- Do you wanna save time and make better quality videos?
Well, I'm not normally a process guy,
but this eight-step check list for filming
has saved me entire projects and a ton of time
on every shoot over the years,
so we're gonna run through this simple, pre-shoot process
to help you avoid issues
and to speed up your production process,
no matter what videos you're creating.
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Hey, it's Justin Brown here from PrimalVideo,
we release a ton of content to help you
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then make sure you click that Subscribe button
and all the links to everything we mentioned in this video,
you can find linked in the Description box below,
so let's jump into it.
Now, a lot can go wrong with filming
and if you're still here,
then the chances are you've experienced that firsthand,
best case, you lose some time,
worst case, well, I've lost entire projects in the past
and I really don't wanna talk about it,
but over the years, with each mistake,
we've built a solid, pre-shoot process
to prevent all the common issues, that pop up
and save a ton of time, during each shoot.
I'm gonna step you through the process now,
so you can start using it for your own videos
and stick around, because once we're done
with the pre-shoot check list,
we're gonna cover the number one thing
you need to do asap after finishing your shoot,
that most people don't do or forget about,
until it's too late, like I did those two or three times,
when I lost an entire shoot's worth of footage.
Right, so it's check list time,
which means handy progress bar, okay, it's there, let's go.
Step number one is to prepare your notes,
now this is really, really important,
because you don't wanna be fumbling around
and thinking about what you wanna say in your videos,
you need to prepare everything upfront,
so have an outline of what you wanna say,
or better yet, write out word-for-word,
it'll really depend on your delivery style
and what works best for you,
but if you know exactly what you're going to say
and all the points you need to hit in your video,
that's gonna speed up the entire filming process,
it's also gonna make sure that you don't miss anything,
while you're filming.
Step number two is to check your gear,
now this is where you're gonna make sure
that you've got everything that you need to be able to film,
so all your microphones, your cameras,
your batteries, your spare memory cards,
everything that you're going to need to film,
if you can have a check list, so you can tick everything off
to make sure you've got everything, then that is ideal,
the last thing you wanna do is to rock up,
get ready to shoot and find that you're missing something
that could have been on your check list,
so make sure you've got batteries,
make sure you've got backup batteries
or spare batteries ready to go,
make sure that they are charged,
make sure you've got memory cards, enough memory cards
to last the amount of time you're shooting,
it's also a good idea to have extras,
in case you end up filming for longer,
so all of these things can prevent
a whole heap of heartache later,
if you're in the middle of shooting
and you run out of storage for your filming
or you run out of batteries,
so that your camera switches off,
so it's all about preparation, prepare your script,
prepare your gear, make sure you've got everything
and it will make your filming much more seamless.
Now depending on your gear,
the camera and the lights that you're using,
it may be possible to power
some of those things off mains power,
so that you don't need to rely on batteries,
now if that's possible for you,
then it's something that I would highly recommend,
because it removes the chances of things going flat
or turning off, while you're in the middle of shooting.
Step number three is to set everything up,
so this is where you're gonna put your camera
on your tripod, set it up to the correct height,
you're going to set up your lights
and get those organized and to the right brightness levels,
set up your microphones, whether it's your wired lapel,
wireless lapel or shotgun microphone,
so we're gonna plug everything in
and get everything ready to go.
Step number four is a big one,
this is where you're gonna set up your camera,
so the first thing you'll need to do
obviously is turn the camera on,
make sure that you've got your memory card in,
quickly do a check on the memory card
to make sure that there is nothing
that you don't need on there
and then format the memory card,
so then you wanna check your recording format settings
in your camera as well,
so it could be that you're recording
to things like an MP4 file or a MOV file,
so you wanna pick the one that's right for your camera,
you also wanna set your resolution,
so 1080p, 720p, 4K,
again, depending on your camera and your workflow
and also lock down your frame rate as well,
so it could be 24 frames per second, 25,
it could be 30 frames per second.
Now if you're looking for a full, detailed walkthrough
on the settings and the ideal settings
for setting up your DSLR mirrorless
or point-and-shoot camera or even your Iphone or smartphone,
then check out the video linked up on screen,
where we cover off all the settings
and to help you decide the best settings for you.
So in this step, it's all about locking down
your camera settings and double-checking
that everything is as you want for your recording,
so even if you're positive that all the settings
are 100% correct from your last shoot,
it's still worth double-checking
just in case you might have changed something,
maybe you kicked your camera into slow motion mode
or a higher frame rate to do some B roll footage,
you wanna double-check everything time you shoot
to make sure that everything is as you want it.
Step number five is where you're gonna set up
and frame your shot, so the first thing to do here
is to make sure that your camera is level,
so you can either use the spirit level on your tripod,
if you've got one, if you don't have one of those,
a lot of cameras have a built-in level system,
that you can bring up on the display
to show that it's level,
if you don't have either of those two,
then you're stuck to using your eyes
to see if everything looks straight and looks level
and the way that you can do this
is to look at any vertical lines in your shot
and make sure that they are actually vertical
or look at the horizon, so you wanna make sure
that any straight lines are as close
to being straight as possible.
