that were not covered in this book. There are a plethora of tutorials online that will save you hours, if not days!
• When working with others, it is best to show a friendly yet stern side of yourself. No one likes working with a dictator. If no one likes working with you, you can bet that they won’t try hard to make your project as great as it can be!
• Have fun! Honestly, there is absolutely no point in doing any of this if you’re not having fun. Life is way too short to spend it doing something that makes you miserable.

These are the best tips I can give you as these were the tips that were given to me when I first started video editing. And we’re finally done!

Summary

We’ve mentioned a few career choices here, but these aren’t the only ones, as video editors are always needed in almost every single field today due to the entertaining and communicative nature of this kind of media. We’ve also talked about a few important general tips that you should always consider when doing pretty much anything, not just video editing.

The only thing left for you to do is, well, start! You have all the power to create amazing videos and if you got this far, I definitely have confidence that you’ll do an amazing job in this field.

I cannot stress how proud I am of you for making it this far in the book. It shows excellent work ethic, determination, and discipline, and you should be just as proud of yourselves as I am of you! In this chapter, we covered some of the potential career or hobby paths you may have an interest in and also saw a great way of creating a plan.

Once again, excellent job on getting this far and I wish you nothing but the best when it comes to your creative journey in video editing! It’s been an absolute pleasure guiding you through this journey. Farewell.