How AI Audio Transcription Is Reshaping Video Post-Production Workflows

While the debate continues over whether AI will serve as a helpful assistant or eventually take control of the world, I currently see it as a tool that can automate many of the time-consuming, repetitive, and often tedious aspects of our daily lives.

In video post-production, one area where this automation has already taken hold is audio transcription.

In the past, we had to send audio to a service where a transcriptionist listened in real time and typed out each word. This written text helped to find the ideal soundbites within an interview for the story the director, producer, or editor was telling. Speed and accuracy were crucial skills.

Now, we can get AI to do much of the heavy lifting of audio transcription for us.

As video editors, we need to search through and process large volumes of material quickly. AI transcription helps us find what we’re looking for faster. As someone who has had to locate and listen to content repeatedly to make sense of lengthy interviews, I believe AI transcription offers significant benefits. This, combined with newer text-based video editing tools, allows us to quickly rough together video sequences similar to the way one might edit a written script.

Several professional video editing tools currently include audio transcription features that enable you to quickly scan files, generate transcripts, and convert them into captions and subtitles—all within the software.

These tools include  Adobe Premiere Pro (powered by Adobe Sensei), Avid Media Composer (via PhraseFind and ScriptSync), and DaVinci Resolve Studio (available on the Cut page in the Studio version 18.5 and above).

There are stand-alone alternatives as well. Descript is popular among YouTube creators, content marketers, and podcasters. It provides edit-by-text functionality, AI voice cloning, screen recording, and podcast editing. Otter.ai integrates with Zoom, Google, and Microsoft Teams and also accommodates file uploads—great for meetings, interviews, and documentary work. Trint automatically tags speakers and allows keyword searches across transcripts, making it perfect for corporate and journalism workflows. Sonix.ai supports multiple languages and offers automated subtitles, translations, and media synchronization—ideal for producers and media companies.

One caveat, though: AI transcription isn’t always going to be 100% accurate.  At least, that’s the current situation; however, this technology will likely improve over time. The accuracy of AI transcription depends on several factors, including speaker accents, foreign languages, overlapping voices, complex vocabulary, industry-specific terms, and the level of precision required for the final transcript. Are we using it merely to reference and locate content, or do we need it for something mission-critical, like a legal deposition or medical record?  As video professionals, we still need to double-check the work for anything that viewers may see, such as graphics, captioning, and subtitles.

Even though these AI tools are not perfect, they still have the potential to significantly streamline video post-production workflows. Creating transcripts from audio used to involve a much longer multi-step process. You recorded, sent it out, waited, and then had to search for soundbites manually via timestamps and multiple pages of text. Now, with the help of AI, this work can go a lot faster.

© 2025 - Mike Konstan - MAK Digital Media, Inc.

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