Juliet Warren

One of the most valuable things I've learned over the years is creating video is a collaborative effort. I've had an editor for one of my short films swap some shots around and suddenly the scene flowed much better. As an editor, I've done the same thing with client's scripts and footage. I'll see the way it's written on the page and rearrange or try something slightly different with the edit and suddenly it feels more cohesive. I truly believe that video is the type of medium where people's expertise will shine if you give them an opportunity to express it, instead of telling them exactly what to do. Giving a little freedom to the artist to let the piece breathe.

I went to school for directing and screenwriting, so I didn't go to school for editing. I fell into a position as a vault manager at a post house for advertising and worked my way up to assistant editor from there. But a lot of the programs I use today, I didn't use a decade ago. I learned how to use Premiere, Photoshop, After Effects, Lightroom, and Audition on my own through mistakes and Youtube tutorials. For me, video editing was a lot of trial and error and watching other people's work and really trying to pay attention to the pacing.

I'm one of these people who loves trying new things. I get excited by trial and error. Right now I'm writing an animated series I would love to pitch to a studio but I know I'll need to find a way to make a proof of concept piece or at least put out short social clips of scenes, so I'm currently looking into animation programs to see how I might be able to animate characters.

In theory, yes. I've messed around with AI generated video software. It's okay. It's not perfect yet. So my imagination can't go too wild at this point. But of the things that are shot practically and sent to me to edit, I haven't come across an effect or a transition or something like that that isn't possible. And even if I don't know how to do it myself, I can Google it, find a video tutorial and then apply what I learn. It's kind of amazing the ways you can improve your skills these days!

As an editor, I would love to edit something beautiful and classic. This is a very old reference but Cary Fukunaga did a Levi's commercial years ago that still sticks with me. The cuts are fun and the footage is beautiful, it's a mix of slow, gentle and calm when needed, and fast cuts where it fits. (ex: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdW1CjbCNxw)

As a director, I've recently become more interested in scenes with dialogue. I used to be far more about the stillness and silence of scenes, but I've come to love dialogue scenes because of the expressions on people's faces and how that can either confirm or contradict what they've just said. It's another layer of acting on top of what's being discussed.

Trying to be more discerning about how many project I can take on at once.

With quite a few of the projects I've edited, pacing and timing are really important with the cuts (mostly social videos). So I find it easier to pick out an audio track that vibes with the project and lay that into the timeline first. It gives me a sense of rhythm as I work.

I've edited episodes of the podcast, Pablo Torre Finds Out, which has done some very interesting sports and sport-adjacent episodes that have had significant viewer/listenership. I edited an interview for Boardroom and several social clips for them, which were a lot of fun and had a pretty wide audience.

Yes. I didn't know about editing until much later in life, but since I was little I wanted to make movies. I wanted to create videos. Tell stories. I just fell into editing and ended up really enjoying it.

By understanding what the client is trying to convey. At the end of the day, the project is for the client, so if I can make the end product convey what they set out to and add some creative flare at the same time, then I've done my job!