Today, we're going to show you how to build a DIY teleprompter
that will let you read out a script
while you're looking right at the camera.
[Music]
Guys, believe it or not,
almost everything that we've said on this channel
has been without the use of a teleprompter.
Some of you may be surprised to learn that,
because in my first videos,
I was awkwardly staring straight at the camera, rarely blinking,
or interacting with my surroundings.
It was a struggle for a while.
I'd like to think I've gotten better,
and don't need to do that anymore.
However, we are going to show you how to build a teleprompter,
because they can be very useful.
Here's the basic idea.
Using foam core, hot glue,
and a sheet of acrylic,
we can help you make a teleprompter that will fit
to your camera and smartphone.
So guys, a lot of YouTubers
and a lot of people on TV use teleprompters.
They're incredibly useful.
They make it really easy.
If you have a lot of bullet points,
you've got to hit really fast.
Well, you've got to memorize that,
unless you have a teleprompter.
Teleprompters aren't for every situation.
If you're acting on stage, or screen,
something like that,
then you can't be looking right at the camera,
which is where the cues are usually going to be scrolling.
But for anything where you're really trying
to just focus on the camera itself, maybe vlogging,
or showing a DIY video that has a lot to say,
it can really save a lot of time
so you don't have to sit and memorize lines forever.
The supplies you'll need to build this are
actually very simple.
We've got a sheet of acrylic.
This is an 8x10 sheet I picked up at the hardware store
for like less than four bucks.
We've got a sheet of craft foam.
This stuff comes from Hobby Lobby,
costs about $1.50.
This is the thickest stuff they have.
You could get something a little bit thinner,
but I like it with the thicker version.
We have a hot glue gun,
pretty much any hot glue gun is going to work.
And then we also have foam core.
This is the stuff that's paper on the outside,
and like a styrofoam middle.
We've got a clicking razor blade,
very useful because if it started get to dull,
you can just break the tip off,
and keep using the rest of it.
Pencil, it's good for marking things,
and this piece of paper,
which were actually just going to fold,
and use as a 45 degree angle guide.
The other things you're going to need are a camera to film with,
and a smartphone to run the teleprompter app.
This app that I'm using is the Parrot Teleprompter app.
The Parrot Teleprompter is a commercially
available version of what we're building today.
It's a bit more sturdy than what we are going to build today,
but it cost quite a bit more as well.
The app however is free,
so that's what we're going to be using with our DIY version.
Before we started this build,
I reached out to a friend of mine named Brigham,
who actually invented the Parrot Teleprompter,
and I asked him some questions
about his design and invention process
so we could know what we were getting into.
So the design itself is actually deceptively simple,
but there are some few basic things
that you really want to keep in mind
when you're building one of these to make
it actually flawless.
One of those things is the angle of your acrylic to make sure
that everything is actually lining up correctly.
The other thing
that you really need to take into account is the vignette.
You don't want your camera lens to catch the side of the box
of the teleprompter itself.
We're going to want to build this custom to our camera
and our phone.
Every phone is going to be different,
a lot of cameras are going to be different.
You can see, this right here is the camera
that our cameraman Mark usually uses.
He's currently using our emergency backup camera,
so we can see his primary camera.
Sorry, Mark.
And so we have to build onto this,
so that it all works smoothly.
So to start off,
we're just going to cut some 4 inch strips of our foam core
that's a large enough size
that we can cut it down to what we need,
but we won't end up with any pieces that are too small.
The first piece that we're going to want to cut out of these,
that's actually going to be part of the body of the teleprompter
is going to be the pieces that hold our phone.
This is going to be the basic idea here
is we're just going to have a slit,
a rectangular hole cut into this that our phone fits in nicely,
and that's going to hold it in place,
and just generally do everything we want to in terms
of keeping our hardware where we need it.
[Music]
I measured correctly.
That's actually quite snug.
As you can see, it's not falling out like that.
That's pretty good thing, and then trim this,
I'm going to give myself too much space here.
It's not going to be this tall.
This is just moving on,
and now, we need to build another one exactly like that.
Got our two pieces that hold the phone, however,
with my particular phone,
I have the camera that sticks out.
It's not quite flush with the rest of the phone body,
and I want it to fit
just right so I'm actually going to cut that notch out as well.
I'm gonna show you why.
So you can see here the width that
the teleprompter text runs at,
and we want to encase it about that width,
and so we want this side to get in a little bit closer.
