Do you think high-end cameras, lighting & sound equipment are required to create videos? Absolutely Not! Creating a video using a smartphone is easier than you might think.
In this tutorial, we will learn how to shoot videos at home. We have also discussed 4 essential things that you need to focus on while recording videos on a smartphone.
Creating a video using a smartphone
How much money do you really need to start shooting videos at home? Zero! You heard me right! You may have heard about fancy cameras and fancy lighting, and great equipment, but you don’t need ANY of that to START shooting videos at home The only thing you really need is the determination to start.
[ Don't Memories intro music ] Remember that it’s more important to have great content than to have a huge expensive production set. Let’s first talk about the simplest setup possible! To start shooting videos at home, you just need your smartphone.
Because nowadays, all smartphones come with good quality cameras. But is that it? Let me give you just 4 tips that will help you create great videos! First, good lighting! And you don’t need fancy lights for that. The best lighting out there is natural light or sunlight. Also, remember that if there is one light source, then it should be in the front of your face.
It shouldn’t be behind you. How do we know if the lighting is good ornot? This, for instance, looks good, and this, not so good. Also, if you are using a board, especially a whiteboard, make sure there are no reflections seen on the board. To avoid this, you could just place the light diagonally across and not straight towards the board. Second, good sound quality. Make sure that there’s no background noise when you are shooting videos.
Turn off your TV, close your windows and try your best to eliminate all external sources of sound. Another common problem when it comes to sound is ECHO. The best way to avoid the echo is to make sure you’re not in a completely empty room. Echo occurs mainly due to the reflection of sound. How can you reduce the echo? You could have carpeted floors, you could fill the room with furnishings, and you could also use thick curtains to cover the walls and windows. If you want even better sound quality, then you could possibly invest some money in buying a good external mic. Let me give you an example.
How to shoot videos at home
This is how it sounds with an external phone-mic, and this is how it sounds without an in-built phone-mic. Third, good framing. Framing is all the things your audience can see in the frame of your video. That not only includes you, but also your background. Don’t be too close to the camera or too far away from it. And have a simple, clean background without any distractions. Treat the video as if you’re taking an actual class for your students in person. You’d want no distractions whatsoever, right? And lastly, the Stability of your smartphone.
Your smartphone needs to be very stable when it’s recording a video. You could buy a tripod as simple tripods are available for cheap. But if you don’t wish to invest in one, you could use books on a table, and then use your laptop for stability. Now there’s a possibility that you want to go one step further to create better quality videos using some advanced equipment. What I am using right now is a DSLR camera on a tripod. Now let me show you 2 pictures on the screen; one taken with a cellphone and the other with a DSLR. I’m sure you noticed the difference. A better camera will give you sharper andcrisp images, unlike your smartphone camera. You can also use a zoom lens along with it, which will help you capture zoomed-in video without making the video look grainy.
The DSLR camera also has a sensor that is far superior to the sensor in your smartphone camera. That means it can handle many more lighting situations relative to your smartphone camera. I’m also using a good wireless mic here which gives a crisp sound quality and also eliminates the noise around. Here’s how it could sound with a regularmic; and here’s how it sounds with the current mic I am using. You should note that the recordings that are generated using your DSLR camera are stored in an SD card which is present inside the camera. These recordings can then be transferred to your laptop or tablet using a card reader. Now some of you might be wondering... what if there are some parts in your video which you want to cut? This part is called EDITING the video.
You will not believe how easy it is to do this. There are plenty of free editing tools available out there that make it so easy for you to cut parts of your video. You could also shoot many bite-sized videos and merge them together to create a longer video. All of this and lots more can be done easily using Editing tools! I’ll share more details about editing tools in the description of this video! So… how can you begin? My suggestion would be to start off usingyour smartphone, and once you start uploading videos consistently, the love you get from your audience would automatically make you invest in better equipment. So what are you waiting for? Shoot your first video, and share it with the world! In the next video, I will tell you how you can UPLOAD your videos to your YouTube channel.
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