Why the Future of Video Editing Belongs in the Cloud (and Your Browser)
I believe it’s safe to generalize at this point that digital life is more pleasant on the cloud. Logistics is the enemy of creativity. And cloud reduces logistics.
Tools like Canva and Figma point the way in how traditional software can be improved by, among other things, simply being moved to the cloud. And I think the natural next step in video editing will follow the same footsteps.
My Canva Journey
For my production house, I create pitch decks and use Canva and Keynote alternately depending on my mood. I like the Canva templates, but I prefer the control I have on Keynote (still do today).
As my decks go through producers, agencies, and clients — many of whom start making changes and send back new decks (some in PPTX format, some in PDF, and some are just markers on a screenshot) — I pretty much cannot find anything. If I want to re-use an element from something I worked on a few years ago, most likely, I cannot find it.
With Canva, though, everything lived in one place. I can access everything I did from the very beginning. Mental clarity.
The cloud didn’t solve problems — it erased them.
The Server
Our production company owns a server the size of a fridge. It needs its own temperature-controlled room, and it makes a lot of noise. We go through all this trouble just so three in-house editors can access the same storage.
Maintaining that server costs money every year. When we moved offices, every location we looked at, the most pressing question was: Where can we keep this server?
Guess what? I never needed anything like that when I worked with someone else on a Canva project in real time. They move something, I see it. I move it, they see it. No server, no maintenance, no upload or download, no relinked missing files… just simple, straightforward, and natural.
Any video editor who uses other web-based creative tools will find it extremely hard to justify the need for heavy software and working in isolated local environments.
Why I Like This Prospect
- No Expensive Computers: We spend tens of thousands of dollars investing in powerful computers to edit every few years. You don’t have to anymore. Get a Chromebook, go to an internet cafe, and you can edit Arri RAW, instantly.
- No Hard Drive Chaos: With every project, we buy on average thirty hard drives for editing, double backups, and client delivery. That cost is eliminated.
- Work from Anywhere: We’re limited to working on location because the computer is here, and collaboration happens through the server. That’s gone. You can go anywhere, and everyone is on the same project, collaborating in real time. The browser is intrinsically multiplayer.
- No Missing File Relink: Gone. And I will never miss it.
- No Proxy Workflows: Tedious stuff like making proxies… gone.
- No Sluggish NLE as Project Grows: Gone.
- No NLE Crashes: Gone. Just as the good lord would want it.
The legacy NLEs are putting out their “cloud” solutions, but they’re only half-cloud. It’s basically still very much local software that syncs your edit to the cloud. It’s not very different from how some adventurous editors put their local drive on Dropbox so that they have their edits backed up to several computers.
This half-cloud, half-local solution is not a solution. It’s a first baby step. In my personal experience, it’s hard to set up, and about half the time, I simply gave up and said, “Just mail me that hard drive.”
What’s Your Opinion?
Should the future of video editing happen entirely in the cloud? What are the pros and cons? Let’s discuss.
