The Lone Video-maker’s guide to making videos at home

Do you need to buy an expensive dedicated camera to get started with videos? Or can you use one of the cameras you already have?

HD means High Definition - but there are several different HD formats and you need to decide which of these to use.

HD videos are in widescreen format so they are wider than they are high. That contrasts with full screen videos which are square like old-fashioned TV sets. The minimum definition to qualify as HD is 1,280 pixels across by 720 pixels down. Here I explain the main HD modes.

First let’s take a look at some HD capable cameras that you may already own. Or which, if you don’t, are quite cheap to buy.

Here I look at: pocket cameras and smart phones and tablets. Are they really up to the job of making good quality videos or should you invest in a dedicated video camera at the outset?

You may have a camera built into your computer. It turns out that this may be a very good choice for making some types of video.

DSLR cameras can take great still photos - and many of them can take great videos too!

If you decide to go to a more professional level you have a big choice of cameras. Some of dedicated video cameras are really aimed at professional film-makers and cinematographers. These can be extremely expensive and are really a bit too specialised for the sort of videos I’m making and which I assume you want to make. Though if you already have video-making experience and a large enough budget these are certainly an option. There are also some lower-cost dedicated camcorders that might be suitable.

These days some cameras are so small you can wear them on your hat! But are they the best choice for the lone video maker? 

Action cameras can be worn on a helmet so are great for filming sporting activities. They can be in all sorts of inaccessible places. But are they really ideal for filming ‘talking head’ videos?

You need something to put your camera on. Here I look at some tripods.

Tripods come in all shapes and sizes. And prices! From small, cheap, desk-mounted tripods to big expensive tripods with fluid-filled heads for smooth camera movement, you pay your money and you take your choice!

Microphones are built in to all sorts of devices from cameras to computers. But are these good enough for making videos?

You should never ignore the sound quality of your videos. While it may be easy to let your camera or mobile device record both sound and vision, it is often the case that the audio lets down the video. I discuss this problem in this lesson.

Before going any further you need to understand a bit about the ways in which microphones capture sound.

A microphone records sound from a particular region around the microphone. For example, it might record sound mainly from in front or from all around. In fact, most general purposes microphones record sound mainly from in front but also from the sides and even a bit from behind. This is called a sound pattern. The sound pattern is important so be sure to understand the basics before you buy a microphone.

Let’s begin by looking at a good, all-round microphone suitable for general-purpose recording.

Condenser, cardioid, bidirectional, omnidirectional or stereo? The options may seem confusing. Let’s simplify this to see what you really need in a good ‘all round’ mic...

What sort of microphone is best for screencasts and voice-overs?

If you are not videoing yourself. If you are doing screencasts - that is, recording what takes place on your computer screen; or if you are doing some sort of narration - a voice-over for some previously recorded video - you may want to consider a microphone that works optimally at a very close distance from the speaker. Let’s take a look at some choices.

When talking direct to camera, a lapel microphone is often a good choice.

A lapel or ‘lavalier’ microphone slips onto your clothing and may record straight onto the video being recorded by your camera. This is one of my favourite types of microphone. Here I explain why.

If you need to record ‘on the move’, a camera-mounted microphone might be a good choice.

There are all sorts of microphones that can be fixed onto the top of your camera. While this would not be my first choice, it is good to have as an option, especially if you often make videos ‘on location’.

For the ultimate blend of audio quality and portability, a dedicated hand-held recorder may be a good choice.

But what is a portable recorder? Put simply it is a hand-held microphone that lets you record audio without being connected to another device such as a camera or computer. Why would you want to do that and what are the advantages? This lesson explains.

The iPad has a great camera. But you need a better microphone to make the most of it.

There are some microphones that are made specifically for various types of phone or tablet. If that’s what you need, by all means get one. However, with a bit of work you may be able to use one or your other microphones. In this video I want to give you a specific example to show how I use my Blue Yeti and Zoom microphones with my iPad.

You may have a microphone, but how are you going to position it to record good audio? Maybe you need a stand?

You may already have bought a tripod for your camera. If you want to make best use of your microphone, you need something similar to hold it!

To get rid of all those annoying breathy sounds, use a pop screen!

Pop filter are filters that help to remove the ‘plosive’ P and B noises you make when you talk into a microphone. A pop filter is normally either a piece of material stretched over a frame placed in front of the microphone or a piece of sponge placed over the microphone. If you are talking directly into the mic, a pop filter can make a big difference.

