The ability to insert, copy, replace, transform, and delete clips at any time. Nonlinear editing allows experimenting with various sequences and effects, previewing the changes before compiling your final movie, or outputting to videotape.
NTSC:
National Television Standards Committee. The organization that sets the American broadcast and videotape format standards for the FCC. Color television is currently set at 525 lines per frame, 29.97 frames per second.
Offline:
The videotape editing process whereby the final edit list is compiled, usually in a more inexpensive edit room, in preparation for the on-line edit. (Video)
Online:
The videotape editing process that creates the final video edit master, including effects, from the offline edit list. (Video)
Outgoing Scene:
The first scene of a dissolve or wipe effect which changes into the second, or incoming scene.
Overlapping and Matching Action:
Repeating part of the action in one shot at the beginning of the next shot, or covering the action with two or more cameras, then matching the overlaps on the editing table for the purpose of making a smooth cut on action. (Film Editing)
PAL (Phase Alternating Line):
The European color television standard that specifies a 25Hz frame rate and 625 lines per frame.
Pick-up Shot:
Reshooting a portion of a scene, the rest of which was acceptably filmed in a previous take.
Plug Ins:
Auxiliary programs accessible from within a parent program.
RAM:
Random Access Memory. Computer memory within which the applications are executed and run.
Relational Editing:
Editing of shots for the purposes of comparison or for the contrast of content. (Film Editing)
Reverberation:
The presence or persistence of sound due to repeated reflections.
Ripple Edit:
The ripple edit tool adjusts the duration of one clip on a track while retaining the duration of all other clips on the track. The effect of the duration change in one clip adjusts (ripples) the positions of other clips and may change the total duration of the movie. Ripple editing is sometimes called film-style editing.
Rough-cut:
A preliminary trial stage in the process of editing a film. Shots are laid out in approximate relationship to an end product without detailed attention to the individual cutting points. (Film Editing)
Rolling edit:
The rolling edit tool adjusts the duration of one clip, but increases or decreases the duration of the adjacent clip to maintain the original duration of the two-clip sequence and the duration of the entire track. Rolling editing is sometimes called video-style editing.
Score:
The original-music composition for a motion picture or television production which is generally recorded after the picture has been edited.
Scrub:
Moving a piece of tape or magnetic film back and forth over a sound head to locate a specific cue or word.
SCSI:
Small Computer Systems Interface. Data transfer format for Computers. Hard Drives, Scanners, CD-ROM's etc.
Sequencer:
The hardware or software based brain of a MIDI studio. It receives stores and plays back MIDI information in a desired sequence.
Sibilance:
An exaggerated hissing in voice patterns. (Post Production)
Signal:
The form of variation with time of a wave whereby information is conveyed in some form whether it is acoustic or electronic.
Signal to Noise Ratio:
This is the ratio of the desired signal to the unwanted noise in an audio or video record/playback system.
Slate:
The identifier placed in front of the camera at beginning of a take.
Sound Effect:
A recorded or electronically produced sound that matches the visual action taking place onscreen.
Sound-on-Sound:
A method in which previously recorded sound on one track is re-recorded onto another track while new material is added.
Soundtrack:
Generically refers to the music contained in a film, though it literally means the entire audio portion of a film, video or television production, including effects and dialog.
Splice:
The act of joining two pieces of film by any of several methods. (Film Editing)
Split Screen:
An optical or special effects shot in which two separate images are combined on each frame.
Stop Frame:
An optical printing effect in which a single frame image is repeated in order to appear stationary when it is projected. This may also refer to a camera technique in which only one frame at a time is exposed.
Sweeten/Sweetening:
Enhancing the sound of a recording or a particular sound effect with equalization or some other signal processing device.
Time Code:
There are several SMPTE (Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers) timecode standards targeted for the different frame rates used in the film, video, and television industries. For technical reasons involved with broadcasting, the NTSC adopted a standard of 29.97 fps rather than the 30 fps originally used in early black-and-white television programming. The SMPTE timecode for NTSC video assumes a frame rate of 30 fps, which results in a 0.1 percent discrepancy between real playing time and the timecode's duration measurement.
To address the discrepancy between the playing time measured by SMPTE timecode and real playing time, the drop-frame format was developed. With drop-frame timecode, two frame counts are dropped (actual frames are not dropped) from the count every minute, for 9 out of every 10 minutes. The nondrop-frame timecode ignores this discrepancy and thus is not duration accurate.
- While you can use either format, it is important to know which format was used in recording your video source material and to edit your videotape using the same format throughout so that you know how real time is being represented.
Traveling Matte:
A process shot in which foreground action is superimposed on a separately photographed background by an optical printer. (Laboratory)
TV Safe:
The area of a filmed image which will normally appear on a home television set after a film has been transferred in a telecine and then transmitted.
Underscore:
Music that provides emotional or atmospheric background to the primary dialog or narration onscreen.
VITC:
Vertical Interval Time Code. A time code signal that is written in the vertical interval by the rotating video heads, allowing it to be read when the tape is not moving. Requires special equipment to read and write.
Voice-over:
Narration or non-synchronous dialog taking place over the action onscreen.
Wild Track:
Audio elements that are not recorded synchronously with the picture.
Workstation:
This term generally refers to a disk-based audio or video recording and editing system.