Now more than ever, your audience wants to get information as quickly and easily as possible. Enter video. Not only can they multi-task when deciding whether or not your content is interesting enough to watch, but if they aren’t watching, they’re at least listening.

Equipment
Remember video is about engaging your audience in easily digestible nuggets.  Don’t get so caught up in the quality of the video if you are just doing a video blog or a quick video for email.  It should be well lit, be audible (spend a little extra on an audio recorder) and the content should nail your customers pain points.
If you are doing something more professionally produced, then don’t go too cheap on the equipment that you get into trouble! During our last Partner Marketing Roadmap our less expensive diffusion filter almost caught on fire. (Sniff, sniff. Hey! Do you smell something burning?) There are plenty of quality products out there on a budget.  You just need to find what’s right for you and when in doubt, ask someone!

Setup
Setup is key to a successful video. Most of the video we do for the channel is in interview style with one or more people having a dialogue with advice on how to implement a technique, knowledge about a product, or feedback about an event. With this style, it’s best practice to use three-piece lighting set-up. This is ideal to focus on your subject, allowing them to stand out as a 3-Dimensional entity, rather than part of the wallpaper. It also removes some of the background drab or distraction. You want to find lighting that highlights your subject best. Fluorescent and LED lights tend to give more flexibility to changing your color options by using filters or diffusers. They also give off a more natural light, while tungsten lights give off a yellower, warmer light. Be careful! 90% of the energy used by tungsten goes toward heat rather than lighting (note: hot, sweaty subjects never give the impression you want). The lighting option you choose depends on where and what you’re recording.

Photo credit: howto.gov

Putting it Together
Have you ever tried to record a video of something epic, like the an important interview with your CEO, or a famous keynote speaker at a summit, only to realize you never hit the record button on the camera or audio once it’s over? Yeah, neither have we. Alright fine, we have. This proves that even with the right equipment and setup, you’re not automatically an expert on videography. It’s helpful to have one person in charge of each of the different tasks. If you choose to have a separate audio recorder from the video camera’s audio, then having someone to focus on only sound is essential. Be sure to also have another person managing lighting setup and maybe another on recording.

We’ve had a bit of a learning curve, but we’ve gotten it right now and now it’s smooth sailing. Our process when we’re kicking off a video is to have:

1. The subject holding up a sign with the video title and what take it is.
2. The audio person turns on the audio recorder and say “Audio for video XYZ is on.
3. The video person say “video is recording”,
4. Then have the subject hold up the sign and clap before starting.  The clap helps the video editor align the audio and the visual when editing.

We’re not afraid to admit our mistakes, if it helps others. Do you have any video or sound mishaps or tips we missed that you would like to share?  We’d love to hear from you!

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