How can a dead cat help you make videos out of doors? The answer is: a furry wind shield.

So called ‘dead cats’ are a bit like pop filters but aimed at filtering out the noise of wind blowing over the microphone when you are working out of doors. They aren’t perfect and they may let through some wind noise. Even so, if you are working outside, a dead cat is likely to be a necessary bit of kit.

In order to make video you need light. But is light from a window good enough?

You might think that the cheapest and easiest type of lighting is natural light - from a window, say. Well, yes, it is certainly the cheapest. But it is also definitely not the easiest. Even on a sunny day it can be difficult to find a window that provides good, all-over illumination. On cloudy days it’s even worse. At night, of course, it’s impossible.

Even so, I’m going to try to give you a few hints and tips on how you may be able to use natural lighting and overcome some of the problems associated with it.

Let’s first take an overview of lighting for video.

What sort of lighting can we use for videos? Let’s consider some options:

• Household lights.
• Softbox lights.
• One-direction lighting.
• Two-point-lighting
• Three-point lighting.

Studio lighting needn’t cost a fortune. Here I take a look at one of the best options for lighting on a tight budget.

Softbox light units are fluorescent bulbs that give a quality of light similar to daylight. They come with their own stands, hoods and filter screens to soften the lighting quality. These are good, inexpensive units when starting video-making.

If you can afford to spend a bit more, LED lights not only provide intense illumination but they are also more portable.

The future of video lighting is LED. These lights provide intense white illumination. They are small, portable and in most cases they provide ways of changing the intensity of the illumination. They are a bit more expensive than softbox lighting but, if you can afford them, they are a far superior option.

Should you script or should you speak ‘naturally’ to camera? Here I discuss this and other questions about presentation.

Some people have no problems remembering what they want to say then just sitting in front of a camera and saying it. Other people don’t feel comfortable unless they are reading from a script. 

Both speaking ‘off the cuff’ and from a script have advantages and disadvantages. When everything is scripted, you may come across as very stilted and unnatural. Worse still, it might be obvious that you are just reading the words.

But when you speak without  a script, you may forget to say everything you had intended and you may also hesitate and mumble.

Here I consider the merits of various ways of talking to camera.

If you really want to script everything precisely you might decide to use a teleprompter, also known as an autocue. 

If you really want to script everything precisely you might decide to use a teleprompter, also known as an autocue. 
This is similar to the teleprompter or autocue that newsreaders, anchor people and chat-show hosts often use on television. 
The advantage of an autocue is that it ensures that I always stay on script. I never need to worry that I will forget to say something and, if I stick to reading the words shown by the autocue. And with an autocue system, even though I am reading my script, I am nevertheless looking directly at the camera. 

A TV monitor or a portable ‘field monitor’ lets you see yourself as the camera sees you.

This is tremendously useful to a lone video-maker. It lets you check that your lighting is right, that you are centred in the shot, that your camera is focussed and that you haven’t got things unintentionally showing up behind you. A field monitor is not an essential. But if you can afford one, it is a great tool to have.

Once you’ve recorded your videos you will need some software to edit them. 

Typically, you will need a timeline based editing program. With this sort of video editing software you will be able to cut bits out of clips without actually cutting the original video file itself. Clips can be dragged around to change their positions and you will usually also have the ability to perform other actions such as add transitions to fade one clip into another or add animated effects where clips are joined together. And you may also be able to speed them, up, slow them down, change their colours, zoom in and out and do all kinds of other operations to create your final video from multiple video clips.

When you’ve edited the video you need to ‘produce’ it to create the final version.

When you produce a video, all the video and clips, soundtracks and graphics, from the editor are rendered as a single video file. These are the videos that will be watched by your end users or students.

If you want to use multiple cameras or record audio separately from video you will need to synchronize the audio.

Shooting with multiple cameras is very useful, but how do you synchronize the two videos so that if someone is talking their lips match the audio no matter which camera is being used? The answer depends on which video editing software you are using. You may need to synchronize tracks by visually aligning the ‘waveforms’ (the graphs of the audio). Or your software may be able to do that automatically.

That’s what I want to explain here.

What if your videos are huge but your Internet connection is slow? A little optimization can help before uploading.

By optimizing videos, you may be able to reduce the file sizes so that they not only take up less space on disk but - more important - they also take less time to upload. Uploading huge video files can take a very long time, especially if you have a slow Internet connection. Luckily there is some free software that can make those videos smaller.

Now we’ve come to the end of this course, the time has come to go and make some great videos!