This is how stock footage can be invaluable to editors [sponsored]

Well placed stock footage can really transform an edit

When you are up against the clock and need to inject that 'special something' into an edit, stock footage could help you out in a multitude of ways.

Stock footage has many uses. Some are obvious, such as intercutting shots of subjects that would be prohibitively expensive or time consuming for a production to make themselves. Some are less obvious, such as animated textures for compositions. Either way, there’s a wealth of material for you to choose from, and Adobe Stock’s extraordinarily effective search tools can help you find exactly the asset you need for your next video project.

With the competition and standards for video being higher than ever, it is critical for production companies to give clients extra value. On smaller projects where time and budgets are very tight, it can be much harder to find the leeway to create effects and titles that give the impression of a much higher budget production. The ability to use stock footage can often solve such issues in one swipe, particularly if you are up against the clock and you really need to add that extra pizazz to impress the client.

Stock footage can add that extra pizazz, particularly when you are up against the clock

Workflow

Editing video is not a straightforward, by-the-numbers process. It’s a creative exercise, and anything that interrupts the flow not only takes up valuable time, but can also stifle the creative thought process. From an editing perspective, the need to search for stock footage has often meant interrupting the workflow to spend time trying to find the perfect shot on a stock website, before either downloading a full resolution licensed version of the footage, or a very low resolution preview. Both of which have their limitations.

Licensing the full resolution footage from the beginning isn’t ideal because sometimes you can insert it into the timeline only to find that it doesn’t quite work as hoped. Low resolution previews are easier to deal with, but the fact that you can’t see the full detail of the footage means that you might find the full resolution licensed version of the footage has unsuitable elements that you weren’t fully aware of when you were previewing it.

Help is on hand however, and one of the best ways to integrate stock footage within your editing workflow is to use the Creative Cloud Libraries within Premiere Pro and After Effects. This gives you an effortless way to search for and download stock footage without having to leave your NLE. That in itself is a powerful advantage: searching, previewing and licensing directly within your NLE saves time and allows you to make creative decisions faster.

Adobe Stock allow you to place full resolution previews right into your timeline

Even better: by doing this you can place a watermarked, full resolution preview of your selection of footage within your timeline, removing any issues with the low resolution previews you might have been used to in the past. Once you have finalised the edit you can fully license the footage. All from within your NLE.

This is important because from a creative point of view, it means your workflow is more effective. You can offer clients or producers multiple choices of shots without having to commit to buying before the edit is approved. If you need a texture for an overlay, or a light leak effect for a transition, you can search for exactly what you need, and drop it straight into the timeline. If the footage that you have selected doesn’t quite work, you can ask the search engine to give you a list of similar clips so that you can find your perfect footage.

It isn’t just about video footage

Editors have several reasons to use stock, not the least of which is there are many more content types than video clips to choose from. What if you want to create a high end looking logo or title animation?  Or you need a good looking animated lower third? Usually if you want to make templates like this it takes a time-consuming process all of its own, and when you have a tight deadline, this isn’t ideal.

Stock footage can allow you utilise highly complex motion graphics at the click of a mouse

For this reason, Adobe Stock also contains a huge variety of fully customizable templates that you can license directly from within Premiere Pro and After Effects which you can find here. These range from lower thirds and animated titles in almost every style, through to fully customizable light leaks and futuristic HUD display backgrounds. If you imagine it, the likelihood is that there will be a something there for you, saving more time and money.

It would be easy to think that stock footage is simply all about landscape shots or timelapses. But Adobe Stock is far more than that. It’s a place to find high level visual SFX, outstanding aerial footage, professionally created title animation templates and much more. And with the ability to find what you need from directly within your NLE, the process of licensing your perfect footage has become easier than ever before.

If you would like some ideas or need stock footage for an existing project, visit Adobe Stock to be inspired! You can also click here to learn how you can contribute videos to Adobe Stock.