Are you used to filming videos of your children’s activities, your family celebrations, trips or walks, or any other memorable moments? Then you probably have gigabytes of video clips stored on your phone, computer or in the cloud. Would you like to turn them into interesting films spiced up with music, titles, and effects that you can share on your YouTube channel or blog, send as gifts to loved ones, or keep in your collection?
Not sure how to go about it? Check out the 7 tips that will help you assemble exciting family videos from your disparate footage filmed over the last few years.
Choose The Right Video Editing Software
The first thing to do is to choose your video editing software. You can start by looking at what’s already installed on your computer. On a Mac, this can be the built-in iMovie software, which offers good editing tools and is fairly user-friendly for beginners. On recent versions of Windows, you’ll find Clipchamp, and on older versions – Windows Movie Maker.
In case you don’t have an editing application pre-installed and don’t want to download anything to your device, opt for an online video editing tool. There is a recommendation for you – Free Online Video Cropper is a free web tool focused on cropping videos. Its big advantage is that it doesn’t leave a watermark on exported videos, unlike many other free web tools. With its help, you can quickly crop your videos to the format required by different web platforms and improve their composition by cutting out unnecessary details. And it works on your mobile device too, if it’s what you prefer for editing your videos.
In general, when choosing a video editing programme, start with your experience in the field and if you have little, prefer a programme that offers a simple and intuitive interface, various templates, and collections of music, titles, effects, and embellishments.
Plan Your Montage
So you’ve launched your video editing software and it’s telling you to add your clips, but which ones? To create a consistent film quickly, you need to do a bit of preparatory work.
First of all, think about the concept of your video: will it be dedicated to a particular event such as your last holiday, to a particular person whose birthday you’re planning a surprise for, to an activity that you regularly do as a family, or something else? You can simply collect your best videos over a certain period.
Keep It Short And Dynamic
Surely you don’t want your viewers to get bored watching your film, especially children, who unfortunately have a very short attention span. That’s why you need to keep the total length to between 5 and 7 minutes if it’s not a full account of a big event like a wedding or a graduation party.
If you’re making a compilation of the best moments of your trip or your little one’s playful antics, be sure to cut any clips that are too long or monotonous and leave only the essential moments. Speed up the parts of a video where nothing, in particular, is happening to give the impression of time passing, alternate close-ups and general shots, and use dynamic transitions, but without overdoing the animation effects.
Add Titles And Texts For Information And Style
The opening titles and closing credits will give a cinematic feel to your montage. The opening titles set the tone, so that the viewer knows what to expect. Choose a template that matches the theme of your film (travel, school, Christmas, etc.). As for the text, a play on words and a touch of humour are almost always welcome in family videos.
A good idea might be to overlay some captions to indicate the date and place, or to provide an amusing or informative commentary. To stay in the style of film or TV, you can add a few texts in a lower third or a ticker tape.
The end rolling credits are an opportunity to honour the actors, director, scriptwriter, and all the other members of the family who took part in making your masterpiece – they’ll be pleased to see their names on the screen.
Enhance Your Videos With Filters And Overlays
To give a more harmonious look to your final video combined with several snippets, you can apply a tone filter to all of the clips. You can also play around with various filter effects to give your video a cinematic feel, add a touch of nostalgia or modify the colour balance.
To make your videos more entertaining and grab viewers’ attention, don’t hesitate to add a few funny cliparts, animated GIFs or smileys, but be careful not to overshadow the essence of your editing: your precious videos and the unforgettable moments they capture.
Insert A Suitable Soundtrack
In some cases, you’ll want to keep the original sound of your family videos: the children laughing, the whole family singing Happy Birthday, your baby’s first words. In other situations, you may be faced with videos where the sound is inaudible or spoiled by the noise of the wind, traffic or crowds. Then it’s best to replace it with lively music and some voice comments.
Music can create the right mood for any video, but there are a few nuances to bear in mind. If you intend to publish your video on YouTube or Facebook, make sure you use a royalty-free melody, otherwise, your video will be rejected by the platform for copyright infringement. Fortunately, many video editors offer collections of royalty-free music.
Save Your Video In The Right Format
The output format you choose for your video depends on how you want to share it. MP4 is the most popular format, so you can choose it without hesitation.
You also need to think about the resolution of your video. The higher the resolution, the better the quality, but the file size may be too large for downloading online or viewing on mobile devices. For mobiles, the optimum resolution is 720p, while to view your videos on your computer or TV, you’re better off recording them in full HD (1080p) or even 4K, if your video editor allows it.
There are also horizontal and vertical videos, which are preferable for mobile devices and social networks. Finally, it’s better to create several copies of your videos for different platforms using the ready-made presets available in your video editing software.
All You Have To Do Is Get Started
You may think that video editing isn’t for you, but all you have to do is get started, because it is a creative, exciting, and rewarding activity that can bring your family closer together in a new hobby and help you preserve and share your precious memories. As you master the editing tips mentioned above and discover new ones, your skills will grow and you’ll be able to create really beautiful montages from your family videos.