How to create a talking head video?

Lesson Details:

Video Transcription: So the great thing about making videos outside and in the countryside is that you know you have an infinite amount of backdrops that you can choose, This video is brought to you by Appy Pie’s Academy, Here I am today I'm just out walking my dogs you can see there's no one around I've got all the peace and quiet that I want apart from I can my dog panting in the background and you probably hear some. Some beds as well singing but the important thing is is that you have fun with recording and making your head shots you know it's not about being perfect it's about being real being authentic now this is very authentic for me because every morning I spend at least an hour walking my dogs and so I thought what a great where to demonstrate taking a headshot with somewhere that I'm comfortable with so when you're doing any your headshots outside make sure that you're away from the wind that the Sun isn't in your eyes because then you'll be squinting at the screen and if people can't actually see your eyes when you talking then sometimes it can create a level of distrust and it also shows that you can have got it wrong so make sure that you're fully in the screen that the Sun isn't in your eyes that you aren't in any wind because that's gonna really affect the audio on your recording and that you're not going to get disturbed plus other people probably don't want to be in your recordings and there's probably some sort privacy laws against that anywhere anyway unless you've got permission so choose somewhere that you're happy with I mean it might mean that you've got to get up early in the morning to avoid the public and you know and make your recording then or it might be you know later in the evening if you're lucky like me you could make the recording in your garden hi I'm back home now and I'm in my garden and I thought this would be a perfect opportunity to show you the difference that light makes where the lights coming from in your videos whether you're outside or inside it's important to control the light so if I just spin a full 360 degrees watch how the light changes how it affects the actual filter natural camera shot and how it impacts on the viewers experience now the Sun is directly in my face here and it's quite uncomfortable to I'm to squint slightly.

So I'm gonna move around another 90 degrees into this position so I'm getting the Sun on the side of my face it gives them much better lighting experience you can adjust this if you're in your office you can adjust this however you want it's always best to have two lights one from each side so that it outlines your face now you'll notice at the position of the camera that I'm holding it's just a mobile format and recording this on but the actual position is just slightly above my eyeline it's about an inch to two inches above my outline I've got my arm outstretched recording this position that the cameras tend to be when people are doing news features so news readers tend to have the camera little bit higher than their eye line and this is a good dynamic and it's what people are used to as well I thought to bring my camera down and as to be looking down into the camera only does it affect the lighting also it feels strange it feels a lot more natural it looks like I'm really talking to the audience you feel engaged with I'm sorry my arms starting to ache a little bit now so it's that to shake a bit that was just to give you an example of lighting and if you're gonna take some pictures some outside you get a do it you garden choose your part you garden that's pleasing to the eye I'm very lucky I've got my orchard here at the bottom of the garden and we share the bottom of our garden with a neighbor it's all very well looked after and it's very pretty so now we're gonna go back to the office and we're gonna do some other exercises and show you some other examples back in a moment.

Still on the subject of lighting I'm here in my office in my home office and I've got a good source of lighting coming from both this side and this side if it was an evening I wouldn't have that natural lighting coming in so what I do is I put this light on and I put this light on and that would illuminate my face much better these are things that you've got to consider when you're doing a headshot the other thing to consider is the backdrop I am quite comfortable having the background that you see now in my videos as you'll have seen through this training some people like to have a white screen background or you may prefer a neutral screen background as you can see there's no shadow against this background here unless I walk right close to it and this is about getting the lighting correct you don't want to be this far away when you're actually present in a video because people won't be able to see your face properly so it'll seem a bit strange at the same time if you don't want to be right in their face as though you're peering through their screen because that'll just feel weird another point to consider is the speed of our delivery when we're speaking it's important to slow things down and not to rush it gives people time to take in what we're actually saying another thing that I'm very guilty of is punctuated in each sentence with words like sir and now and basically and um and okay instead of putting these words in it's much easier to just create a pause in your speaking this gives your listener again time to think time to consider what you're saying so slow it down and be aware of the punctuation and I'm aware that I just did another one you'll get a much better reception much better delivery to what you saying your thing that I want to point out is that when you're actually delivering something to an audience and you want them to take action at the end of a video you can point in a certain direction you can tell them so click here click here click on the button below this engagement transitions them from watching a video to the action you want them to take.

It's very powerful you don't see a lot of people doing this but when you do see it being done it is very effective try it remember punctuation z' better to leave a pause for them to use repetitive words like sir just okay now they show a certain amount of nervousness in our conversational skills and by leaving a gap it gives people time to take in what we're saying after all that's why we president in a video we want people to listen thank you for listening the final point about making videos outside and using a handheld camcorder or using your phone is that you get a lot of movement as you can see with this video my camera is moving about because my arms feeling quite strained and I'm limited to how far I can actually pull this back now watch what happens when I put this in the tripod as you can see now the camera is held very steady in a tripod it means I can walk backwards or walk forwards towards the camera it gives me a lot more control and it's less of a distraction when you're having to hold a camcorder or your phone and you having to think about keeping that steady and what's in the background it takes your focus away from the actual presentation now I'm not a natural presenter and have no formal coaching for presenting I feel a lot more comfortable actually talking into the camera when it's been held in a tripod so something to bear in mind and it's worth the extra investment.