Imagine this: you're a video editor and you receive an email from a colleague saying they have a new assistant editor they'd like you to take a look at.
It's a bit frustrating at first. Of course, I always have an assistant available, but I don't have the budget or the space to hire someone younger to help me. It requires so much effort and money.
But if you click on the invitation email, you'll meet Eddy, an AI assistant video editor designed to make your editing job easier. After talking to Eddy for five minutes (yes, you're talking to him), you'll quickly realize that this guy named Eddy isn't so bad after all, and that he could actually save you time and effort editing your project.
Introducing Eddy, our AI assistant editor
At first glance, Eddy appears to be designed as a personalized AI video editing assistant to help editors make sense of interview footage and finish a rough cut in seconds. It can get summaries, find soundbites, organize by topic, and more. Eddy AI aims to approach the video editing workload in an entirely new way.
In my time playing with this new AI assistant, I've found Eddy to be both full of personality and surprisingly sophisticated: Following your instructions, Eddy can create a stunning rough cut of a feature-length video.
Editors working with clients can also use Eddy to create a quick rough cut and finish it super fast. If the client doesn't like the cut, they can add a note to Eddy and quickly finish a perfect rough cut. They can then ask Eddy for additional output, like a cutdown for social media.
Active editing: It felt strange at first, but quickly became intuitive
The most unique thing about Eddy is its conversational interface: when you first upload your footage, the AI fully understands the context of the footage and is ready to perform assistant editing tasks.
In one example in particular, Eddy was able to navigate a (some might even say quite difficult) back-and-forth interview about a new camera. I asked Eddy to “find the key topics,” which he did. From there, I instructed him to “identify the key soundbites talking about the new camera release,” which he did.
Eddie was also able to respond to directions like, “Use these soundbites to create a coherent three-minute edit,” as well as more subtle instructions like, “Can you add a strong hook that will grab the viewer's attention?”, fulfilling the request with an edited clip each time.
It was definitely a struggle at first. I’m not used to “putting words” into words, so at first I was typing words awkwardly and intermittently, like a Google search.
But the key for me was realizing that Eddy can iterate. The first result is just the beginning. Keep sending him your subjective requests. And the first result is not the only result. You can request a bunch of other storylines and compare which one you like best.
I was pretty surprised when I realized that Eddy is an active video editor. NLEs are passive, performing tasks only through the editor's clicks. Eddy takes an extra layer of abstraction, reaching into realms of greater thought and creativity. It helps you experiment, understand what you want and get there faster.
Built for professionals: communication and exporting
Ultimately, Eddy's incredibly intricate understanding of the craft of video editing and the many nuances of cutting long pieces of footage into short, easy-to-use clips makes it one of the most impressive AI performances for communications.
For example, if you ask Eddy to explain why he made a cut, he'll provide examples and context for why and explore your ideas in the conversation.
It's clear that Eddy is made for video professionals. Even though my video didn't have a zero start timecode, Eddy exported my edit as XML for DaVinci Resolve and seamlessly relinked it to my source footage. Eddy also has options to export to Adobe Premiere and Final Cut Pro, as well as export as an MP4.
If you want to meet Eddy and see if he has any tips for speeding up your editing workflow, check out Eddy AI here.
