4 Common Mistakes to Avoid When Editing Videos

Everyone makes mistakes when editing videos – especially when they first start out. It is part and parcel of the learning curve and can either be accidental mistakes or misjudgments.

Some editing mistakes may not have that big of an impact on your videos or maybe barely noticeable unless you look for them. Others, however, can completely alter how the video is perceived.

It is important that you avoid common mistakes that could lead to the latter, and to do that you need to first know what to look for:

Mismatched color in video clips

All too often when video footage is shot on different cameras, or at different locations, the colors turn out differently. On its own, it may not be that noticeable, but as you start to cut together the video and place video clips with mismatched colors side by side – it becomes glaring.

To avoid making this mistake you should color correct the video footage and apply any color grading consistently.

Out of sync audio tracks

One of the most common accidental mistakes when editing videos are when the audio track is slightly out of sync with the video. It often takes place when you’re cutting together clips and don’t realize that a part of the audio track has been nudged slightly out of place.

It is important that you review the audio and video periodically as you edit it, and keep an eye out for any audio sync issues. By looking for it you should be able to spot it rather easily and can fix it in a couple of seconds at most.

Flash frames left in

Another mistake that beginners often make is that they accidentally leave in ‘flash frames’. A flash frame is basically a couple of frames of video of blank screen that aren’t meant to appear but seem to ‘flash’ into being.

The reason for this mistake is either because there is a small gap in video cuts, or footage was accidentally left in that was meant to be removed. In either case, the fix is simple: Monitor and review the timeline carefully to spot and remove flash frames early.

Overused visual effects

Adding visual effects can help your videos, and provide additional visual meaning or accentuate their content in various ways. However too much of a good thing is almost always bad – and overusing visual effects will be tacky, distracting, and could make your video look like an amateur production.

As a rule, you should only use visual effects when there is a specific goal that you want to achieve with them. Try to limit the overall number of effects that you use too.

Aside from the mistakes above, there is one other that you should look for: Mismatched frame rates in video clips. Unfortunately this can’t be effectively corrected in an editor, and instead, you will have to try to make it a point to record your video using the same frame rate.

Overall if you keep an eye out for these mistakes when you edit video, it shouldn’t be difficult to avoid them – regardless of the software that you’re using. For example, you could use Movavi Video Editor if you want a user-friendly option.

Although there are many other mistakes that you could (and probably will, at some point) make – the ones listed above are likely to have the biggest impact. If you carefully review the video after you’ve edited it you should be able to identify any other mistakes that are present, however, and can take steps to rectify them before you export the final video.