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Assistant Editor
Today I’m talking about editing video and film and not
editing words, specifically being an Assistant Editor.
Job Description:
An assistant editor’s job might vary from project to
project, but basically anything the editor doesn’t want to spend time doing,
the assistant editor will have to do. Since I did this in the “olden days,”
most of my knowledge has to do with working on film and not necessarily
remaining all digital. The workflow on an all-digital show will likely be
different.
On a movie, after the shoot day the “dailies,” the video or
film transfer (version of the film on tape or digital format) of everything
that was shot that day will be sent to the editing room. Depending on the
schedule, this material could arrive late at night and it is usually expected
that an assistant editor will be available to load everything into the computer
and make sure that everything looks correct before the editor arrives at 9 am
the next morning to start the first assembly of the film. Part of making sure
that everything looks correct is making sure that the time code/footage numbers
on the dailies are being correctly read by the editing computer.
The film editor will start working on the first assembly of
the film the second day of the shoot, once the material from the first day is
available in the editing room. During this first few weeks of production, while
the movie is still being shot, the editor will work days and the assistant will
work when the editor doesn’t - which means nights. There might be more than one
assistant editor, depending on the needs of the production.
Once the shoot is over, the assistant editor should be able
to transition to a better schedule of not just working nights. The duties of
the assistant while the editor is working on the assembly could be
significantly reduced. They might be asked to not come back until the editor
has his first cut done or close to done, or they might be asked to hang around
to just do whatever the editor tells them to do.
Some editors might ask the assistant to sort the digital
film clips a certain way or to do some of the rough assembling of scenes so the
editor can focus on making more nuanced choices.
Once the first cut is done, the assistant will be
responsible for making sure that whoever needs to view the cut of the film is
able to. This could mean setting up screenings in the editing room, making DVDs
to send around to producers, or maybe nowadays setting up a secure on-line
viewing experience.
The assistant might also be asked to provide materials to
different actors who would like something for their reel. So an assistant might
sit with the film and just pull out scenes that a specific actor appears in and
then create a file or tape for that actor.
On projects which finish on film, there might be some
special effects which will be created per the editor’s instructions and which
the assistant will then need to replace in the cut of the movie on the editing
system so that the effect film is referenced on the edit decision lists instead
of the dailies numbers.
Once the final cut of a film is determined to be locked, the
assistant editor really takes over and makes sure that all of the instructions
for the negative cutter are correct. This could mean watching back a cut of the
movie and verifying the in and out time of every shot on the edit decision
list. It is tedious work and one mistake could end up costing a lot of time and
money. Luckily, it is rare that the EDL will have a mistake, and if one does
show up, it means something at the start was done incorrectly.
You might also be asked to sit in and make some changes to a cut if like the editor and director get into a fight. You’ll be a button pusher for the director while the director explores their ideas the editor refuses to entertain.
How do you get this work and what does it lead to:
I got this work by interning (working for no money) at a
post-production company where I told them specifically I wanted to get into
editing. I did a lot of different things at the company and they started paying
me after about a month of working for free, but I was a little surprised to
find out I was an assistant editor on a project. I was doing something for a
particularly grumpy editor and asked to not work with him. That’s when I was
told I didn’t have a choice but to work with him because I was actually his
assistant editor on the project in question. I just had to deal with him.
If you know someone who is an editor, you can ask them if
they’d be willing to let you assist them on a project. You should also get some
editing software and work on building your skills on your own so if you see an
ad which requires some basic understanding of editing software, you are able to
apply knowing it isn’t a total bluff.
Some editors will also be encouraging of their assistants
and let them edit segments on their projects, helping get them on their way to
being an editor and not an assistant.
You should also consider working on some low or no-pay student films to get some experience.
What kind of person is this good for:
Night owls! If you don’t mind working long hours, alone, in
the dark, then you’ll be prepared for the first part of the job of making sure
the work is all loaded into the editing computer. You’ll need to organize the
files also, so you’ll need to be organized. And when I was the assistant I also
had to do a fair amount of tech support. If something malfunctions with the
editing computer or software, the assistant gets to troubleshoot it and maybe
spend hours on the phone with tech support instead of the editor doing it.
Eventually I knew a lot about how to troubleshoot AVID problems and for the
most part no longer needed to call tech support to solve the problems which
would pop up.
You should also have an easygoing personality and not take it too personally when an editor is rude to you, because they will be rude to you. It’s easier to blame an assistant editor for a mistake than to accept responsibility.
The downsides:
You’re sort of down on the list of important people, so are likely to be treated poorly or overlooked, even if you have good ideas on what is or isn’t working in a particular scene.
The pay:
This can vary from literally nothing to really good. If you
can get into the union and work on union jobs, you’ll be doing great. A quick
internet search shows that the union salary for an assistant editor on a big
studio movie is over $2000/week. And because it will be in the union, there
will be protections that non-union projects won’t have as far as abusing your
time.
If you can get yourself booked most of the year, you’ll earn
a good living as an assistant editor. You’ll most likely be working project to
project, so you might go for long stretches without work. But you could also
get booked onto a project that lasts several years.
If you can get a job at a post-production company, like I did, it will be a regular full-time job. Otherwise, you’ll be a freelancer going from one long-term assignment to another.
If you have any questions about what else I did as an
assistant editor or what movies I’ve worked on, please feel free to ask them
below. Don’t forget to subscribe so you can see all my videos, about all the
different things.
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