Finely Sliced: For Dayn Williams Story is King

Dayn Williams is a multi-award-winning film editor of commercials, music videos, short films, and feature films. He began his career at just 18, serving a seven-year apprenticeship in 35mm film editing at DGW Ltd in London’s Soho before becoming an editor at 25.

He then joined Cut+Run and became known for his immense passion for shaping stories and his unparalleled attention to detail. Moving to New York in 2009, Dayn has become one of the most respected and sought-after editors in the industry. His boundless enthusiasm for filmmaking, combined with his skill in both editing and sound design, ensures every project he takes on achieves its full creative potential.

Dayn is now splitting his time across the Atlantic in the UK, France and across Europe where he’s represented by Square Peg.

Dayn’s collaborations with luminary directors such as Jordan Scott, Chris Cunningham, Martin Wonnacott, Johnny Hardstaff, Joe Pytka, Paul Hunter, Dave Meyers, Carl Erik Rinsch, and Sean Ellis have established his reputation as a master storyteller. His work has been recognised internationally, including a Grand Prix at the Cannes Lions Festival, an Oscar nomination for the short film Cashback, and awards from Cannes, D&AD, Telly, and others.

LBB> The first cut is the deepest: how do you like to start an editing project?

Dayn> I’m very old school in that, the very first thing I will always do is: WATCH EVERYTHING, before even reading the script if possible. 

I find this exercise to be more than helpful for me to assess the footage on its own merit without being clouded by what one was ‘hoping to get’. 

I’m given a finite amount of footage to work with, and within that I must find the best film possible, making my brain work harder to construct a story with what I’m seeing and hearing. Then at the end of 1st assembly I’ll review the paperwork and see how close I am. I find that the result is: I already solved inherent problems the film may have had and conceived new paths, paths that I’m not sure I would have been allowed to explore using a more conventional approach.

LBB> Non-editors often think of editing just in technical terms but it’s integral to the emotion and mood of a film. How did you develop that side of your craft?

Dayn> It was once I realised the colossal influence I could have on any given film. I embark on a journey of analysing it’s emotional effect on me and I trust in my first impressions, as this is invariably what the first impressions of the audience will be.

LBB> How important is an understanding of story and the mechanics of story?

Dayn> I cannot say this enough but: ‘STORY IS KING’... 

Amazing imagery/terrible story = terrible film...

Terrible imagery/amazing story = Amazing film.

Storytelling is our job and I was lucky enough to be taught the mechanics of it, during my seven year apprenticeship on 35mm print. Shot size / composition/ motion / direction / music and acting will all influence the emotion / mood of a film so it’s imperative one recognises what each individual element is bringing to the party to enhance the overall story.

LBB> Rhythm and a sense of musicality seem to be intrinsic to good editing (even when it’s a film without actual music) – how do you think about the rhythm side of editing, how do you feel out the beats of a scene or a spot? And do you like to cut to music?

Dayn> I have really enjoyed editing music in general. It helps to have an ear for it and understand musical construction. Today's music, very often follows the same musical structure that we have all come to know (intro, four bar, chorus, middle eight etc). Classical music, although noted for its mathematical nature, is eminently harder to edit into a short format as it is effectively way more complex in its structure. But also way more powerful emotionally, is the reward.

I love doing sound design and dialogue work, as all language and sound will sit better in our minds if we introduce a musicality to the pacing and placement to them whilst reinforcing the story at the same time of course.

LBB> Tell us about a recent editing project that involved some interesting creative challenges.

Dayn> I thoroughly enjoyed working on a commercial for Topo Chico mineral water from Mexico. Shot by Martin Wonnacott of cake-factory nyc

The first challenge was creating a story narrative in this close up world of bubbles. Seeing as all footage was shot at 1440fps, this allowed me to frame cut every shot to reveal the optimum parts and then rearrange everything into an order that takes you on a journey through the liquid and glass bottle. This was in turn complemented with doing the sound design, which I decided to go quite bold to reflect the sharp clarity of the product.

LBB> How important is your relationship with the director and how do you approach difficult conversations when there is a creative difference of opinion?

Dayn> The relationship with the director is extremely important, I’ve been editing mainly in the US for the last 15 or so years and the director often has little involvement beyond the shoot, so I’m looking forward to doing more projects in the UK where the director and editor collaboration is at the forefront of the storytelling process.

It’s a relationship that needs trust and I find it very important to be extremely honest at all times with the director. It’s important that they’re open to alterations to the narrative if they want to create a better film, this can lead to the odd difficult conversation, which of course happens behind closed doors out of respect for the director.

LBB> What’s harder to cut around – too much material or not enough?

Dayn> It is way harder to deal with too little footage, than too much. Too much just means options and simply requires more time to achieve. Too little, restricts the options massively and can create large gaps in the narrative, which is very hard to cut around.

LBB> Which commercial projects are you proudest of and why?

Dayn> I suppose I’m proudest of a few of my pieces of work. A four and a half minute commercial for Miuccia Prada (directly), beautifully shot in Berlin by Jordan Scott of RSA Films edited in LA, in tandem with the editing of an 18 minute free form jazz piece created from splits of instruments (from Amber Music) and approved without changing a frame. 

But my all time fave has to be the work done on ‘Sony Playstation 3’ cut in Japan. Shot by Tim Saccenti of Radical Media for Wieden Kennedy Tokyo. Again shot at 1440fps this film shows people playing PS3 whilst watching their reactions. Each shot had six layers of frame cuts to composite individual eyes / tongues and neck muscles etc… With this I was able to develop new and different styles of frame cutting that I've never seen since to this day, no artificial speed ups at all.

Then I got to do all the sound design using only sounds used in the actual games, my request for these resulted in Sony supplying me with thousands of audio assets. It was slow going and I spent five months there as they also hired me to design the booth for the Tokyo Game Show.

The first films were released in Tokyo and were featured on every billboard, train poster and Shibuya screen. It was the only thing being shown throughout the entire city. It made headline news in Japan…literally! Oh and won multiple awards to boot…

LBB> There are so many different platforms for film content now, and even in advertising something can last anything from a few seconds to a couple of hours. As an editor, are you seeing a change in the kind of projects you’re getting from brands and agencies?

Dayn> I feel the social platforms have lead filmmaking down a not necessarily great path. The sheer volume of versions being generated are, in my opinion, ‘Too much’ with no additional benefit that I can grasp. I usually get asked to make their longest format and then hand it over to the clients sadly underpaid junior to generate 192 versions for social media which leads to high volume and shoddy work.

LBB>Who are your editing heroes and why?

Dayn> Andy Walter - taught me everything I know in the world of 35mm film and optical / story structure / editing rules and how to break them and the value of passing on this knowledge to future generations as he did with me.

Piers Douglas - Piers had a totally different approach in that he just wanted me to do everything so I learnt the whole path from start to finish by default and so I managed his entire life and career and we had so much fun along the way. Sadly he left us all too soon.

Kevin Whelan - His fast cut work and ability to combine multiple shoots and angles of the same event, I have always admired and used in my own little way further down the road.

Nick Diss - iconic reel with a huge variety of work. In my opinion one of the gods.