Ensure your audience a great viewing experience!

We all know that watching a video shot using poor camera work is hard to watch.

You know it.  I know it.  Your father-in-law… needs to read this.

As you recall, telling a story is the most important thing to do when making a video.

The next most critical thing is to use good, solid, time-tested camera techniques.

If the mere mention of watching your videos make people scatter like cock roaches in light, you may suffer from what I call HMD.

6 Easy ways to practice good camera technique

1. Hold your camera steady while shooting - Keep your elbows close to your body.
2. Don’t pan and tilt all the darn time!! - There’s nothing wrong with slowly panning across your scene… once.  After you get your wide sweeping (slow) pan, then concentrate on tighter, and again, steady shots.
3. Hold your Shot – Hold your shots for at least 5 seconds.  I usually shoot between 8 and 15 second long clips.
4. Frame your Shots – Try to make the things your shooting look nice in the image frame.
5. Get Close Ups – Your viewers want to see the details of the who and what your showing them.
6. Get Sound – If it’s a video of your kids, your audience WANTS to hear them SAY cute things.  If it’s a video of your friends, then you want to HEAR them say something clever or funny.

• • To get any decent audio of your subjects’ speech, your camera will have to be within 4 feet of the person speaking.  (Unless you have a shotgun mic or a lavaliere mic.)

Stay tuned, class, for more detailed discussions of all of the above!