You want your YouTube videos to be the best. You really want to get tons of views,
right? And so, the big dilemma is what type of quality
is best? Do I need to invest in the best camera so I get the best results?
What really is the most important? That's we're going to answer in this video.
Okay, we're going to cover a lot of ground in this video really quickly. We're going to
talk about equipment and gear and lighting and sound. And the most important thing you can do
in your content so that your videos are the best quality. So, a friend of mine that we all miss,
Grant Thompson from the King of Random, he shared with me a story one time about his liquid nitrogen
in the face video. This was a couple years before he passed away. He was really frustrated and he
was about ready to quit YouTube. Like seriously, he had 10 million subscribers on his YouTube
channel but it was taking up so much of his life that he was ready to quit YouTube. I mean,
he put a lot of time and energy into research into prototyping and then filming and editing
that final video. And he had to keep making video after video and video and he felt like,
"If I don't do this, my channel is going to fail." Well, one day, he was reading a lot of
comments about people thinking that he was being careless with liquid nitrogen. So, we decided,
"You know what? I'm just going to make a quick video." He pulled out and he filmed it on his
phone. So, he didn't do any prototyping or any preparation at all. He just pulled out his phone
and he had a cup of liquid nitrogen. And he says, "Alright, for those of you who are concerned,
I appreciate your concern. But I've been dealing with liquid nitrogen for a long time and actually
want to show you that you can get liquid nitrogen on your face and it's not going to hurt you. So,
do not try this at home because I know what I'm doing. But watch."
And liquid nitrogen on his face. He just took a minute or so to film this quick video on his phone
and he uploaded it directly to YouTube. That video got millions and millions of views. He's like,
"What? I mean, my other videos they get millions of views but they're a lot of work. And then this
one that he just quickly threw together, got millions of views as well." He's like, "Whoa!"
He shared that he learned is that people want good content. That was a cool thing for people to see
it even though it didn't have any of the production value or preparation. Okay, if you
actually want to watch that video, I'll link to it right up there. When talking about video quality,
most people are talking about production quality in the camera and whatnot. I'm going to suggest
that you start with the camera that's in your pocket or your purse right now because these
cameras are so advanced compared to what they were just a few years ago. Maybe if you invested
in expensive camera, your video might perform 5% better or maybe 10% better. But 90% is awesome and
you've already got this. So, the camera I'm using now is a DSLR. And the reason that I upgraded to
this camera and this lens is so I could blur the background. Okay, that's the main reason but you
don't have to blur the background. So, I've got my monopod here. I'm going to set my phone on it.
Okay, I've hit record. So, I'm gonna set this right next to my dslr camera. I don't know,
I haven't checked. I'm not even looking at. I'm not behind it. So, I don't know if the angle is
good or not. If it looks like it might be aiming up. But if I stand up, you can see my microphone.
I don't know. But take a look at that shot, right? So, I'm using the same lighting from this camera
to that camera. And yeah, the blur is different, right? But start with the camera in your pocket.
One of the most important things you can do in your youtube videos is just to talk
conversationally. You don't want to give a speech you don't want to give a presentation.
You don't want to look like you're reading from a teleprompter. I mean sometimes, it's okay to
use a teleprompter if you really practice so you don't look like you're reading. People want to
connect with you. They want to make eye contact with you and they want to just feel like you're
having a conversation. You know, sometimes, I see people that are just so energetic like, "Alright,
guys. Are you ready for this?" Sometimes I feel like, "Oh. Well, that's how I should be? I should
have that much energy." What's best for building that relationship on YouTube is approachability.
And just by being conversational, you really do accomplish that. So, for a lot of people, this
takes practice you've got to like catch yourself and like, "Wait, am I talking in a presentation
mode am I talking like a newscaster?" And perhaps record yourself. And say, "Hey, do I sound like
I'm talking to a friend or do I sound like I'm giving a presentation?" And I'm curious. So, right
now, I'm trying just to talk conversationally to you how do you think I'm doing? Am I doing
two presentation mode or am I conversation? Go and comment below. I'm just curious to hear what you
guys think. Lighting is extremely important but it can be overwhelming and i don't want it to stress
you out and I don't want it to hold you back. So, I'm going to show you what I'm using here
but I'm going to show you a simple solution that's free and that you probably already have, okay?
So, what we're looking at here... Yeah, what... I've got pretty advanced stuff going on here.
I've even got a light up there shining light on the ceiling. So, that's a huge soft box, right?
And I've got these amazing aperture lights. And what I'm trying to simulate is a window.