But right now, it's bumping into my camera.
So I need to cut a notch so it doesn't do that.
[Music]
How did I do?
Nice.
[Music]
So obviously, we're going to cut these down to size.
But the next step is going to be to cut
some 45 degree angle slits into the side,
that's going to be what holds our acrylic piece in place.
Piece of paper folded across diagonally.
It should give us a perfect 45 degree angle.
Here is where we're going to want our piece of acrylic.
We've got the piece of paper,
and I'm just going to set that right
onto the screen of the phone, and then this line,
where we can mark.
Same thing on the other side.
We've got our 45 degree angle lines, and now,
we need to cut out a small slot,
the same thickness as our acrylic sheet.
We have the lines drawn longer than they needed to be.
We don't need to have this extend all the way down
off of the foam core.
We're going to have it stopped right here,
a little bit above the height of the phone.
We can see that it's maybe five millimeters
above the height of the phone screen,
and on the other end,
it doesn't need to extend all the way to the end
of the phone screen either.
So we're just going to cut it off right about here,
and all the light
from the phone will be shining up this direction.
This is actually an interesting demonstration right here
about how exactly a teleprompter works.
So our camera will be filming this direction.
So we'll have the lens
of the camera will be about right here,
filming out here.
This is where the person being filmed is.
Phone screen is down here pointing up.
The acrylic is reflective, but not as much as a mirror.
So light coming off of our phone,
the text that's being written on it,
is going to bounce up.
Some of it is going to go right through the acrylic,
and it's just going to keep going that direction.
But some of the light is going to hit the acrylic pane,
and at a 45 degree angle, it's going to bounce off.
And remember, this is where we are over here.
So we're going to be able to see what's on the phone screen
as it bounces off this way.
But because of the angle,
the camera isn't going to see any of that light.
The phone isn't going to bounce light
off the acrylic this direction.
That just doesn't happen.
It's only going to go either straight through the acrylic,
or bounce off the 45 degree angle out towards us.
So a tip for you,
if you're ever cutting mat for something
that needs to look really really pretty, make sure
that you're cutting inwards.
You don't want to ever cut outwards towards the mat
you're going to be keeping.
You might end up with like a score mark
that you don't want.
In this case,
it doesn't really matter, but for future reference.
So you cut towards the piece that isn't going to matter.
So now, to know what size of acrylic we need,
we're going to measure the cuts we've already made.
Now, what we also have to take into account is
how far apart we want these,
and again, that depends on the phone you're using.
So we'll start by just cutting a 4 inch wide strip of acrylic,
kind of like we did with our pieces of foam core,
and we'll then chop it down to the right width after.
Cutting acrylic is more like scoring
and breaking acrylic.
You don't slice all the way through it,
you cut a deep enough line that it's slightly weaker there,
and then you snap it over the corner of something sharp.
All right, I've run several cuts down through there,
and I mean,
I haven't even cut 1/4 of the way through,
but it's enough weaker that I can now take the acrylic,
put it over the edge of our bench here.
Very nice.
And it just snaps pretty clean.
So in theory,
this now fits into the slot we just cut.
So we want just a little bit of extra acrylic on the sides,
so we can adjust it as necessary.
So I'm just lining up with phone screen.
[Music]
Yeah.
Unfortunately, acrylic
over time will get scratches and dust on it, unlike glass,
but it is a lot easier to cut.
[Music]
Yeah.
We don't really need any height above the top
of the reflecting screen.
So let's mark right there,
and then cut both of these posts off of that height.
[Music]
So if you have the tools for,
and if you know how to cut glass,
you could use a glass screen.
It would last a little bit longer,
but acrylic is very easy to cut,
very easy to handle so...
And it's cheap.
Let's measure to put a roof on to this.
And before we start gluing all the pieces together,
there's one more step we want to take.
We talked about how we wanted to avoid vignetting.
That's when there's something on the sides
that showing up on screen,
and I'm simulating it
by just giving myself blinders at the moment.
If these are on the edge of the lens,
and they're too far forward,
then you're going to see them on the sides,
and you're not trying to record this.
You just want it to be there holding stuff.
So to make sure that we don't get any vignetting,
any blocking of the visual,
we're also going to cut out just a little bit
of a curve shape into these,
to try and minimize any accidental encroaching
on the sides.
There you go,
and you normally will not see that in movies,
but a really easy example, turn on your camera phone,
and just put your hand to the side.
