Books on Film/Video Editing

Color me old school, but I always consult Hitchcock in such matters. The Truffaut/Hitchcock interview book is a great source of very practicle theory. There's also Hitchcock On Hitchcock, which has a few essays like "Direction" and "Some Aspects of Direction" that I reread every once in a while. As much as anything else, Hitch was an avid observer of the medium and what works. He also talks about it pretty elloquently, which most directors don't.

Basically, pace and structure need to be firmly fixed in your head when you shoot, as it's really hard (if not impossible) to decide these things in the editing room, where you only have the footage you shot to work with. I've learned this the hard way, and the project is still up on blocks in "postproduction" as a result.

My next project (probably animation) will go through a full storyboard/animatic preproduction process, which is really the way to go unless you're shooting a documentary.

There are two types of books you are going to be looking for. One is a book on how to operate whatever video editing software you will using then there are books on cinema. I will pull togeather a list of the books I have bought.

What do you mean by film/video editing? The actual act of editing is fairly straightforward: select shots, trim to desired length, compile together, add any needed transitions (fades, dissolves)... That part's pretty simple.

Then there's stuff like shot composition, flow, etc. That's more of an art, and there are piles of books on issues like that.