I’ve been talking about wanting to create a yotube channel for an embarrassing amount of time. I even tried starting my first video last July before I ended up deleting it. There were a few factors in this: I could never figure out what I was going to talk about, there are only two rooms in my house where I can record and you won’t hear my darling bird, and I just felt really awkward on camera. Well, I fixed that because I have a youtube channel!
I’m all about learning and I decided 2018 would be my year of learning video basics. I spent November and December brainstorming, watching a lot of Youtube videos, and figuring out what I would really like to do. I felt if I continued to put this off that I would feel let down by myself and it wasn’t something I wanted to continue feeling. The feeling I had after I made my first video was amazing- I felt so proud of myself and every time I have made a video after that the feeling has been the same.
What I’ve been filming
Book reviews
I really wanted to be able to share reviews for fiction books I’ve been reading. I’m a little behind because I decided to finish the Anne of Green Gables series before making another one, but I can already tell I’m going to love sharing more.
I plan on making a video for each fiction series/ book that I finish.
My word of the year progress
My word for 2018 is bloom. I was inspired by this series from Blair Lamb‘s videos on her word of the year for 2017. I asked her if I could copy her format and she was super nice and said yes. Being able to share how I feel about being able to bloom where I am planted in Georgia has already been really relieving. I will always love writing, but I love how being able to video my thoughts on this really shares a different dimension of myself. And yes, I use my hands when I talk a lot and I easily cry.
This series comes out at the beginning of every month to show my progress and will finish up before 2019.
I decided to stop the video series because it felt SO personal!
Other future series…
Some ideas I am throwing around revolve around travel videos and doing videos of simple recipes that I have made. I’m open to other ideas!
What I’ve learned about making videos
- There are many times that I have recorded a video twice because it has been all over the place the first time. Now, before I begin my video, I use sticky notes and write out a general structure of what I am going to discuss.
- If I mess up, I make a long pause in my video with my speaking and then repeat what I was going to say. It is easy to find the mess up because the audio goes dead in the sound wave section of my video editor and it makes editing a lot faster.
- I allow myself to stop between sticky notes when I’m talking. Maybe some people can do a video in without any cuts, but I’m not one of those people and that is okay 🙂 . It helps me gather my thoughts again so I don’t ramble.
- I film in a room that has a north facing and a west facing window. I open the blinds and curtains so I can have natural light from both windows. I was only using one window in my first two videos until I figured out I should use both. This seems obvious, but I’m learning from the school of trial and error!
- I use the Movavi editing program which has been worth my investment.
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When everything is said and done though, I’m happy I just made this commitment to myself and have been making videos! I still have a lot to learn, but I’ve been enjoying sharing and people have been so supportive. While I may link to my youtube videos on here every once in a while, I probably won’t put them in a blog post unless they directly relate.