Dive Club 🤿 – "Keys to Craft: Supercut’s Playbook for Design Excellence"

Host: Ridd
Guests: David & Neil (Co-founders of Supercut)
Date: October 17, 2025

Episode Overview

This episode is a deep dive into the craft, decision-making, and iterative obsession behind Supercut—a rapidly rising design tool beloved by the host. Ridd interviews David and Neil, Supercut’s co-founders, about their philosophy of design excellence, balancing speed and polish, their aversion to process, simplification as a mantra, and their hands-on, builder-centric way of working. The conversation spans everything from micro-interactions to larger product decisions, the design/development pipeline, and their take on building small, highly productive teams.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Origins & Philosophy Behind Supercut

• Supercut’s Evolution
  • Both David and Neil previously worked at Typeform, longing for new creative challenges after years "stuck in forms" ([01:10], B).
  • They set out to create a "product lab", independently iterating at high speed with tight, autonomous teams ([01:54], B; [02:05], B).
  • Supercut aims to elevate standard tools, focusing initially on a strong core offering before layering in innovation ([03:16], C).

2. The Value of Obsession & Iteration

• Meticulous Attention to Detail
  • “We do love working to the point that it doesn’t feel like work. For me, just sweating over the UI and building all the tiny little details is right, is just super fun for me.” ([05:36], B)
  • Both founders describe their approach as ‘carving’—constantly shaping and reshaping until things feel perfect ([05:36], B; [06:20], C).
• Breakthroughs Drive Motivation
  • “When you have breakthrough moments on ideas...there’s something really exciting about that. That’s the bit where you’re like, wow, I’ve got to show everybody.” ([06:20], C)

3. Simplicity as a Design Mantra

• “Less fuss” in Practice

  • Every feature is considered through the lens of simplicity: “If we put a feature in, can we take a feature away but still give it to you?” ([06:53], C)
  • The goal: let users “do a recording and get a great outcome” without fussing over editing or decisions ([07:11], B).

• Different User Personas

  • Auto Edit caters to those who want speed, as well as demanding users who care about every edit ([08:01], C).
  • Refinement and clarity are used to avoid overwhelming users while still enabling professional results.

4. Fast, Hands-On, Process-Averse Product Building

• Anti-Process Culture

  • "We don’t have a design process.” ([10:13], B)
  • The team works in overlapping roles with minimal bureaucracy, iterating directly in code or design as needed ([11:01], B; [12:25], B).
  • Planning happens in bi-weekly cycles, but without rigid design sprints or reviews ([12:25], B).

• Continuous Iteration Over Perfection

  • “It’s not fast for the sake of going fast. It’s fast whilst making it delightful.” ([16:13], B)
  • Shipping features, then obsessively fixing and refining, is key to their speed and quality ([14:37], B; [16:27], C).

5. The Balance Between Speed and Polish

• Sweating the Last 2–3%

  • “You are pushing into that final two, three percent of delight and polish...I always equate to stealing from speed a little bit. So where does that come from?” ([15:02], A)
  • This polish comes from “the obsessiveness...continuously going back over things across the design, across the tech.” ([15:53], C)

• Polish and Iteration Go Hand in Hand

  • The player UI, micro-interactions (e.g., keyboard shortcut animations), and notification panel are cited as areas of repeated, methodical refinement ([16:36], B; [35:55], A).

6. Deep Dive: The Auto Edit Feature

• Design Philosophy & Tradeoffs

  • Auto Edit aims to let users “just carry on” after mistakes, removing friction from creating polished recordings ([21:01], B).
  • Focus: enable speed to delivery and production value, but not become a full, heavy-weight video editor ([22:41], B; [23:49], B).
  • Features like automatic zooms are deliberately left out to maintain simplicity and avoid creeping toward an editor paradigm ([23:05], C).

• Using AI Thoughtfully

  • AI is injected in contextually valuable places: chapters, transcripts, “ask AI” panel—all streamlined to avoid clutter ([25:34], B).
  • Founder restraint: they resist adding more, preferring to start minimal and add only what is necessary ([26:46], A; [27:57], C).

7. Organization, Collaboration & Small Teams

• Advantages of Small, Generalist Teams

  • “How small can we keep the team on Supercut to get it as far as possible? That’s a really interesting question...” ([14:37], B)
  • Small team = less process, faster iterations, and more direct ownership ([43:18], B; [44:23], A; [44:36], B).

