3 Tips for Better DIY Videos

Not all videos require a professional’s touch (or bill.) But if you’re expecting someone to sit and watch through any video that you produce, you should probably go the extra mile to make the experience worthwhile.

Where do you even begin? Let’s start with these 3 things.

Know the Plotline

Story structure may not be your passion, but either way, you enjoy the benefits of it every day.

The last great movie you saw likely had a carefully scripted beginning, middle, and end. It probably built up towards a climax, hit that moment, and then finished with a resolution of some sort.

On the other hand, you’ve probably also watched a recipe video or online tutorial recently that had no such plot:

A home chef rambles about their childhood, takes forever to get to the recipe, and then finally gets to the part you actually care about.

An online tutorial starts off by opening the program you’re trying to learn, sidetracks into talking about the alternatives to that program and why this one is the best, and then finally comes back to what the video was supposed to be about.

Feature film or not, just about any video could benefit from having a plotline. Knowing the reason your video exists, why someone is watching it, and how the content benefits that person are the foundations for making videos people actually want to watch.

If you’re serious enough about this, you’ll avoid telling pointless stories just because they’re funny or going off on a tangent that detracts from the main storyline.

Respect your audience and what they’re there for, and you’ll end up making better videos in the process.

Uphold a Reasonable Quality Standard

Now that it’s 2019, just about any phone or consumer-grade camera has the ability to shoot HD video. It’s not all created equal, but that’s a different article.

Once you pull out your camera of choice, take a close look at the preview image. Is everything on screen well-lit? Is there anything distracting in the frame? Are you sitting in the shadows?

Make sure the camera focuses properly on the subject and that you can see all of the important elements that are part of the video. Then, consider audio.

Where’s the microphone that you’re planning to capture audio with? If your subject is a reasonable distance away from it, you might find that people have a hard time hearing whatever’s happening in the video.

That, of course, is one easy reason for a person to decide to simply move on. Consider buying a microphone that can be clipped to your subject or placed nearby (separate from the camera.)

Shorten it Until it hurts

If you edit your video and it comes out to ten minutes, push yourself to make it five minutes. You’ll have to cut out entire thoughts, reduce the time spent on others, and occasionally wonder if you’re even making the right decisions.

But once you hit your target, you’ll watch the longer version back and will be amazed that it was ever that long to begin with.

You might not even end up shortening it all the way to your goal time, but any amount of tightening up that you can do will give your audience a better chance of sticking with you and getting the whole picture.