Do You Need A Good Videographer, Part 2?
In my last article I talked about what to look for in a videographer. One who is going to record you on raw video.
In this article I want to go the next step and talk about YOU on camera. Most people will tell you to watch the action of people on television and mimic their actions for your video. And one of the most important steps that TV people do is to MOVE. They will move their bodies, their hands, their head, and even walk around a bit just to make the camera person work at keeping them in the camera.
Remember, video means ACTION!
But for today’s Web video, excessive movements are BAD. It causes larger video files as well as create poor looking video. And the reason you want small files is the limitation of the Internet’s delivered bandwidth.
Think of bandwidth as a hose with water. The bigger the hose the more water that can be delivered. The smaller the hose the less water will be delivered. Some people have a big hose so they get video faster. Some people have a very small hose so their video comes in slowly.
But no matter how big a hose people have, it still can’t deliver the standard video without some serious compression. In the multimedia business they call this compression/decompression “Codec”. The video is first compressed and sent to you. Then the player decompresses the video and plays it on your computer.
And believe me, while those Codecs are magic, they do require some unique approaches to make video work on the Internet. And one of the items that Codecs use banks on not a lot of motion by the on screen talent as well as for the background.
So when you are the on screen talent (sounds like Hollywood, doesn’t it) you will want to keep large movements to a minimum. One of the best ways of having movement without causing problems for the Codecs is to use the techniques of the old silent movie stars. They used a lot of facial expressions. Just watch some of those silent movies on TV to see what I mean.
Here’s something that you might not know. Silent movies were run slower that “talkies”, at something like 24 frames per second. The “talking” movies were at something like 29 frames per second. That’s one reason why watching a silent movie today seems like they have speeded up the action. It is because no one has one of those old projectors that could run at two different speeds.
Today you’ll find some “video experts” on the Internet who are moving around on camera more than they should. Don’t use them as examples. I went to the source of streaming media to get my facts. Excessive motion on camera is one of the major problems with videotaping anyone who has been used to performing on stage or on television.
Just another step in creating good looking video online.
A friend of mine, Sherman Hu, the Word Press guru, has just put a new website online. It’s about Word Press and lets you decide just where you fit as a blogger. Go to Word Press Tutorials and check it out. I know, you might not want to create your own blog. But that’s not why I want you to look at Sherman’s site. The concept he’s using is totally unique. His website was created to answer the questions of those at different levels of blogging. And this concept can be used in just about any niche.
And how does Sherman give his Word Press Tutorials? With screencast videos! I had to build this blog twice because my software got corrupted. But thanks to Sherman’s videos it was really simple to do. Just another way of using screencast videos to create a product for the Internet.