wouldn't be great if all our video calls
look something like this with soft
lighting nice clean non embarassing
backdrop
well my secret is that I'm a video
producer so I happen to have a room full
of lighting gear for everyone else out
there here are some easy tips for
improving the lighting for your video
calls at home
let me take you on a little journey
through my office it's starting with
natural light
hey window
the first rule of natural light is don't
have it behind you if you're backlit
like this your face is gonna look too
dark or your background is gonna look
too bright just avoid that all together
if you're lucky enough to have a big
window in front of you where you work
that's great most of the work is done
for you you have this nice big beautiful
light source that will light your face
right up but there are a couple of
things you can do to make the natural
light work for you a little bit better
so in this scenario the natural light is
lighting my face but my entire
background is completely dark and that
might work for you if you don't want to
draw attention to your background if
it's cluttered or embarrassing but if
you want a more even sort of natural
filled outlook then there are a couple
of things you can do you might be
tempted to turn on your overhead lights
or other incandescent lamps you have in
the room and you really want to be
careful with that because when you mix
natural light with indoor light you're
gonna get some color casts due to the
color temperature difference so you're
gonna either maybe look orange or you're
gonna look blue it really throws off the
look unless you really need that extra
boost of light stick to either natural
light or incandescent light another
thing you can do to make the natural
light look a little better is instead of
facing directly straight on into the
window you can pivot yourself a little
bit at about a 45 degree angle to the
window like this this will give you a
bit of a shadow on one side of your face
it is a little bit more flattering it
de-emphasizes your blemishes and just
has that a little bit of a cinematic
touch if you're in a situation like this
where a very little natural light is
hitting your face you're gonna have to
rely on indoor lights preferably some
lamps that you have one of the biggest
mistakes is when people put desk lamps
on the corner of their desk facing
directly at them you end up with a
really harsh look like this
in this scenario there's a bare bulb
lamp shining right into my face not only
do I end up with these really harsh
shadows on one side of my face but it's
just not pleasant to have this big giant
light shining in your face all the time
especially for longer meetings but
there's a pretty easy fix if your lamp
has any kind of flexibility at all you
can turn it around and face it at the
opposing wall now the light is bouncing
off that wall and onto your face
creating a much more soft evenly
diffused look ask for the background if
you want to spice it up a bit you can
try turning lamps on that may be sitting
in the background but just be careful
because they might look a little
distracting I have a lot of blown out
areas like this if you have smart bulbs
in your house you can use those to craft
your your look you can dial down the
background light that or you can create
an accent color makes you stand out from
the background a little bit more
if you really don't want people peering
in on your disgusting living quarters
you can kill the background entirely by
hanging a sheet or a curtain behind you
or if you're willing to spend a little
bit of money you can get a big
collapsible white and black background
that you can hang on a tripod or a light
stand just set that right up behind you
above all don't put too much pressure on
yourself you don't need to look like a
TV studio as long as people can see you
and hear you clearly that's all that
matters
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