Announcing limited openings for personalized mentorship from a continuously-in-demand Master Storyteller whose career editing television in Hollywood has been distilled into a FOOLPROOF SYSTEM that will leave your audiences glued to their seats…
…and position YOU as the trusted, high-performance artist that your directors, producers, and clients hire over and over and over.
From the desk of Jeff Bartsch
TV Editor, Author, and Teacher
Los Angeles, CA
I’m not usually the bragging type.
Those who know me will agree that I’m not the type to go randomly tooting my horn all over the place. But in this case, I’m gonna go there, because what I have to say could very well represent a major turning point in your editing, and in your ability to consistently make REALLY GOOD MONEY doing it.
So at the risk of sounding like a bit of a douchebag, I’m gonna brag on what I’ve accomplished in Hollywood… for the specific purpose of giving you the chance to take your editing to the next level.
Fair enough?
Jeff Bartsch, Editor. Present day.
When it comes to editors, TV producers are known to say things like, “Oh yeah, that guy’s a killer editor. He’s a finisher. If he’s ever available, hire him. Don’t even think twice, just get him on your project.” I used to always be slightly jealous when I heard about those kind of folks…
…but the fact is, I’m now one of them.
Post supervisors and production executives call me repeatedly to see if I’m available to cut for them. Huge network, tiny cable channel, whatever.
I average 48 weeks of editing work per year. I am booked constantly.
Executive producers regularly ask me to “take a Jeff Pass at this” or “do your thing.”
Getting the response of “Great, let’s move on,” or “no notes” is normal for me.
I do not randomly take just any job, and I definitely don’t work with jerk producers or sleazy shows. I no longer have to. On the contrary, I tend to work with really, really sharp execs like the ones quoted below.
What execs say about me.
Here are some opinions on my work, from executives who put their post-production budgets where their mouth is:
Editors are a dime a dozen – Jeff is an artist. The difference is that Jeff doesn’t just tell a story, he makes you FEEL it. From gritty, underground drama to pure comedy, Jeff distills unedited footage into a heart-pounding (or heart-wrenching) cinematic masterpiece.
– Mary Jaras, EP/Showrunner, A&E, VH1, MTV, FOX, NBC, E!
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Jeff Bartsch has been one of my go-to editors for the past six years. In addition to his storytelling prowess, he has the rare ability to turn a concept into a fully executed segment, making it his own while maintaining the vision of the producer.
– Anthony Storm, Vice President/Executive Producer, A. Smith & Co. Productions, ESPN, UFC, FOX Sports Net, TV1
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Jeff took a project with a minimum of shoot outline and field notes and helped craft it into an amazing sizzle. If you want to learn how to be a fast, efficient, and often-recommended editor, Jeff is your guy.
– Rupert Dobson, VP Programming, BASE Productions, BAFTA-Nominated Showrunner, SKY, Channel 4, Channel 5, Discovery, HGTV, Travel
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Jeff is one of the most talented and trusted editors I have ever worked with. But what separates Jeff from many other talented editors is his diversity – I would happily use Jeff to edit on any show. Many editors excel at a certain style or a certain type of programming, but Jeff is great at everything! This is because Jeff is not only a highly skilled technical editor, but at his core he is a storyteller. He understands the nuances of each particular show and scene and always finds a way to make the finished product better than I could have hoped for.
– Frank Sinton, Executive Producer/COO A. Smith & Co. Productions, Former VP Programming FOX Sports Net, Former VP Programming Disney Channel
Geeky kid from Iowa makes it big in Hollywood!
It took a long time for me to get here. Growing up mostly in South Dakota and Iowa, I was always interested in moving pictures, sound, and music. I started piano lessons at the age of 4, started playing with basic multi-track music recording in 5th grade, and spent hours arranging and recording music with MIDI synthesizers hooked up to my first PC.
I graduated high school in a class of 35 people in a zero-stoplight town of 1,000 in Northwest Iowa. I was That Kid with the VHS camcorder permanently attached to my shoulder, and I was the only person in my entire school who cared enough to shoot hours of footage, drive an hour away to a state-funded video suite, and use an S-VHS linear editing system to assemble my video projects.
Moving to Nebraska for college, I studied music composition, traveled with musical ensembles, and took weekend DJ shifts on a local 100,000 watt FM radio station. To keep the bills paid, I worked at a lumber and building supply yard packing semi trucks by hand. One day after two years of shlepping construction supplies at the lumber yard, I decided I wanted to get back into the TV and video thing.
So that summer, I packed up all my earthly possessions into my car and drove out to Los Angeles to start my 3rd year of college at film school. I worked 3 part-time jobs, lived on campus taking a full load of classes, and generally busted my tail working on any student film project I could.
