I get a lot of comments about the aesthetic and the filming and editing of
my vlogs, and genuinely appreciate that because I do enjoy that creative side of
editing and just finding different ways to tell whatever story it is
I'm trying to tell, but the truth of the matter is that it's really not that
complicated! So I thought I might as well share a few of the little tweaks that
you can make to really enhance your storytelling, your video-making,
and give your videos that a little bit of something special, something different
and something of an art form in themselves. So I'm going to start with a
tip that I know you're going to hate but I thought I'd get the cheesy one out the
way because I do think it is one of the most important, and that is to be
yourself. I think everyone on this platform now is looking to stand out and
people tend to look at what has gone viral in the past and what other people
are already attracted to and they try to replicate that- replicate that success-
but I feel like the thing that's gonna make you stand out the most is
obviously just being yourself. There is no one out there that is the same as you
and so you're going to bring something unique to the table without even trying.
When you are trying to imitate someone else and what they're doing and
replicate their success, you will always just be an imitation-
you'll always be in their shadow- whereas no one can do you as well as you do you.
So embrace your quirks, embrace what is different about you.
When I first started making videos, I really thought that there wouldn't be
many people that would be interested in me and the way that I do things. I watch
a lot of videos where people are very high-energy and loud and I'm more quiet
and mellow and low-key and I thought that that would come across as boring.
But that's actually turned out to be one of my strengths, where people come to my
channel because they find it relaxing which I never would have expected. I feel
like the more you project the parts of you that maybe you didn't think people
would find interesting, the more you're going to find a genuine tribe of people
that really connect with you. And the better connection you have, the more
engagement you're going to have and the better kind of viewer-creator
relationship you're going to build. Something really genuine and meaningful.
Okay, I'm sure you've heard about this next tip when it comes to improving your
video quality, and that is to improve the audio.
I'm a bit of a hypocrite when it comes to this because I know that with my
videos it's kind of hit-and-miss. They're sometimes really really good audio and
they're sometimes really bad audio. But the bottom line is, the sound experience
is what really immerses a viewer. You can have fantastic visuals but
nothing says unprofessional- and sometimes unbearable- more than really
bad sound. Now your best bet with getting good audio regardless of your price
range I think would be a shotgun mic. So this is one that you can attach to the
top of your camera, so it's portable, it's light, it's easy to have with you at all
times. This one you power with a battery, but
this one- which is the smaller version I tend to use- is powered through the
camera. So it's really something that you can just chuck in your back wherever
you're going and have that boost in audio quality that's quite simple.
I'll leave it links below to anything I mentioned in this, as well as a few
other options for whatever different price range you're in. But then,
another option that you might be able to use if you find yourself out without a
microphone, or in a situation when you need to improve the audio from what you
would get just from in-camera audio, would be to use just your phone. So I
tend to just hold my phone off screen down here and use the audio just record
my voice on the voice-recording app that's just built in to iPhones and that tends
to give me a better sound as opposed to if I were to just use my camera on its own.
Right, so second to good audio- I would say- would be having good music. Obviously,
it depends on your personal tastes, depends on the vibe you're going for
with your vlogs, but I would say if you look at things like television, film, even
adverts, the way that they use music is really indicative of what an amazing
tool it is for storytelling and for viewer immersion and just keeping things
interesting. And music can really set the tone, it can set the pace in your videos.
I find that when I have a load of footage that I really don't know what to
do with it, I'll just lay it all in in Premiere Pro and put a music track
underneath it and it's so much easier to just edit to that music, keep things succinct
and keep things interesting and dynamic.
It just takes all that footage and compresses it down. The music almost makes
something out of it I may not have seen initially. So, I use Epidemic Sound for my
music- this isn't sponsored- but I have been using them for about a year, maybe
longer. Before that, I used to use SoundCloud.
Also the YouTube music library has been growing and I think there is some really
good stuff on there. One thing I will say about using something like SoundCloud or
even just searching on YouTube for copyright free music, YouTubes
copyright tools are really cracking down at the moment so I would be careful.
That's why I do like using Epidemic Sound, just because I know that I have
that license to use it in all my videos at ten pounds a month I think which is
pretty decent for such a massive library of some really good music, some really
professional music, some great different genres, different sounds, different moods...
Just everything you could look for and- I mean, I even have a playlist on there
that I just listen to around the house rather than using it in videos because
there is some real quality music on there. And obviously, I said this video is
not sponsored by Epidemic Sound, they don't know I'm making this video, but I
do have an affiliate link just to be completely transparent with you guys- I
have an affiliate link so if you do choose to sign up to it, you get a free
month with that link and then if you go on to use that service I will make a
small commission off that. But I just thought I'd let you know, if you want to
try it out for a month for free you can use the link below and then you can
cancel if it's not what you're interested in. Right. Now pacing, I find, is
a really personal thing. There are some people that can't watch more than 12
seconds of video of someone just talking straight to the camera, and there are
some people that cannot stand constant cuts in filming and editing. So the one
thing I would say to be able to get an idea of what your viewers like, is to
look at the analytics that you have for existing videos. There is a tool on
there called called Audience Retention and you can look at a video
minute-by-minute, second-by-second, and see a kind of graph of where people are
dropping off- where people are less interested- so if you find that there's a
clip of you talking for five minutes and at the four minute mark you lose a lot
of viewers, then you know that maybe you should be pacing your video
differently, cutting it, editing it differently to where maybe you talk for
two minutes, overlay some footage but you keep
talking, just use different options to break up your footage in a way that
makes sense to how your audience responds to your existing videos. I also
like to edit quite brutally I guess and quite honestly. So I kind of ask myself
'okay if I've got like a coffee-making montage, do you need to see me
grabbing the coffee, putting the coffee down, opening the coffee, scooping it out,
putting it into the machine, grinding it.... or could I really chop that down? Or is
that scene necessary at all??' I also do this thing where, when I'm editing, I go
back and re-watch everything that I've done quite regularly. So, I mean,
my vlogs are like 30 to sometimes an hour long, so it's a lot, it's a lot to digest.
