Short-form: vertical, under three minutes

Short-form is vertical (9:16), watched on a phone, often with the sound off, and judged in the first few seconds. It's where most new filmmakers find an audience, and since 2024 the formats have grown: a YouTube Short can now run up to three minutes.

Know the container

• YouTube Shorts: square or vertical videos up to three minutes count as Shorts. Most songs can be used for up to 90 seconds of a three-minute Short.
• Instagram Reels and TikTok set their own length limits and change them often. Check the app before you lock the cut.
• Vertical series ("microdramas"): serialised stories cut into very short vertical episodes. It's a large and growing business: one 2026 industry report puts its revenue outside China at $3.6 billion this year.

Make it for the phone, not from the widescreen cut

1. Set the format first: Look & Instructions → Film aspect ratio → 9:16 (this also sets the timeline), or the editor's Project format → TikTok, Instagram Reels or YouTube Shorts.
2. Frame for a tall screen: close-ups and mediums over wides, one subject centred, room at the top and bottom for the app's buttons. Turn on the viewer's Safe Zones to check.
3. Open on the most interesting image. No logos or slow fades before it.
4. Burn in captions: Transcript Editor → Transcribe → Add captions track.

If you already have a widescreen cut, Inspector → AI Post → Reframe → Auto-Reframe Clips gets you most of the way, but recut it: pacing that works at 16:9 usually drags at 9:16.

A vertical series

Write each episode around one turn and end it on a question. In MoviePro, keep one project per series so the cast and look carry across episodes, and give each episode its own scene in the shot list.

Ship it

Publish posts to TikTok, Instagram (as a Reel) and YouTube from one place, and can schedule posts (see "Publish and share").