And about a semester later, I dropped out of college, never to finish my degree. It was all my own nickel, and my nickel ran out… I was flat broke.
Thankfully, a film school professor connected me with a producer up in Hollywood who allowed me to show up Friday and Sunday nights for 5 months, for free, to feed Betacam tapes into this machine called The Avid. Those 5 months of slave labor turned into my first assistant editing gig.
Two seasons later, I was the lead assist, and I was promoted to full editor at the age of 24. That was the first year I crossed the $100,000 line from my editing work, and I’ve exceeded that in the 11 years since, editing for everyone from ABC to Animal Planet, NBC to MTV.
What I realized: the bulk of the editing done today is unscripted content, unscripted editing is a very unique animal, and I’m very good at it.
For years, I thought everyone was ahead of me. That the guy who cut the latest primetime network show was automatically better than me. That the gal with alphabet soup after her name (MFA, A.C.E., etc.) was operating at a higher plane of consciousness than me, poor lowly soul who didn’t even graduate from college. Poor me.
But after years of editing my brains out, my brains finally made some connections:
• In a word, [cough] bulls*** [cough]. There will always be someone with “better” credits or a higher payscale. So give yourself some credit for where you are, Jeff (said my brain to myself) – and it’s a very, very good place. Unusually good.
• The vast majority of edited content today – both inside and outside Hollywood – does not come from the pages of a screenplay; it comes from raw footage, unscripted content. Unscripted television editing is a very unique animal that requires unique skill sets. Not everyone can do it, even if they’ve come from the scripted drama or feature world. I’ve seen it with my own eyes.
• Pro editors here in Los Angeles are always worried about whether they will have work. I am working, ALL THE TIME. Now I’ll temper this with a caveat – dry spells happen to everyone, period. If it hasn’t happened to you, it will. It could happen to me any time for any number of reasons. Having said that, I have to look at the bare facts: my last multi-week break from editing that was not of my own choosing was in 2006. This is not a coincidence.
Expanding beyond editing
And I’ve gone beyond just editing. I’m now teaching and writing about it. My commentary on editing and the entertainment industry has been featured in TIME Magazine, USA TODAY, the Associated Press, and multiple textbooks. My businesses, Editmentor.com and ThePowerEdit.com, have served film schools and individual clients in over 30 countries and 6 continents (I wanted all 7, but the penguins down in Antarctica aren’t really into editing).
And my recently published book, EDIT BETTER: Hollywood-Tested Strategies for Powerful Video Editing, is bringing 5-star rave reviews like these:
The amount of knowledge Jeff has and the way that he communicates it instantly makes your editing prowess that much better. The information Jeff gives from experience is usually found in conversations with editors in edit bays, not readily available in text.
– James Gregg, Freelance Editor/Videographer, Linden, NJ
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Simply outstanding! Clearly a professional’s POV, and here’s one of many things I love about it: even though I’d say I knew or practiced about 90% of what you’ve written, man, the 10% I didn’t know or hadn’t thought of the way you’ve presented it is unbelievably helpful. Anybody from seasoned pro to newbie is going to find it very helpful. I’d even go so far as to describe it as essential reading for the 21st century editor. Please quote me on that. Lovin’ it, dude, you’re a badass!
– Harold Houze Jr., Editor, Los Angeles/New York (credits on CBS, FOX, ESPN, MTV, many others)
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In the reading of this book, you will likely have moments that range all the way from “yeah, I already knew that” to *mind=blown*. But that’s the beauty of it. It all functions together invaluably so that, by the time you finish it, you have a certain baseline of knowledge that creates a wonderfully solid platform to take a confident high dive off of into whatever type of editing you do or desire to do… and do it better.
– Micah Carter, Amazon Review
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Jeff has an amazing ability to flesh out concepts that previously only lurked hazily in the back of my editorial mind. I’ve learned more about the craft of editing from his insights than I ever learned in four years of film school.
– Chuck Gonzales, Producer/Editor, Houston, TX
I am driven with the burning desire to pass on the knowledge of powerful communication to people who are worthy of that knowledge.
So towards that aim:
Here is the #1 secret to setting yourself apart from all the wannabes… as a high-performance artist whose directors, producers, and clients hire over and over and over:
Drum roll please:
Brrrrrrrrrrrr-CHSSSSHHH!
You need Serious Skills.
Cue the crickets.
Chirp chirp chirp.
“Greaaaat. That’s the secret?” you might be thinking. “How the heck does that happen?”