I'll do the first 10 minutes of editing and I'll go back to the
beginning and watch it through and while I'm watching it, if I get bored I'll just
trim up the fat. And then I'll do the next ten minutes of editing and then go
straight back to the beginning, watch everything that I've done so far all
together, and again trim out the fat. It's also a great way to spot mistakes as
well- if I've made any mistakes along the way.
But it's a great tool to be able to really see where I'm losing
interest in my own video. And if I'm not interested while I'm editing, then the
viewer probably isn't gonna be interested watching. So I'll have to be
very honest with myself in that. I might feel like this thing I'm saying is
really important, but also if I'm not saying it in a way that's keeping me
interested, then I'm quite happy to cut it out. I just think it's important to
remember that pacing is a great tool in how you choose to tell your story and
to be able to use it as that. Right, so with sound effects, I don't
necessarily mean things like actual sound effects, although I do think there
is a hidden value in ambient noise and background noise-
just, I don't know an extra element of sound design that the viewer might not
necessarily be able to put their finger on- they can't pinpoint it- but it's
giving a little something. I don't necessarily mean that, and I also
add sometimes those sounds like *mouth-pop* just to keep the viewer interested
and use as a audio cue - something different, something to look at. But what
I mean more by sound effects is the effects that you use with your sound so
things like how you use music, how do you bring a song in- do you start it
immediately or do you ease it in? Do you ease it out? Do you just do a hard stop?
Same thing with when you're talking; are you talking straight to the camera or
are you switching to b-roll while you talk or are you going to start talking
to the camera and then let that trail off where you're still talking in the
background but there's other things going on, like you lead your audio into
the next scene....
There's really loads of options. I think it's cool to watch other
people's videos and see how they use sound and their talking, their music,
and see if there are things that you can adopt or change or just see what
interests you and if there's any way that you can implement that into your
own videos. But try to be a bit more creative with how you use sound and how
you start and stop. Another thing I think it's kind of fun to get creative
with is the angles that you use. I mean it's obviously really easy to make all
of your footage just handheld at this level and it still is gonna get
across whatever you want to get across, but there are so many other ways that
you can do that. You might also even turn it into a game
where you're looking for the most unique places to put your camera where you've
never put it before. You also might find it interesting to study a little bit of
cinematography and find out what it means, what different perspectives mean
within film and what kind of mood they convey. I would say don't get too carried
away with moving the camera and all the time- as I was saying before with
audience retention, look at whether or not your audience responds to that- but
have fun and mess around with it, see what you can do to make things a
little bit different and shake things up. I know I get so many comments of people
thinking that I have multiple cameras going on at the same time and I really
don't, I just kind of get bored of this and just want to move the camera
over there. It could be as simple as talking over here and then just turning
over there and talking to a camera that's there. So there are loads of
different options for that, but I think it's fun to mess around with where
you're placing the camera and how often you move around. To help with that, I
would recommend having at least one small tripod. This is what I use 99% of
the time. It's the cheaper Manfrotto tripod- they have another one which
I also have that has like retractable legs I guess, I actually prefer this one,
I prefer the cheaper version. You can also get- obviously, I'm sure you've seen
these little gorilla pods I before- I thought I would use this a lot more than I
actually do but I do think it's good for if you're trying to clamp your camera
onto something especially if you have a lighter
camera. Speaking of cameras, the camera that I generally use is that this
Canon EOS M6. As I said, links for everything will be below.
I've spent a long long time looking for the perfect vlogging camera and this
ticks all the boxes for me. You've got changeable lenses, you've got
a flip up screen that you can look at, and it also has external mic input as
well which is really all I was looking for for a vlog camera, plus it's small
and lightweight. Another thing to bear in mind is the why- you know, why are you
vlogging, what is your story, who are you and what you bring to the table? I think
those are important questions to ask yourself. Just ascertain who you are on
this platform, keeping that at the forefront of your mind, you have more of
a direction with what you're filming, what you choose to shoot and what you
choose to edit out. That bottom line that informs the things that you choose to
show. It doesn't have to be completely rigid and controlled in that;
'I'm a student and I'm vlogging student life so I can only vlog when I'm
doing homework or at school' or things like that. I mean it's a lot easier to
decide what fits into the vlog when you know what narrative you are going for.
Okay, bonus tip; if it starts to feel like a burden, take a break. Or don't do it all.
Or just cut down. I mean, I haven't vlogged at all this month just because
I wasn't particularly in the mood to. We need to make sure to keep that balance,
we all deserve privacy and we all deserve some boundaries in our lives in
what we share and what we don't share. And it's totally fair to just choose not
to sometimes. Live your life and share some of it, but make it a priority to
live in the moment. Have those great experiences without
having to think 'I should be vlogging this' and make make sure that
you're making memories first and making videos second. Anyway, that is it for
today. Thank you guys so much for watching. If you are interested in my
vlogs or just seeing the progression of where I started vlogging a year ago and
how that's changed up to now, I will leave that playlist somewhere over here.
But other than that, thanks so much for joining me. Subscribe if you're
interested in seeing more videos like this,
and otherwise I'll see you in the next video! Bye!
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