So, I'll just turn this around in selfie mode. I'm going to walk over to a window and we've got,
we've got evening light coming right at me so I won't stand in the direct sunlight. But when
I come right here and I'm facing a window, look how good I look in that light, okay? Compared to
if I do a shot like this or if I do a shot like this, okay? Or if I just come over and I'm
kind of randomly doing shots. If I haven't paid attention to lighting,
you know, sometimes you might get lucky, sometimes you're not. But by default, right here I don't
have any professional lights on me. I'm just facing the window and tell me what you think
about that. I haven't looked at it. I'm looking at the camera lens on my phone. Like another window
is right here so I could come over and I could look at the window right there. How does that
look? There should be a darker spot right there. So, compare that to my phone and I'm coming back
and I'm gonna sit down right here. I'm curious to see the comparison on how well this video
does compared to this video right there. You know what? Why don't I actually show you with the dslr?
Alright, so, let's now walk with this camera. The audio is going to be different we're only using
the shotgun mic there. But now, I'm facing that window. So, I've got a really wide lens and it's
so bright outside that it's darkening everything out there. But compare this light to this light
to this light, okay? Huge difference there, isn't there? To this light, to this light. Okay,
I'm facing oh another window right now. There should be a shadow coming from that direction.
So, now I'm back a ways. But the windows are right there none of this is the professional
lighting. This is just windows. I'm facing the windows. I don't have any direct sunlight on me.
What do you think about that? And now, let's talk about audio. If you're close enough to the camera,
just go with the audio built into the camera, it's simple. But once you start to get 2 feet, 3 feet,
4 feet. Right now I'm probably about four feet away from the camera and I'm about one feet away
from the microphone. You can't see it out of the shot. Would you like to know what it looks like?
I've got one of these upside down. So, you can just screw a little handle
into the bottom and I've got it on a boom arm just right out of the shot. So, this is
the Zoom H2N. You can get it on amazon. It's like 150 bucks. This mic is my favorite. It's
been my favorite for years and years. I've tested it against many others. There's actually a lot of
settings. There's a lot that this little thing can do. I always point it this way.
So, you've got the little display screen here. Yeah, when I turn it on. The arrow
points towards the display screen and it's a directional mic. So, if I turn it sideways,
it's muffling out everything here, it's only picking up what's right in front of the screen.
So, how I have the mic above me... So, I have it positioned you know aiming at me just right out of
the shot. So, just barely out of the shot. There are a lot of audio recommendations I can give you.
And by far and away, this one's my favorite. You can have a lav mic on the collar. And sometimes,
it's easier to do that if I'm doing a lot of movement. Let me just tell you.
I was downtown Salt Lake City, I was filming with Kris Krohn and we were interviewing people on the
street. So, I was behind the camera, Kris was talking to a guy holding the mic like this.
And the tracks train in downtown salt lake city. Really squeaky. One of the loudest trains I've
ever heard. And like I couldn't even hear their conversation. I wasn't that far away from them,
maybe 5 feet away. I could not hear what they were saying but the microphone was right here right
between them. And I just thought, "Yeah, we'll see if we can even use any of this audio afterwards."
Well, I listened to it and yes, you could tell. You could hear that there was a train
in the background but it was muffled out and you could really clearly hear what they were
saying. The audio was totally usable. So, this is my go-to mic. Hey, zoom, if you're watching this,
you should sponsor me. I'll make more videos about Zoom. Now, don't confuse that with zoom.us that
we make Zoom calls all the time. Zoom digital recorders. It records to an sd card. So, when
I'm done, I can just pop out the sd card and give those files to my editing team. The most important
part of your video is your content and it's got to be valuable. If your content is valuable
then you can actually make mistakes. On a lot of the other things that we're talking about and your
video will still succeed. So, think about that for a minute, "What if I have bad lighting? What if
my audio is bad?" Or "What if I'm dressed funny or if there's a hair..." I don't have any hair.
You know, think about that. You can have all these other things go wrong in your video
but if what you're sharing is super valuable, your video will still perform well. Here's an
interesting side note: If there is something wrong in your video but the content is still valuable,
people will comment below and they'll say, "Hey, you had really chapped lips in the video. What's
up with that?" Or they'll say, "You know what? What you said about the philippines being a third
world country, it's actually a developing nation." Yeah, this is a true story for me. "We prefer
to be called a developing nation, not a third world country." So, when you mess up and you say
things in your video or you do things or there's something off on your video, it will encourage
people to comment and YouTube sees that as more engagement and your video will perform better.
It's kind of funny. Make sure your content is valuable. Keeping people's attention is important
and so is traffic. The next video to watch and I'll link to it right here or right here is How
to Find Low Competition Keywords for Youtube. This is one of the best strategies I teach.