Exactly. That’s a really good question to which most people shrug and say either, “I don’t know…” or they tell you reassuringly, “Don’t worry, it all comes with experience.”
Occasionally it does. More often it doesn’t. Either way, it seriously sucks to hear that if you don’t know how to get there in the meantime.
Ask me how I know this.
The roadblocks to Serious Skills
Let’s face it, today’s world pretty much forces us all into do-it-yourself, trial and error learning. Sometimes we can pick up a nugget here and there from random places on the Internet, but the vast majority of the Internet either doesn’t know what high-level editing is, or equates editing with button-pushing.
Hey, here’s a new plug-in that will make your piece look cool!
Hey, here’s a way to make your computer render video files faster!
Speaking plainly here, the shiniest footage or the snappiest processors do not guarantee an actual story. Certainly not an emotional reaction that cements your piece in the hearts and minds of its viewers.
Plug-ins, LUTs, and hard drives are merely frosting. They are NOT the cake – editorial technique and story skills are the cake.
So where do people go to learn real-world editorial technique and story skills?
It’s next to impossible to find online.
Otherwise, you might have gone to film school and read books by film industry luminaries – I’ve done both. You might have edited narrative shorts and learned how to start with the master shot, go to the reverse, then the close-up… except for that time you’re all tricky and start the scene with the close-up. You sneaky iconoclast, you.
But here’s the thing – people go to film school because they want to learn about film. Scripted stuff.
A shocking amount of what we learned in film school and from books written about film just plain does not apply to unscripted content, which comprises the vast majority of what we will ever edit.
Unscripted material requires an entire separate set of skills that are virtually impossible to learn except through years of picking up tricks here and there… and painful trial and error. With producers and clients raising their eyebrows and saying “Ehhh, that’s not what we were thinking.”
Hang tight, because there’s a way to bolster your editing chops. I’m talking about arming you with legit, Los Angeles-caliber Skills. The kind of Skills that make decision-makers say, “Damn, you nailed it. No notes.”
And in today’s world where any shmoe can buy Final Cut or Premiere and call themselves an editor, people with actual Skills stick out like a Van Gogh in a stack of finger paintings.
Here’s how to take yours to the next level:
The Power Edit Virtual Academy:
The FASTEST way for you to gain the Skills that will leave your audiences glued to their seats…
…and position YOU as the trusted, high-performance artist that your directors, producers, and clients hire over and over.
My team and I are launching a hybrid online/offline series of instruction on weekly editing projects where motivated, smart attendees (like you) take on the same projects at the same time and interact with each other’s edits in the process.
Here’s what you get with the Power Edit Virtual Academy:
• Five interactive sessions online for selected Academy members around the US and the world. I have prepared 5 weekly sessions of live instruction on the very top ideas and frameworks that have shaped my TV editing career from its beginning to this very day. They have been hand picked from my own studies in communication theory, picture editing, music composition and performance, and applied psychology over the last 32 years. (That’s what happens when you start playing piano at the age of 4.)
• Weekly assignments put ideas into play immediately. We will ship you a hard drive (either yours or a new one supplied by us) loaded with licensed and custom-produced footage. You will be jumping into action on weekly assignments on specific editing projects that bring these elite editorial strategies ideas to life – strategies that can be transferred into any project you do in the future.
• Editorial shadow boxing: real learning through a relaxed atmosphere. If you check out my credit list on IMDB, you’ll see I’ve cut over 60 episodes of a show called UFC Countdown, an hour-long promotional show for MMA (mixed martial arts) fighters in the UFC, the NFL of the MMA world. All these fighters constantly train under varying levels of stress, usually rising in pressure as their fight approaches. But the thing they all do constantly is shadow boxing – repeatedly going through the actual physical actions of their art in a low-stress situation where they don’t need to worry about getting demolished in front of millions of people.
That’s what the Power Edit Virtual Academy is – a low stress, uplifting environment that lets you shadow box your edit without a rabid producer or client all up in your face… “You’re not doing it right!! Are you done yet?! FASTER!!” None of that here.
• Accountability through reasonable deadlines. We’ve all thought, “Someday I’m gonna sit down and cut that one cool project.” And someday never comes… because we have nobody holding us accountable, and there’s no deadline. Here, you will have both: actual motivation to make the projects happen because you’ll have a specific project to take on, plus a reasonable but real deadline for everyone to screen their cuts the next week. Deadlines force action. (Huge life lesson, by the way.)
