Building your own YouTube channel is a free and terrific way to expose your video producing skills. The channel will serve as a single space to store and display all the content you choose to exhibit.

So you’ve got your channel, the knowhow to create and edit videos for YouTube, and the proper software to do it. There are just a few more technical aspects to keep in mind before you begin the editing process…

Keeping media files organized efficiently is a crucial element to not only getting work done right, but timely as well (countless hours can be lost while searching for misplaced video clips, trust us).

Make sure all your clips are carefully labeled and placed in the correct corresponding folders. This will make life much easier for you.  Maintaining an organized digital workspace allows you to focus on the real heart and soul of your project, and that’s the creative aspect.

And to that point…

Being precise about your clip selection and judicious when it comes to eliminating unnecessary footage will be key when it comes to the finished product. Tight storytelling is good storytelling in any medium, but this applies with special weight on the YouTube platform, which leans more into quick bursts of story before making an even quicker exit.

Truly being meticulous about your footage selection will also show an always-welcome degree of professionalism to the work.

Now we can get into what makes truly effective and engaging videos…

Even if you’re not considering the word “story” in its most traditional sense of a clear beginning, middle, and end, having an ironclad understanding of what you’re trying to say is crucial when it comes to producing comment.

That’s not to say that what you’re producing has to be earth-shatteringly important, but there should be a crystal-clear point that you’re trying to express. Even if your video is less than a minute long, take the time to think through the conceit behind your idea and the understandings you want your viewers to take from it.

The easier to grasp and cleaner your execution is, the more likely it is to appeal to a broader audience. Check out this thirty-six second video for an example of that…

There’s an art to creating pace in a video that can only be enhanced the more you do it. After you’ve pieced your video together, watch it. Then watch it again. And again. Try to get an understanding if anything is moving too fast or too slow. If so, why are they moving at an off pace?

A harmonious flow of events will keep an audience engaged. Your aim is to keep your viewer from being bored as well as exhausted from trying to keep up with a pace and rhythm that’s too fast. For a quick tutorial on video pacing, watch this video below.

To back up for a moment, transitions are the way film editors move, or transition, a scene or moment, from one to the next. There are many different ways to execute a transition (a timed dissolve, creative effect, and a hard cut are all examples among many others), but you’ll want to weigh which is the right transition for the mood and moment you’ve created, and also (here comes the real professional part), can it be done seamlessly?

A jarring transition can immediately (and sometimes irrevocably) pull your audience out of their viewing experience and lose connection with your work. Make sure that the transition you’re using enriches the flow of the narrative and stays consistent with the emotionality you’re trying to convey. Check out this video for a more in-depth look at video transitions.

When we’re talking about audio, we’re not just talking about dialogue, it’s also music and any other ambient sounds you’re looking to build into your video. Audio quality can have a significant impact on your video and is a key factor when it comes to keeping an audience engaged.

Make sure all of your audio levels are balanced and clear. Also, and arguably most importantly, make sure that whatever audio additions are being incorporated into your work play a significant role in achieving the overall effect you’re going for.

When done right, audio can compliment visuals and substantially elevate your material beyond even your expectations for the material. For a deeper dive into the importance of the audio component in videos, check out this clip.

Color correction is the process of fixing or correcting colors in a video to align them with what they should be. Color correction is essential when it comes to immersing a viewer in your work, by ensuring there’s a cohesion to the colors and hues and a consistency with the world you’re creating. All worlds, locations, and settings, even the most mundane, have their own color scheme and you’ll want to adhere to those in order to be effective with your video.

As with all other aspects of the creative process, you’ll want to hear from some peers on what they think about your video. Did it make sense to them? Were they able to follow it? Did they understand your point? Was it too long? Was it too short? You don’t have to take every note you’re given, but collecting them and giving them consideration often helps to complete a more well-received piece of material.

When you’ve completed your video, you’ll need to export and upload it to YouTube. Make sure you’ve chosen the correct format and resolution and then further, optimize the YouTube settings to preserve the video quality you’ve established during the upload process.

Thumbnails are the first thing viewers see when they’re browsing videos, so you want to be sure that yours not only conveys some genuine aspect of your story but also serves as something of an attention-grabber.

Ideally you want to display a thumbnail image that will make a viewer want to click on the image. And further, ensure your title does the same. You want to create something that stirs interest, but also manages to maintain the integrity of your work.

Video editing for YouTube videos is no different from editing for other mediums. While there are technical aspects involved, the majority of them are user-friendly and cost-effective. As you build your video portfolio, remember that skills and craft sharpen with time and experience, so keep at it and don’t be afraid to experiment. You can always revise material that doesn’t work until it finally does at very little expense.