Learn How to Edit Videos by Watching Videos

When I first invested in some serious video editing programs, I was able to figure out a lot of things by just playing around.

Giving yourself a project to work on and just digging in is a great way to learn any new program. You can get pretty far with trial and error, but today’s video editing programs are SO much more powerful than ever before and not every feature is sitting on the surface for you to discover.

Thankfully, you don’t have to rely on giant outdated textbooks to use more than $50 worth of your video editing software. Online video tutorials are amazing resources because you can:

See your new software in action
Work along with the instructor
Pause and re-watch sections at any time
Find tutorials for any version of your software (even if it’s outdated)
Track your learning progress
Download project files and plugins
Learn wherever and whenever you want
Pay less than college classes (or even college text books for that matter)
Stay current without buying new books

Meet Lynda

Essential training for all the major video editing programs
Learn whenever or wherever you want with iPad and iPhone apps
Find courses by software or subject matter and view full course table of contents

Try Lynda.com FREE for 7 Days

Back in 2009 I became a member at Lynda.com so I could start learning how to use Adobe Premiere and After Effects more efficiently. After running through a few lessons in one of their “essential trainings” I felt like an idiot for wasting so much time on YouTube watching poorly produced (and slooooooow moving) tutorials.

Every course is painstakingly organized by topic, company, software, and even instructor. From there you can drill down to the exact tutorial you want in each course’s table of contents, so no more sitting through 8 minutes of bullshit before the instructor even opens the damn program. I’ll take you through the interface next, but just know that you can walk away with the information you need in less than the time it would take you to find a passable video elsewhere.

Since becoming a member I’ve learned 100s of new editing tricks and techniques, how to animate characters, how to set up a website on WordPress, how to edit CSS, how to create pivot tables in Excel, how to use that damn pen tool in Photoshop, how to use Garage Band on my iPad, how to take better pictures with my DSLR camera, and so much more.

Membership Plans

Subscription plans on Lynda.com give you unlimited access to all of their 1,415 courses (don’t worry, I list some of my favorites below). You can grab a monthly or annual membership and pay a little extra if you want to go premium. Premium just means that they include the ability to download the exercise files for each training.

Unless you absolutely want to work along with the instructor with the exact same files, I say skip the premium and go with the regular membership. I also recommend starting out with the monthly plan even though its not as good of a deal as the annual plan. You can always upgrade to an annual plan later, and this way you have the option to cancel after a month or two if you’re worried about not using it.

I personally started with the monthly plan and upgraded to the annual plan after the first month. However, if you’re thinking about picking up an annual plan, here are a few of my favorite courses to get the most out of your membership…