Hey friends, I'm Ginny Di and today I'm gonna walk you through how you can make
a music video all by yourself. [Singing] Never have to face a fight alone you see, I'm here to
keep their eyes on me.
They danced through the day and into the night through the snow that swept through though the hall.
Think of all the cons I've done think of all the masquerades I haven't won.
And I dug my axe into the side of her pretty little souped-up pirate ride, carved some dicks into this floating heap
I have been making music videos for the internet for almost a decade now and
quite a few of those have been created almost entirely alone, without a crew or
even someone to stand behind the camera and press the record button. It shows
that you don't need a full production team in order to create some pretty cool
videos, so if you're interested in doing that kind of thing, hopefully this video
will teach you the basics that you need to get started. I'm going to specifically
talk about music videos here, but a lot of these principles could also be
applied to other kinds of video productions, too. One more quick note
before we start: Throughout this video I'm gonna talk about free or cheap
options and then I'm going to talk about what you can do if you're willing to
invest a little bit more. In most cases the free option won't be the best
quality option, but I don't want equipment expense to stop people from
creating. There's no shame in starting with what you have and investing and
growing over time when it becomes feasible for you.
Before anything else,
you need your actual music. If you're going to record your own song as opposed
to working with an audio engineer, the biggest thing that you'll need is a good
microphone. The free option here is to just use your phone or your computer's
microphone. Most modern smartphones have a pretty good mic on them these days, and
you can download recording apps that give you a little bit more control over
the result. I like the app VoiceRecorder, that's one word, for iPhone for recording
sound effects or clips when I don't have a mic on me. Some gaming headsets may
also have a pretty good quality microphone. You can experiment and see
which of the options you already have at home will deliver the cleanest sound. If
you're willing to spend a little, you can pick up a good quality USB mic like the
Blue Snowball or the Blue Yeti for a reasonable price. Make sure you get or
DIY a pop filter — that's this — and do a little self education on how to use the
mic properly to get the best quality sound. As for software, there's a freeware
program called Audacity that's very easy to use, supports multi-tracking, and has a
pretty functional noise reduction tool. If you want a more powerful software
Adobe Audition is available with a Creative Cloud subscription for about 20
dollars a month. That's what I use when I do any of my own audio recording at home.
When I work with Blake, my audio engineer, he uses Logic Pro. You have a bunch of
different options. For most songs, unless you're doing something a capella,
you will need an accompaniment. You can accompany yourself on an instrument like
the guitar or the ukulele or the piano, or have a musical friend help you
out. If you're willing to invest a little, you can pay someone to create an
accompaniment track for you. All of my tracks are created by one of my best
friends, Blake Smith. If you would like him to create an instrumental track for
you, I will include his contact information in the description. I'm sure
he'd be happy to send you a quote for whatever you're looking for. If you're
doing a parody or a cover, You can also purchase the rights to a premade karaoke
track, but please keep in mind that whatever rights you purchase need to
include the right to modify and redistribute the track, which is usually
a few hundred dollars. If you're recording your own vocals over an
instrumental track, make sure that the instrumental is playing in headphones
while you record, not out loud where the mic can catch it. This will ensure that
you don't get a weird echo effect.
you can do literally anything for a music
video. You can do stop-motion, you can make a lyrics typography video, you can
have dancing, you can do animation, you can use a drone, you can use stock
footage. Some of my favorite music videos are incredibly simple conceptually, like
Tessa Violet's lyrics video for "Games," which is just a single uncut take of her
crouching and then eventually dancing in front of a giant glowing cube, or the
music video for "These Bones" by LARP House, which is just top-down footage of
her lying on the grass. In short, there is no right way to do a music video. The
most important thing is to have a plan, no matter what that plan is. My best
music videos are the ones where I had a complete shot list laid out before
filming. The more prep you do up front, the easier filming will be and the
easier editing will be. When I create a shot list, I usually create a spreadsheet
that cites timestamps in the song, lyrics, what set will be used, the style and
width of the shot, and notes on what will happen in the shot. For example, will I be
singing in the shot? Is it an over-the-shoulder shot, is it a close-up?
The more detail you have in your shot list, the easier it will be to film,
because you'll basically just be going down a checklist. You can either film in
a set that you've put together yourself in your own space, like hanging a
backdrop, filming in your house, or constructing a set, or you can film on
location. If you're filming in a public location, make sure first that you are
allowed to film there. You may need a permit to film in some public spaces.
It's also important to make sure that you won't be getting in someone's way or
they won't be getting in your way if you do film in a public space. Once I planned
an entire shoot weeks in advance at a public
park where I had shot before, and then we showed up to film and there was a huge
yoga in the park event happening and we had to switch locations last minute and
it sucked. Don't do that to yourself! You'll also want to check on things like
availability of power, parking, how you'll get your equipment there, stuff like that.
If you're going to film on location, it's a good idea to visit it before your
shoot and check out the space. This is called location scouting. You can even
bring your camera and test out some of the kind of shots you want just to make
sure that they look the way you want. If you're filming in your own space, you'll
want to make sure that it is clean and well lit. You can hang up a backdrop or a
film against a solid colored wall for an easy, clean set. I personally have a
collection of photo backdrops that I've bought online that I've used for music
videos like "Look What You Made Me Do" or "Take a Hint." You can also pick up a green
screen and use some of the techniques that I outlined in my partial green
screen set video, which I will link in the cards. The sky's the limit when it
comes to building sets, it just depends on how much labor you want to put into
it. For my Firefly music video, I hand-painted giant sheets of styrofoam
to turn my parents garage into the cargo hold of a spaceship. Don't ever be afraid
to think big or challenge yourself to use your resources creatively.
