How to Edit a Product Highlight Reel

Today I’m going to be walking you through the editing process for a highlight reel for a candle. Videos like this don’t have dialogue or a story, so you need to start by asking yourself a series of questions before you get started editing.

The 1st question I asked myself was, “How long do I want this to be?” Now I’m going to be honest with you, the shorter the better. With a video like this, you want it to be as short as possible. Think about it - when was the last time you saw a director’s cut of a feature film that was better than the original? (Unless, of course, you are a super fan.) Director’s cuts are usually longer, they have extra information that the director feels really passionate about, but they tend to get kind of bogged down. They are not as good.

I wanted my highlight reel to be 10-15 seconds. No more than 15 seconds, and as close to 10 seconds as I could get. One of the big challenges is that short videos are really hard to edit. Each cut, each decision, can feel brutal. It can feel vicious because you think so many of the shots are good, are critical, are important. But you’ve got to be ruthless and take away things that are actually unnecessary.

The 2nd question you need to ask yourself for a highlight reel for a product is, “What is the vibe?” This really depends on what your product is. You could be filming a shoe, or a candle, or a musical instrument - your product is really going to determine what the vibe of your video is.

Now there are 2 things that will set the tone, or the vibe, of your video.

1 - the music you pick

2 - how long your cuts are

If you have really short, quick cuts that align with faster paced music, that’s going to be far more upbeat. If you have longer cuts with more soothing music, it’s going to feel more soothing to the viewer.

So with this being a candle, I wanted it to be more on the soothing side, but I didn’t want to get into something as low key as something like a spa - that could make my viewer fall asleep! I want the viewer to be excited about the candle and maybe make them think that they want to buy the candle.

So now … how do you even start?

You have 2 options. You can start with close up shots, and each shot gets progressively wider until you reveal what the product is. Or you could start wide and either go in reverse, or intersperse close up shots with your wide shots.

I thought about building my reel by starting close up and going wider for a reveal because I like that effect. But I realized when I sat down to edit that, because of my filming location, all of my shots are close ups, so a reveal just wasn’t going to work. So instead I decided to show the name of the product in the very first shot. A choice like that can work to make people excited for the product - maybe they know about the candle, or maybe they’ve just heard about it, and maybe they want to try it.

My 1st shot is a sort of visual hook - it shows the name of the candle and it is a little bit off center which makes it pleasing to look at.

So now that you’ve started - you picked your 1st shot. Now, how do you decide what comes next?

I went through all of my footage, pulled out all of my favorite shots, and laid they all on the timeline. Then I simply started playing with the shot order to see what I liked and what I didn’t like. What worked and what didn’t work.

I want any shots back to back where you could see the name of the candle. I thought it was repetitive and it took me out of the moment, trying to read it over and over again. In fact I realized I didn’t even want the name of the candle in every other shot. I didn’t like how it made me feel when I was watching it. I was busy reading and not getting into the mood of lighting this candle.

I also didn’t want to put opposing movement back to back. So something like a shot with a tilt followed by a shot with a pan. It looks far to busy and frantic for a candle. A candle is supposed to set the mood, to create ambiance, it’s relaxing and romantic, it could be celebratory. But it is not supposed to be busy and active.

This is where using the computer paper as a reflector really came in handy. It added a sense of movement without actually moving the camera. So I could that I could put shots like that back to back without it feeling too busy.

I played with where to place the shots of my lighting the candle and then blowing it out. I decided I liked them at the end - they are the sort of reveal that I originally wanted to create. I started with showing the name and ended with actually lighting the candle.

I also filmed myself holding the candle and taking the lid off, but I decided not to use that shot because, frankly, I thought my hand looked like a giant mitt. The shots without my big old paw were far more elegant.

There is a great moment in the reel where a pop in the flame lined up with a beat in the music. Originally that was just a happy accident. As I was playing with shots, that pop was very close to a musical beat, so I adjusted the shots around it so it lined up perfectly. It turned into my favorite moment in the finished reel. Because it was my favorite part, it wasn’t a big deal to change the other work around it. I thought it was worth it.

And that’s all from me!

It really is about asking yourself 3 questions -

1 - how long do I want it to be?

2 - what’s the vibe?

3 - how do I start?

From there you pull your favorite shots and you play with them on the timeline. Then you see if it evokes the feeling in you that you want it to evoke in other people.