How To Edit A Zoom Recording?

After recording a Zoom video podcast episode it might be tempting to add a intro during your open source jingle that is being played at the beginning and the end of the piece.


Make Your Zoom Video Podcast Recording Professional By Editing It

After recording a Zoom video podcast episode it might be tempting to add a intro during your open source jingle that is being played at the beginning and the end of the piece.

Adding a jingle is a great way to make a successful podcast by creating an audio identity but a question stays, what to do on the video recording of the podcast while the jingle is being played?

An easy solution is to replace the video with a picture transition from and to the YouTube thumbnail while you play music during recording with the Zoom video chat inbetween, thus allowing you to add clickable elements to subscribe to your YouTube channel, or to your guest's channel, or to view your other videos, without impinging on your talking time.

But how to do it? See below an easy solution to make a great YouTube Channel by editing your Zoom video recordings for your online videocast!

2 Best Ways To Edit Zoom Recordings

  1. Add Intro And Intro For Free With OpenShot
  2. Edit Zoom Recording To A Professional Video

1. How To Edit A Zoom Recording With OpenShot: Add Intro And Outro

First question is How To Edit Zoom Video Recording for free without much hassle? It is actually pretty easy on any platform, by downloading the amazing award-winning software OpenShot that allows to visually modify any video recording and is extremely simple to use, only with drag and drop along with a few clicks.

For example, my first time ever using the program, I managed to add an intro and outro to my Zoom video recording using my YouTube video thumbnail in less than 30 minutes. The longer was to find out how to export the project on  my computer   with the right video and audio settings, that I simplified for you below.

But first of all, let's start by downloading and installing the amazing  OpenShot Video Editor   program for free directly from their own website, without any registration required.

OpenShot Video Editor Download page

How To Add An Intro To A Zoom Video Recording

Getting in the OpenShot interface, all you have to do to simply add an intro and outro from your video thumbnail to your video recording, is to import both your Zoom video recording and your YouTube thumbnail picture in the current project.

Then, on the first track, drag and drop the picture to the beginning of the track, so the picture will be show first, and a fading effect can be added.

On the next track, drap and drop your Zoom video recording and make it start at the same time as the picture, so it will be shown after the intro picture disappears.

Back on the first track, drap and drop the video thumbnail picture to the end of the video, so it will be shown after the talk, and once again on the track below the video, so the video ending transition will disappear for the picture to be shown.

Now, add an OpenShot transition from picture by right clicking on the first picture on the first track, and select the fade out effect.

At any given time, you can play the video and see how the fade out OpenShot transition from picture goes in real time. Eventually, you can add an external transition effect on the picture that will be more stylish than the simple fade out - you might have to right click on the effect and invert it to fade out, as transitions are by default fading in.

Finally, add a fade in effect on the ending picture from the first track, and eventually an OpenShot transition to picture on the Zoom video recording ending, that will transition to the third track picture, and the first track picture will be displayed after that transition.

And that's all - you now have a professional looking edited Zoom video recording and it is time to export the file on your computer before you can upload it on YouTube. But before that, you might want to export in the same quality as the video was recorded on Zoom.

OpenShot Create Profile Customized to Zoom recording quality

If you want to export your edited Zoom recording from OpenShot video editor to a local file that you can then upload to YouTube, you will need to find an export profile that is similar to the Zoom recording settings, otherwise you will end up with a distorted video or with a very large file, about 1GB per 10 minutes of Zoom video recording using standard settings.

Zoom Recording formats
Zoom Video Compression: MP4 h.264

By getting an export profile that mimics the Zoom video recording settings, the file size will be easier to handle, getting down to about 75MB per 10 minutes recording.

The standard Zoom video recording are the following, if you haven't activated HD video recording and haven't requested the support to extend your video recording quality:

Zoom SD Video Quality
  • Frame Width: 640px
  • Frame Height: 360px
Zoom HD Video Quality
  • Frame Width: 1280px
  • Frame Height: 720px
  • Data Rate: 632kbps
  • Total Bitrate: 685kbps
  • Frame Rate: 25 frames per second
Zoom Audio Quality
  • Bit Rate: 53kbps
  • Channels: 1(mono)
  • Audio Sample Rate: 32000kHz

Zoom audio quality and Zoom video quality default settings

However, this exact profile doesn't exist in OpenShot. The best way to get it is to download below file, that is already prepared, and to save it in your local folder as written below. You can also create the file yourself and add it in your local OpenShot export formats folder.