You'll see it.
In the situation like this, less is more.
Don't melt your phone.
[Music]
Let's measure for the back.
[Music]
Before we attach the back however,
we need to add something else.
We're going to have
this back attached to the lens of the camera,
and not just through the foam,
we're going to be using our craft foam as a collar
that fits around the lens,
because that way,
it won't just be one ring around the lens,
but actually a bit more of a collar.
Here's a one and a half inch strip of our craft foam.
And now, we're just going to measure around the lens,
and glue that into a circle that fits right around it.
[Music]
Very nice.
Now, there's our back piece.
Here you go.
Now, we want to trace out the same shape,
the size of the foam, not just the lens,
but the foam itself.
That's what's going to be glued to this piece of foam core.
The really nice part about working with foam core
and foam is it's usually pretty forgiving.
So even if it isn't a perfect circle,
it's still gonna work.
[Music]
Nice.
Here we go.
[Music]
Looks good.
[Music]
Perfection.
The teleprompter box is mostly built.
There's one more thing that we might want to do.
We can see how nicely it fits right over that lens.
Beautiful.
And the last thing
that we want to add on is a little bit of support,
because the box itself is actually quite lightweight.
Once I add the phone,
it's going to get a little bit heavier,
and it can start to droop a little bit,
and aside from that,
you're really putting more weight on the end of the camera,
which is going to make your hands tired
if you're holding the camera, so we just want to add
a little bit of support.
On this one,
what we're going to do is we're just going to have a piece
that extends off the bottom,
and rests up against the base of the camera.
So if it does try and tip it all,
its leverage is pushing up against the bottom
of the camera base.
It should center the weight so it's all much easier.
[Music]
You can see what it looks like through the teleprompter,
and you can see what it looks like from the other side,
through the camera.
There's our cameraman.
Look, it's not Grant's wife.
So now we want to challenge each other.
So the plan here is we are both going to put something
on the teleprompter for the other person,
and not tell them what it's going to be.
And then see how it look.
Now, while she does that,
I want to talk a little bit about what we are seeing
in that lens.
You may have noticed
that every letter is slightly doubled,
its like there's a shadow behind the letters,
and that's because our acrylic has two sides
that are reflecting.
It's not a very thick sheet of plastic,
but the letters are reflecting off of one side of the acrylic,
and then they're reflecting off of the back
of the same side of the acrylic.
So you do get a slight ghosting effect.
If you're using a professional-grade teleprompter,
they have a few ways to get around this.
One is by using a piece of glass,
and it will usually be a little bit thinner,
and it will have a special reflective coating applied
to it in just the right spots,
in just the right amounts so that it reflects
the words nicely,
but you can still see through it,
and you don't get that doubled ghosting effect.
This however works pretty well
for a cheap version you can throw together.
And if you have decently large text,
it's not a big distraction.
Good when you are.
I don't know what it is I'm about to read,
but I'm gonna give it a shot.
A long time ago,
in a galaxy far far away, it is a period of Civil War.
Rebel spaceships striking from a hidden base have won
their first victory against the evil Galactic Empire.
Nice.
And there's a nice title crawl, just scroll right up there.
Calli's turn.
Your turn.
All right.
I gotta think of something good.
Look, if you had one shot,
one opportunity to seize everything you ever wanted,
one moment, would you capture it,
or just let it slip?
His palms are sweaty.
Arms are heavy.
There's vomit on his sweater already, mom's spaghetti.
He's nervous,
but on the surface, he looks calm
and ready to drop bombs.
But he keeps on forgetting what he wrote down.
The whole crowd goes so loud.
I think we can do this.
Really?
I give you Star Wars.
You give Eminem?
That song won an Oscar.
We went ahead and modified one of our teleprompter builds,
and now we just have this nice little thing
that we can drop a smartphone
into, and use the built-in camera on that.
It's going to do the same thing.
You can film through the back, stays in place.
You can see everything that the camera sees.
Thanks to my friend Brigham for sharing your experiences,
and what you learned
as you're designing and inventing this thing.
It's really cool version.
Guys, if you aren't going to be using this DIY version,
if it's something you think you're going to use a lot,
every day,
or for lots and lots of videos,
it's probably worth investing in a professional grade version
rather than the DIY.
It's got some advantages,
but this is definitely going to work
if you're just going to be using it occasionally.
Hey guys, that's all for today.
But you know,
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Talk to you then.