• Loads of the one thing that we virtually never get to see anywhere else: the PERSPECTIVE of how someone else cuts the exact same projects we’re cutting. Seeing alternate versions of the same project is a huge, huge way to expand our understanding of what is possible on any given piece. But it virtually never happens anywhere – because we’re all sitting in our edit bay by ourselves, and nobody hires multiple editors to cut the same thing. At least not on purpose. Here though, that’s the whole point. Everyone gets to see what everyone else cuts, and everyone benefits. Plus, the the Virtual Academy, you’re just as likely to interact with an Academy member in London as you are with a member in Dallas.
• The collective experience of the group, led by a highly experienced, constantly working leader. Any person who ends up in this group will already have a foundation of knowledge and experience, and I would be insulting the group if I acted as if I have all the answers to everything. The group will have much to offer to its members, just as I do.
Here are some of the ideas we will discuss and practice:
• Direction of attention. How to force your viewers to pay attention where and when you want them to.
• Arcs and structure. Knowing the workings of story is critical to effectively shaping it.
• Shaping of energy and tension. Particularly through visual pacing and music.
• Music. Selection, placement, and intra-cue editing. General music theory for the non-musician editor.
• Comedy. How it works, and how to get more of it in your cuts. Execs LOVE anyone who can “find the funny.”
• Other niche-specific ideas: potentially including the timing of promos and cold opens, creative compositing and keying, etc. We’re definitely open to group feedback on this.
• Plus lots of discussion of career skills: care and feeding of collaborators, psychological positioning as the editor, etc.
These kind of creatively driven, interactive group mentoring sessions simply do not exist anywhere else that I know of.
But they need to! The passing on of these Skills is mission critical for you to OPERATE AT A HIGHER CREATIVE LEVEL that will help you EARN MORE MONEY IN THE PROCESS.
The Power Edit Virtual Academy is definitely not for everyone.
Are you qualified to apply?
Much of what I do in my writing and teaching is geared towards being broadly applicable to lots of people in lots of different editorial situations. The Power Edit’s YouTube channel, for example, is downright goofy and sophomoric at times. The Virtual Academy, on the other hand, is very narrow and specific in its focus. This is serious interaction for serious individuals who match up with these qualifications:
• Access to gear. You must have access to a reasonably advanced editing system and hard drive during the week to complete your assignments on your own time. It can be any standard NLE you prefer.
• Confident pushing the buttons. You must already have strong knowledge of your editing platform. We will be focusing on creative concepts, not button pushing.
• Actual experience. You must already have real-world editing experience, preferably that earned you some sort of monetary compensation. It can be paid work, or donated work on behalf of a charity or a church, but this is not the place for people who are still figuring out what editing is.
• Decent person, no whining. You must be a decent human being who knows how to face challenges without pissing and moaning about life. Or how lame your clients, directors, or producers are, or how much your coverage sucks. If you really need to complain about these things, then that’s your call. But leave that out of the Academy. Life is too short.
Only a handful of people will be admitted to the Academy.
As of this writing, we’re wrapping up our first Los Angeles Academy, and I only allowed 5 people in. That’s it. The Virtual Academy will have maaaaybe up to 10 people – maybe. But no matter what, Academy members will all be active participants who are serious about expanding their Skills and the level of their creative game.
When the spots are gone, they’re gone. Keep reading to find out how to apply for yours.
Flexible scheduling
The hybrid online/offline nature of the Virtual Academy will allow for flexibility of schedule. Depending on details of logistics, group members may end up taking advantage of a replay of the weekly session if their schedule doesn’t allow to participate live – even though live interaction will provide the greatest benefit to everyone.
What would it be worth to YOU to rise to the next level of creative execution in your editing?
As I said, I’m booked constantly with editing work with deadlines that are often LESS than reasonable. Plus I have a family and I’m building a business.
My time is severely limited, and I protect it fiercely.
But here’s one of the things about which I am the most passionate: passing on the knowledge of powerful communication to people who are worthy of that knowledge, and of my time.
If you’re looking for free instruction, go to ThePowerEdit.com or The Power Edit on FB. As of this writing, they’re free.
The Power Edit Virtual Academy is not free, and I’m not interested in dealing with folks who want it to be.
Now if you’re doing editing for your own passion projects, you have to be the one to decide how valuable your time is, and how much you would benefit by participating in the Virtual Academy.
Hint: the more you respect your time, the more valuable this opportunity is… compared to spending potentially YEARS of your life struggling hit-and-miss to figure this stuff out – or potentially never getting it at all. How much do you value your TIME… the one resource that you can NEVER replace or get back?
On top of that, if you’re doing any sort of editing for pay – how much do you earn from each entity that hires you? Is it an independent client that pays $3,000 per job? Is it a production company where one hiring from them means you’re working for multiple months, and you’re earning $30,000?