When it comes to equipment you can spend a ton of money, or you can really fly by
the seat of your pants and go super budget-friendly. You get to decide what
you want to invest in and what you're willing to compromise on while you learn
an experiment. I'll link to a collection of equipment recommendations in the
description in case you're ready to invest. The main thing you'll need in
order to film a video is of course a video camera. If you're really tight on
funds, you can literally use your phone for this. Some recent smartphones can
shoot video in 4k. You'd be really surprised by what you can achieve with
your phone or an inexpensive point-and-shoot camera. If you want to
get fancy, you can get a DSLR that shoots video. Personally I use the Canon 80D.
You'll want to do your own research on which camera has the capabilities that
you want within a price range that you can afford. Also, if you're going to be
shooting on your own, a tripod is absolutely essential. Nearly as important
as the camera is the lighting setup. Unless you're gonna do all of your
shooting in natural light, you'll need your own lighting equipment. Footage
that's too dark or that's grainy because your camera is compensating for a lack
of light is an immediate hallmark of an amateur. An otherwise great video can be
completely ruined by poor lighting, something that I have learned the hard
way before. I've turned off my lighting equipment really fast just to show you
what it looks like when I film with the regular overhead light in my house.
Household lighting can be very yellow, and since it's usually ceiling mounted,
it can also be very unflattering on the face, creating heavy shadows underneath
the eyes. A good place to start is with a basic continuous lighting kit. This kind
of light kit is very common in photography and usually comes with two
or three LED lights with diffusers such as soft boxes or umbrellas. I use a
combination of softbox lights and sometimes a ring light if it suits the
style that I'm going for. If you plan on having any singing
footage in your video, you will also need some sort of speaker to play your track
out loud while you film. You'll need a speaker capable of playing your song
loud enough that both the camera and the performer can hear it. You sing along
with the track while filming to make sure that your timing is correct, and
then during the editing process you match up the track with your footage and
then mute the video. One of these cheap Bluetooth speakers is a good investment
for this, but you can also play the song through your phone or your computer. The
only risk is that if the volume isn't loud enough for both the performer and
the camera to hear, it will make editing a lot more difficult.
When it comes time to actually film, make sure that you give yourself plenty of
time. Shooting a video pretty much always takes longer than you think it will, and
shooting your own video takes even longer. I've shot three-minute music
videos that take multiple 10 to 12 hour filming days to shoot. It's always better
to give yourself more time rather than risk not giving yourself enough. I highly
recommend filming a test clip, uploading it to your computer, and checking it
before you shoot your entire video. This will make sure that you aren't making a
silly mistake that will ruin your entire video, like shooting with the wrong
settings, or shooting with poor lighting. By that same token, make sure to check in
and review your footage regularly as you shoot to make sure that everything still
looks right. Especially when you're shooting your own footage, it's easy to
not notice that you have a funny wig hair sticking up, or a safety pin showing
until you're editing it it's too late. It's a good idea to get at least two
good takes of any given shot just to be safe. If you think you got a good one, go
ahead and shoot one more, because you never know what kind of problems you're
gonna run into later that you didn't anticipate or didn't notice while
filming. Finally, once you're done shooting, back up your footage
immediately. There is no worse feeling than losing track of an SD card that you
need, or worse, accidentally formatting your card and then realizing that you
just lost your footage because you thought you'd already backed it up.
To edit the video you will of course need some kind of video editing software.
I use Adobe Premiere, which you can get through a Creative Cloud subscription
for $20 a month. Sony Vegas and Final Cut Pro are also popular options. If you'd
prefer a free software, you can use Windows Movie Maker on a PC or iMovie on
a Mac. If all you need to do is cut clips together, the free options will work fine,
but a more professional software like Premiere gives you more control over
things like lighting and color correction and special effects. If you
have footage of you singing, you'll want to match up the clips with your song
track to make sure that your lip movements are matched up to the song.
Hard consonants or sharp beats in the song are a good place to make sure that
everything is in sync. Once you have them lined up, mute or remove the audio tracks
from your video recording, so that the viewer sees your footage but hears the
clean audio from your studio song recording. How to edit your video will
depend a lot on the kind of video that you're making.
I'd recommend having a few music videos to inspire you and paying attention to
things like how frequently they cut, what kind of effects they use, etc. Ultimately
your main goal should be to cut together a video that matches the emotional tone
of your song and is visually interesting. Don't be afraid to show drafts of your
video to friends and get feedback on what is and isn't working. And it's
totally normal to occasionally need to film additional footage, usually referred
to as "pickup shots," to fill gaps or to correct for mistakes in your video. And
that's it! That's all there is to it, it is definitely not as scary as it sounds.
Like any creative art, the biggest obstacle is just conquering your fear
and trying it. You'll learn as you go and your work will improve over time. Hit me
up in the comments with any questions that you might have, and good luck making
your own music videos, I can't wait to see them!
I did it.
Vidjas!