• Building for Builders

  • The team ethos: “We’re both co-CEOs but we don’t... want to be like the archetypal CEOs. We just want to keep our hands on the product.” ([17:21], B)

• Transparency about Code & Design Systems

  • The codebase and design system are functional but not overly rigid—“there is some debt, it’s judged case by case” ([45:28], B; [45:58], C).
  • “If you want to move fast, you have to be able to work with a certain level of ambiguity.” ([46:27], B)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On their core design obsession:

  • “For me, just sweating over the UI and building all the tiny little details is right, is just super fun for me.” — David ([05:36], B)

• On the absence of process:

  • “We don’t have a design process.” — David, with Neil’s agreement ([10:13], B; [10:16], C)
  • “We’re very allergic to process. We’re just kind of pure builders, I guess would be the term.” — David ([12:25], B)

• On balance between shipping and polish:

  • “It's not fast for the sake of going fast. It's fast whilst making it delightful.” — David ([16:13], B)
  • “We’re continuously going back over things... We do not just leave that work and say, right, that's done.” — Neil ([16:27], C)

• On resisting unnecessary features:

  • “The delay on why haven't we put zooms in? Well, zooms immediately opened up the editor.” — Neil ([23:05], C)
  • “If you want to do like a sit-down and make a video video that you’re gonna release in three weeks, by all means—there are plenty of good tools to do that... We’re just really focused on this time to delivery...” — David ([23:49], B)

• On dashboard design:

  • “We’ve used other products and we were always like, we’ve got to make this thing super fast, super quick. You get the share link like our products do as well, but they suffer because the dashboards get either neglected or overlooked…” — Neil ([33:10], C)
  • “Try to make it feel as integrated as possible... Just keep it simple, right? You’ve just got your videos, your sidebar...” — David ([34:01], B)

• On team size and modern product teams:

  • “I think you’re gonna see more and more small teams becoming winners... bloated teams, they can’t keep up with the pace that some products are moving, or they split up into smaller surfaces, and they just specialize in that and have no dependencies.” — David ([44:51], B)

• On Figma, design systems, and technical debt:

  • “These components aren’t like referenced in a Figma file because they just evolved inside the codebase by themselves...” — David ([46:27], B)
  • “There’s always a debt to pay at some point. It’s just making a decision about when and where you’re going to pay that debt.” — Neil ([45:58], C)

• On delight in details:

  • “As it slides out, the player actually moves forward a little bit forward...feels really nice...It’s not just like feeling it, it’s revealed with...a subtle zoom.” — David, on the Supercut player ([53:28], B)

Important Segments & Timestamps

• Supercut’s origin story & Typeform days:
  [01:10]–[03:16]

• Simplicity credo and sweating the details:
  [04:43]–[08:28]

• Process aversion & hands-on collaboration:
  [10:13]–[12:25]

• Iterating with speed vs. polish:
  [15:02]–[17:54]

• Design philosophy for "Auto Edit":
  [20:55]–[24:35]

• AI-powered features & decluttering:
  [25:34]–[28:32]

• Dashboard and notification panel design:
  [32:56]–[37:42]

• Code, components, handoffs & technical debt:
  [45:04]–[50:23]

• “Proud details” — Mac app and player polish:
  [51:39]–[53:48]

Highlighted Product & UX Details

• Supercut’s Player: Advanced layering and motion, subtle zoom on intro ([53:28], B).
• Mac App: Highly streamlined window selection, debated design to minimize friction for users ([51:58], A; [52:15], B/C).
• Dashboard: Minimalist, stack-based video organization for collaborative workflows ([33:49], A; [34:01], B).
• Notification Panel: Unique, clean overlay design uncommon among competitors ([35:55], A; [36:28], B).
• Auto Edit: Let users “just carry on” after mistakes—no need to start from scratch, blends simplicity and production value ([21:01], B).
• Delightful Micro-interactions: Examples include keyboard shortcuts that animate, shimmer effects on text, and playful touches that enhance user satisfaction ([15:02], A).

Closing Thoughts

Ridd closes by underscoring how the Supercut team’s obsessive approach, distaste for excessive process, and relentless hands-on iteration are setting the standard for small, effective, highly crafted software teams today. Both the conversation and Supercut itself reveal a philosophy where craft, simplicity, and builder-autonomy are elevated above all else.

Recommended for:
Designers who value craft and polish, founders aiming to build nimble product teams, and anyone interested in the design/development tradeoff between process, speed, and excellence.