Download the OpenShot video profile for Zoom SD
Download the OpenShot video profile for Zoom HD
Zoom custom profiles folder: C:\Users\[USERNAME]\.openshot_qt\profiles
OpenShot how to create your own profile

Export Edited Zoom Video Recording OpenShot Project To Computer

However, even having after selected your Zoom SD recording profile, you might still want to change the recording settings to match the Zoom video and audio quality.

And that's it! You can now save your Zoom audio recording on your computer and upload it to your video cast channel or share it online - after some processing time, depending on your computer, but expect about 10 seconds processing per minute of video recording for an SD Zoom video exported with the same Zoom video compression and audio settings.

And if you upload your edited video to YouTube and setup the right language, after a while you will be able to export YouTube subtitles in order to get the text transcription that can even be uploaded to your blog as an article!

How to cut part of a track in OpenShot Video Editor?

If you happen to have recorded in your Zoom call some parts that you do not want to include in the final video, such as a video issue or other sound problem, then it might be best to cut part of the track in  OpenShot Video Editor   where the issue occurs.

Position the curser at the moment when you want the cut to start, Right click on the track to cut, then select slice and keep both sides.

This is the cut start. Now, repeat the operation where you want the cut to finish, and the video to continue.

You will then have one track in the middle that you can delete, and will be left with two tracks - before and after the cut.

It could be better to add a transition between the two, such as a fade out before the cut and a fade in after the cut, and eventually another visual transition if you feel like it.

2. How To Edit A Zoom Recording To A Professional Video

Another way to edit a Zoom recording is to turn it into a professional video by using the  FlexClip   online tool, or the Windows desktop software that they offer for download.

The steps to do it are pretty simple, and by using content from their stock portfolios, you can easily turn any Zoom recording into an amazing video!

How To Edit A Zoom Recording To Make A Professional Teaser

  1. Create a free account on  FlexClip   website
  2. Create a new video project in storyboard mode
  3. Import your Zoom recording into the media list
  4. Add the Zoom recording edit as many time as necessary in the timeline, by trimming it to the important parts
  5. Use the stock videos, photos and other tools to turn your Zoom Screencast Software Windows 10 edit into a beautiful video!
  6. But let’s see below an example editing a Zoom video recording on  FlexClip   online service!

Extra Tip: use OpenShot to Export GIF animations

You can also use the hidden OpenShot export GIF format to create short animations from your Zoom recordings, that you can then share as memes for example, or send them around as status or message on your favorite communication platform.

But how to use OpenShot to export GIF animations directly extracted from Zoom recordings or other videos?

You can also use this trick to convert your Instagram videos to GIF or simply edit your Instagram videos to add intro, outro, sound and other video effects using the powerful  OpenShot Video Editor   – if that’s the case, start by downloading below Instagram SD video profile, install it in your user OpenShot folder, and select it in menu File > Choose profile in OpenShot, to have the display and export adapted to the video format.

Download the OpenShot video profile for Instagram SD video edition and export

Now that your video is edited and ready to be exported as a GIF file, simply use the following export settings in the advanced options tab to make an OpenShot export GIF animation:

  1. Open the advanced export tab,
  2. In advanced options, select the export to “image sequence” option
  3. In image sequence settings, change the file extension to .GIF

And that’s all! If the file is too big, consider exporting to .PNG image sequence, and then do a  batch image resizing with GIMP   of that image sequence to end up with a low size .GIF animation extracted for your Zoom recording or your Instagram video uploads.

To do so, open GIMP program, select the menu file > Open as layers, select the whole bunch of .png image sequence created by OpenShot,

Then, open the menu Filters > animation > optimize for GIF, to let GIMP make sure that the images are ready for animation. Finally, select the menu File > export as, enter a file name ending with .GIF file extension, and make sure that the option to export as animation is checked. Your final animation should now be much lighter, and easier to share!

Video Walkthrough: Edit A Zoom Recording

In below example video, a Zoom recorded video is being edited into a professional looking teaser that only includes the interesting interview parts, and has professional looking transitions between each Zoom video cut.

On top of that, a nicer looking intro and outro are being added, along with a watermark on the whole video edit, and on top of that a stock music is used to compliment the non-talking parts and make them more interesting.

The final video edit looks amazing and makes up for a professional looking video edit with added stock video, transition effects, and stock music!

Zoom Video Recording Editing Steps With FlexClip


Yoann Bierling
About the author - Yoann Bierling
Yoann Bierling is a Web Publishing & Digital Consulting professional, making a global impact through expertise and innovation in technologies. Passionate about empowering individuals and organizations to thrive in the digital age, he is driven to deliver exceptional results and drive growth through educational content creation.



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