Nowadays, video is the most popular type of digital content, so there are a lot of opportunities for building a successful career in the video editing industry. Videos are used for almost everything, from marketing campaigns to entertainment.
For beginner video editors such diversity can be a bit confusing. They don’t know where to start and what career path to choose to succeed. If you feel the same way, keep reading. In this article, we will tell you about types of video editing jobs and how to start your career. Let’s get started!
Video Editing Career Paths
There are many types of video editing professionals. They work in different industries, have different expertise, and perform different tasks. Before choosing a career path, you need to know more about what video editing career fields exist. So, here are some of the common types of video editors:
- Animator — works with motion graphics.
- Marketing video editor — create product explainer videos, video ads, content for social media, and other video content used by companies and brands to promote their products and services.
- Event video editor — works with footage from different events like weddings, concerts, etc.
- TV editor — works on diverse TV formats, from sitcoms and news programs to advertisements.
- Film editor — works on film and motion picture production, adhering to the director’s creative vision.
How to Become a Video Editor
So, how can you enter the video editing industry? There are many ways, depending on what field you want to work in and what knowledge you have. So, let’s take a look at a few options.
Marketing and Advertising Studios
If you like creating commercial videos, you can start your career in a digital marketing agency or advertising company. You don’t need a degree for it, but it usually requires some experience in video editing. There are many entry-level positions that allow you to work in a team with professionals and gain experience from them.
Freelance
As a freelance editor, you have an opportunity to find projects that require minimal experience in video editing. For some projects, it is enough to know how to work with simple open-source video editors or online tools like video splitter. And of course, you can be hired to work on complex projects if you have enough skills and experience. There are no limits.
TV and Film Editing
If you’re interested in working on movies, short films, or different TV formats, you can start your career in a local production company. Even if you don’t have video editing experience, you can become a post production assistant, gain the required skills, and then continue your career path as an assistant editor.
Successful Video Editing Career: 3 Tips for Beginners
Building a career is a long process and everybody wants to know how to succeed in it. If you’re a beginner, you might frequently feel uncertain about your decisions and want to find someone who can guide you through this difficult time. To help you to pave the way to success in video editing, we want to share some tips with you.
Try It Out
Many beginners are afraid of changing a profession, even if they don’t like their current job. But the truth is you need to try several roles to understand which one you genuinely enjoy and want to turn into your profession. That’s why we recommend you to learn more about different types of video editing jobs. Watch some tutorials, try to create promotional videos, animations, or short movies, and watch some interviews with different video editors.
Understand What Attracts You the Most
After learning more about different video editing jobs, you’ll get a better idea of what type of video content you are interested in. We recommend you focus only on your feelings first, rather than googling what video editing jobs pay the most. Usually, you’re more likely to succeed when you do something you like.
Create a Plan
Planning and setting goals can help you to motivate yourself and work more effectively toward your goal. Start with considering what knowledge you need for the position you want to get. Then, understand what skills you need to gain and how long it will take. Also, set milestones to make sure you can measure your success. For example, you want to become a Lead Editor. In this case, you can make an apprentice editor job your first milestone.
Final Thoughts
There are a lot of paths you can choose as a beginner video editor to build a successful career. People demand more and more video content, and it opens numerous opportunities for those who’re interested in video editing. Even if you don’t like some kinds of video editing work, you still can find suitable projects you’d love to work with.
We hope this information has helped you to figure out what career path to choose. And if you have more questions related to a video editing career, check out the answers from our experts. For example, you can find out why knowing different video editing software is critical for becoming a video editor.