If your higher level of Editorial Skills were to land you one more client, how much income would that mean for you?
What if that one new client hired you again? How much better off would you be if your demo reel blew away any other competitor in your field, and clients had to be brain-dead not to choose YOU?
Then compare those ideas to the opportunity to apply for one of the limited, exclusive positions in the Power Edit Virtual Academy for:
A 3-time investment of $733 for a total of $2199.
Or a 2-time investment of $1,049 for a total of $2,098.
Or a 1-time investment of $1,997.
Absolutely ZERO risk to you: an unbelievable refund policy.
To show you how serious I am about getting the right people into the Power Edit Virtual Academy, here’s our company policy:
Payments will be handled securely through PayPal, and you have the right to a 100% refund at any time… even up to the last session. You can literally request a refund after ALL FIVE SESSIONS, and you’ll get every penny back, promptly and respectfully.
So as you can see, the pressure is all on me to build a solid group, deliver high-quality content, and create an environment that encourages you to grow as an artist.
Your responsibility: play full out. Engage fully with the materials and with the group, and see the benefits in your editing, and maybe even your bank account.
Otherwise financially, 100% of the risk is squarely on me and my team.
Here’s how to apply for one of the exclusive, limited positions in the Power Edit Virtual Academy:
Send an email IMMEDIATELY to my assistant, Carla, to this address:
CMorris[at-sign]ResolveEntertainment.com
with the subject line ”Virtual Academy Application.” In the email, briefly explain your editing experience and why you feel you are an excellent candidate for the Academy, along with any questions you might have. If you wish to discuss multiple payments, please mention that too.
We will review all applications and respond appropriately.
So at this point you have two choices…
Choice number one: you can keep doing what you’re doing.
Maybe you’re doing ok… and maybe you’re not. Maybe you’re a little too familiar with that sickening feeling in the pit of your stomach when a job ends and you don’t have anything lined up. The phone sits there silently. And you send out emails to people saying “Hey, I’m available, let me know if you hear anything…” and all you hear are crickets?
Meanwhile, with no work in sight, the bills keep piling up. Rent. The mortgage. Utilities. Health insurance (maybe). You name it. It doesn’t have to happen to you.
Maybe you’re already working, but you feel stuck. You know you’re capable of more, but you don’t know how to get there. You could stay there, but you know you’re selling yourself short.
Worse, maybe you’re stuck on a job that drives you nuts, with people you can’t stand, but you stay there because you need the money. If you’re there, I’m telling you, it doesn’t have to be that way. I haven’t put up with a truly horrible gig in YEARS, and neither should you.
But maybe you’re comfortable, and you can stay where you are, getting the results you’ve always gotten.
Or, choice number two: you can step up when an absolutely unheard-of opportunity presents itself.
Check out our refund policy again. You have ZERO to lose, and everything to gain – the expansion of your Creative Skills in an accelerated way that is virtually impossible to accomplish otherwise, and the very real potential for getting hooked up with a growing bank account, courtesy of directors, producers, or clients hungry for excellent editorial artists.
If this makes sense to you, and you feel that you’re an excellent fit for the Power Edit Academy, then write that email RIGHT NOW.
When the spots are filled, that’s it. So send your email to CMorris[at-sign]ResolveEntertainment.com, and I look forward to speaking with you very soon.
To your storytelling success,
Jeff Bartsch
PS – Only a handful of highly qualified applicants will be admitted to the Power Edit Virtual Academy for the chance to expand your Creative Editorial Skills to the next level that’s virtually impossible to reach by yourself, plus the possibility of taking your INCOME to the next level as a result. How much would that be worth to you? For right now, the investment is $1,997 if your application is accepted. If you would benefit from multiple payments, we can work with you on that.
If you feel you’re an excellent fit for the qualifications listed above, then email my assistant, Carla, at CMorris[at-sign]ResolveEntertainment.com, subject line “Virtual Academy Application,” and tell us why you feel you’re a good fit. But do it now, because spaces will be taken up quickly.
PPS – Here are some closing thoughts from executives who have repeatedly hired me:
When I want to captivate and wow an audience, I turn to Jeff. And if you are serious about telling stories that resonate powerfully with your audience, I recommend you do the same.
– Jan Landis, 8-time EMMY-winning Television Producer, TV Guide Network/Dr. Phil/ABC
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I feel very lucky to have had the opportunity to work with Jeff the past several years, and I think that any editors who get the opportunity to learn from him should leap at the chance.
– Frank Sinton, Executive Producer/COO A. Smith & Co. Productions, Former VP Programming FOX Sports Net, Former VP Programming Disney Channel
PPPS – Opportunity here. Knock knock.