How the very first films were edited
The first films in the early 1900's were all shot in camera meaning that there was no editing involved it was just one reel which means the audience would have seen the film in the order it was shot in. Which compared to these days would seem like a very daunting task to take on.
Cross cut for the time this was made were a very sophisticated method of editing although these techniques were not original to the great train robbery there is a lot of emphasis on this film because of the masterful execution of these methods.
David Griffiths is considered a legend in the film making industry because of his experimental and also innovative work with editing he invented the parallel editing technique and then taking it to the next level with each film he made taking it to and impressive amount of depth and polish.
Editing in the early days was a lot more physical having to actually cut the tapes of a film then attach them back together to create a edit. This was all physical and a lot more work to create an edit also things werent able to be as impressive compared to todays editing software.
As we move on to the digital era of editing we see massive jumps in the speed an editor is able to create and complete an impressive edit due to the ease of use of editing software.
Starting in the late 70's to the early 80's some equipment was introduced including Time base correctors and digital video effects unit and they used a standard analog, and this composed the video this made it much easier to correct or enhance the video.
Linear Vs Non-Linear
In the early days of electronic video production linear editing was the only way to edit tapes but when it came to the 90's non-linear editing became possible with non-linear editing computers and with it editing became more flexible and powerful.
Non-Linear editing at first wasn't welcomed among people and many editors ignored Non-linear methods mainly because at first non-linear editing computers were cramped with performance issues but because of the many advantages that came with non-linear editing editors could no longer ignore it.
Parallel Editing
Parallel editing also known as cross cutting in it's basic description means that there is more than one story line happening at once in different locations a good example of this would be the godfather in the scene were one of the characters is at the church watching his child being baptized but then the men in his mafia are killing everybody that he has told them to kill and these both occur at the same time making it parallel. God Father Scene https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Zs61pakiIY This means that a film can have very different moods between cuts in the godfather we are seing voilence and bloodhsed but then it cuts to a much more slow and calm scene of a child being baptized.
Once again the example for this is going to be Edwin S. Porters The great train robbery which was the first film to use cross cutting. also another good example of parallel editing would be D W Griffith's Birth of Nation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k57rt58vUYw
Montage Editing
Montage is a French word that means putting together and montage editing is to get a series of clips and then edit them together to create a whole one section instead of them staying as separate clips and example of this would be the Odessa steps scene in the film Battleship Potemkin http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLEE2UL_N7Q even a cereal advert has mimicked this film and the same part of it too https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8up-pJGqYo or another good example and probably the most known is the training montage in the film Rocky http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTN4Y35JkmE
With editing editors can alter time and space with the editing techniques that are used today alot of information was used from the documentary Cutting Edge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jo14zQtMbpg&list=PLB530DBFAB795D20A
Point of View Shot