Now when you're framing your shot,
I'm a big fan of using the rule of thirds,
if you're not sure what that is,
then check out the video linked up here
for a full walkthrough and a full explanation of what it is,
so we try to stick as close to that as we can
for an aesthetically pleasing shot,
but really the big thing here
is to make sure that you've got an interesting looking shot,
without everything just framed in the middle of your frame,
so if you're creating a video
with someone or yourself in it,
then you can position them slightly to the left
or slightly to the right off-center
to make the shot more interesting.
Step number six is to lock down your focus,
your exposure and your white balance.
It's really important to have
all of these three things on manual,
so they're not gonna be changing throughout your shot,
so your focus, that's a simple one,
make sure that you are in focus
or that whatever it is that you're filming
is in focus and not out of focus or blurry,
the exposure is the brightness or darkness of your shot,
so you can normally adjust things like your ISO,
your shutter speed or your aperture
and setting and locking down your white balance
is just as important, so this is the color temperature
or really the look and feel of the video you're creating,
so you can totally change the look and feel
by getting this wrong or changing it to how you'd like,
the presets and using the presets in most cameras
is where I would suggest that you start
and it's normally good enough for most shooting conditions,
so you normally get presets for things like sunny day,
cloudy day, fluorescent lights, tungsten lights,
there's a heap of presets that are built into most cameras
and just by cycling through and either picking your scenario
or picking the one that looks best
for the look that you're after is a great place to start,
some cameras will also give you more advanced options,
where you can type in the Kelvin number
or the color temperature number,
that you'd like to set your camera towards,
in which case, you wanna set it to match the lights
that you're using in your scene,
so for example, the lights that I'm using
in my room right here right now to light me up
are 5500 Kelvin color temperature,
so I normally set my camera to 5500 or close to it
to get a decent looking shot,
so the main reason you wanna lock down your focus,
your exposure and your white balance
and kick them out of auto mode and into manual
is so that you've got full control over these settings,
if you just leave them to auto and let your camera
decide what they should be, there's a high risk
that they're going to change during your shoot,
so if a cloud comes over, then your white balance
may change, your exposure may change
to try and compensate for the change in your environment,
so you wanna make sure that you've locked everything down,
so that nothing is changing and as that cloud moves away,
you go back to the exact same shot you had before,
so it's all about locking everything down
and putting the power back to you,
instead of leaving everything on auto.
Step number seven is to do a test run,
so stand in position,
get your microphone and everything sorted, press record
and what you wanna do is to talk for 10 to 20 seconds,
as if you were presenting your video
and then go back and check and if you can,
plug in a set of headphones and really listen to the audio,
make sure that it is loud enough
and it's exactly how you want
and obviously look at the shot as well
to make sure that it is bright enough,
that the colors are right,
that it is how you want your video to be,
the last thing you wanna find
is that you get back to your editing
and there was something wrong with the video
or there was something wrong with the audio,
especially if you could have easily done a quick test
to make sure that everything was right,
before you spent however long recording your videos,
we've all been there, probably don't wanna be there again,
so it's a good idea to do a test shoot first
and step number eight is to record your video,
so when you're recording your video,
you can actually now relax, because you know
that you've gone through this check list,
you know that everything is set up correctly,
you know that your file formats are all right,
you know that your exposure is right,
you know that you're in focus, your audio and video,
everything is on point,
now you can focus on creating the content.
So now that we've gone through
the eight-step pre-shoot check list,
it's now time for that number one thing to remember
as soon as you're done with your shoot,
yes, I'm talking about backups,
I know what you're thinking, that's it?
Yep, backups is so important and over the years,
I've made excuses to not do it quite a few times,
immediately after finishing a shoot
and that decision always comes back to bite you in the arse,
so what you need to do is as soon as possible,
the moment you're finished your shoot,
start backing up the footage,
at least keep them on the SD card,
keep a copy on your laptop or on your computer,
the moment that you can duplicate your footage,
so that it's not just in one place
is the best thing you can do,
that feeling you get when you realize
you've just lost an entire day's worth of footage
or an entire shoot's worth of footage
is definitely not a good one,
so wherever possible, as soon as you can after shooting
or even while you're shooting, start the backup process,
try to duplicate your footage as you go,
you wanna have at least two copies
of everything, just in case,
but ideally then at the nearest opportunity,
duplicate your footage again, so that you've got it
still on your SD card as an absolute backup,
it might be on your laptop then as your primary backup
and then on an external hard drive as a second copy,
that is really, really important
and I can't stress this enough, backups are so important
and I know that it's a pain and you might just wanna
pack up your shoot for the day and get out of there,
but back up, because you don't wanna have to shoot it again
or you don't wanna have to tell your clients,
that you don't have their footage anymore,
even if it's not your fault,
if you've got a faulty SD card or your laptop dies,
now if you wanna know the different types of hard drives
that we use for editing and for backups,
I'll throw a link up in the cards now,
just to help you remove any excuses
around creating these backups.
Now that you've got your pre-shoot process sorted,
let's talk about speeding up your editing,
we've put together a free PDF guide
on the ultimate video editing and production process
to help you save time and reduce rework
and it's linked on screen right now
for you to grab and get started,
I'll see you soon.