Freelance filmmakers and editors (or even those working full-time gigs) are often looking for extra income streams to supplement their income.
The good news is that there seems to be a growing need for the skills and knowledge filmmakers already have, such as creating motion graphics or applying advanced effects to some video in After Effects.
If you are an After Effects expert you can use that knowledge to make some easy money.
Coming from filmmaker Max Novak is a rundown of three simple ways to start using that editing experience and some your free time to earn extra income.
Small projects that don’t take long and have high demand are the sweet spot here. List them online as a skill you are open to be hired for and you can likely start making some cash.
1. Easy Music Visualizers
Instead of going all in on a full music video you should look into doing some quicker animations or graphics to create a visualizer for music. This can be done with a variety of tools to make the process faster than scheduling a whole shoot and edit.
For example, you can work with newer AI-generated art tools and some simple animation work to create interesting videos that sync up with some music.
You can also take a stab as pixel art with looping effects and motion to make a video.
The pixel art is particularly interesting since you can start with templates and still apply a huge amount of creative freedom to the look of the image.
Another place to start is with regular photos and then using various animation tools to carefully take pieces of the image and create some movement.
Using reactive tools in something like Blender can get you a new object that will move along with the song as well.
Rotoscoping and composing bigger scenes is another option. All of this, once you practice, shouldn’t take all that much time compared to building up a traditional music video.
Image Credit: Adobe
2. Shorts
All the rage these days is short-form content. TikToks, YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels are all platforms that want videos that at most are a minute long.
Demand is growing for short videos and once you get a standard vertical project set up you can easily jump into your work.
Drop in your footage, place in how you need in the frame with the crop, and then use the built-in subtitling tools to transcribe the sequence. This is going to be great for getting quality video up with those ever-important subtitles.
Depending on your source video you could throw these together in mere minutes after you import everything.
A quick tip is that you can adjust the look of subtitles if you want to make the pop. By adjusting the captions to be text layers you have access to all your usual tools to animate and edit them.
3. Low-Effort Music Videos
Some music videos can take a lot of time. Not all of them though.
Certain projects can work if you just do them cleanly. Good cuts combined with a few choice transitions and proper grading can do the trick.
You don’t always need to throw in experiments, 3D graphics, and more on every single project. If you are listing your service you might even make an “easy” tier of work for clients who aren’t looking for anything too elaborate.
Obviously, you should be building up a library of presets and templates to speed up the actual act of editing. This will allow you to make the most of your time and the more efficient you are the more money you can make. As you get better you can start charging more for advanced effects, too.
Focus on making your video fun and interesting with simple changes and you can likely save a lot of time while still making good work.
What do you think about these three ideas for making money?
[source: Max Novak]
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