Are there any gold rules for editing?

[Daniel D. Teoli Jr.]

I'm just learning about editing. What resources are there to study for editing?

Any gold rules for editing don'ts? 

Thanks

[Phil Connolly]

Loads of resources, many technical books focusing on the technical side. And lots of books discussing the craft, this being the obvious starting point: https://www.amazon.com/Blink-Eye-Perspective-Film-Editing/dp/1879505622

Books can help you get to grips with the software, the basic principles of editing can be picked up pretty quickly. I can usually get students from, "never tried editing" to cutting together a coherent sequence in an afternoon.  

There are lots of established "rules" of editing. Personally its better to hone your instincts, you should be able to "feel" when a cut is wrong and with practice you will get better at fixing it.

Couple of tips:

Watch your edits with the sound off, do they still flow?

When your watching an edited sequence back, either make the video full screen or at least hide the timeline. Watching the edit while you see the playback head fly across the timeline, gives you a false sense of the edit. 

Be experimental, on non linear editing there's no reason not too try different things, explore the scene, try stuff. 

Be critical, if you shot the footage its sometimes difficult to be objective. E.g that long tracking shot may have been a nightmare to shoot so you gosh darned want to keep it in. A good editor would only include the shots the best serve the film regardless of the difficulty of getting the shot. Thats why its good for the editor to be a second person. If you are self editing, you have to be extra careful. There are strategies that can help. I'm about to edit a short film I directed. I've purposely not looked at the rushes for 3 weeks, hopefully I can come to the edit with fresh eyes. 

[Simon Wyss]

I second Phil. Open your eyes and ears, that’s what it takes. Develop a feel for movements, pace, and rhythms. Never forbid yourself to alter something. To swap points in time, to change the order.

Cut mercilessly out what’s bad. The high art of editing is to leave away until nothing more can be cut. Not a single frame too frequent, then you’re content.

[Bruce Greene]

A lot of new editors focus on matching the action exactly when finding a cut point.

But, from my experience watching what really good editors do, the most important thing is to make the cut at the moment new information needs to be revealed.  And when this is done well, exact matching of motion is no longer really required for a good edit.

The most important thing, I think, is to convince the audience that they are discovering the story, on their own.  But, in reality, the editor is directing them every bit of the way...

[Webster Colcord]

I agree with what Bruce says.

In addition there are established known cutting techniques. Matching action exactly between shots and cutting in the middle of a motion, like a door swinging open, can often result in the action feeling like a "double cut". Sometimes double-cuts are intentional, but the rule for an action like a door opening is to cut right after the beginning or end of the motion in either shot.

There's also a lot of ideas about establishing the relationships in a space, like a dialogue scene in a room, and whether it's better to obey the geometry of the objects in the physical space, or (more likely) for the editor to "come in cold" and not necessarily restrict themselves to the logic of the actual set. Of course, a good director can make the editor's job easy in that regard.