Video Production Tips And Tools For Professional Video Bloggers

Which camcorder is best when it comes to making videos for the web? What can you expect from the latest generation of digital camcorders that record on microscopic hard disks or on high-capacity SD memory cards? How good is the quality after you upload their videos to the Web?

While at LeWeb08, this past December, I run into two passionate video bloggers: Nicholas Charbonnier and Teemu Arina. Nicholas has actually a blog fully dedicated to video technologies at TechVideoBlog.com, while Teemu is a new media explorer who likes to explore and test out new ways for communicating and sharing valuable know-how.

I then suggested to them to try out a "collaborative" video interview, in which we would have shot each other simultaneously while sharing in turn some good tips and suggestions about video blogging. They did not need to be convinced and in a matter of seconds we were all ready to shoot while capturing each other answers from different angles.

As I reviewed later on this material, I realized that what our readers may have liked to know more about would have been actually the equipment that each one of us was using during the interview, as to get a little perspective on popular options among video bloggers while being able to also see the results that they produced.

And so, I got back to Teemu and Nicholas and asked them to share with me a bit more of their video shooting setup and the specifics of their video reporter toolkit.

In this video information report you can find both some useful tips for your video production as well as specifics about the camcorder models and brands and other accessories that the three of us typically use when shooting video for the web.

Video Production Tips and Tools

Duration: 6'

Full English Text Transcription

Intro

Allright, we're at LeWeb08 here in Paris.

I'm speaking in my microphone, and you have the microphone inside the camera, and we're doing a collaborative project, the first time in the world: we're going to speak with three cameras at the same time, and it's going to be totally crazy.

Here I'm interviewing Robin Good.

First time I saw you was in a live video on Mogulus. You were sitting and you were talking during the iPhone launch, I suppose. It was really good, really funny, and there was this crazy guy from Mogulus, in New York and he was doing live broadcasting and commenting.

What do you think about LeWeb?

You had this... presentation? A really cool presentation...

I'm making a video and putting it on techvideoblog.com, like TechCrunch, but with "videoblog" instead.

 

Robin Good: Be Invisible

Can I ask you Robin Good, what do you think about video and Internet please? What is your your best secret? What do you suggest people should do with video and Internet?

The thing that I suggest is to make yourself invisible. I think that is one of the best suggestions I've learned by doing video.

1. Use your camera always in a modality where people are not going to notice that you're shooting them.

   Do not hold it at high level, like you guys are doing right now, but hold it more down when pointing up to people.





2. Second thing: Close the f**, hem... close the nice lid where you have the video so the people don't think you're shooting because you're not looking inside.





3. Third and last one. Take some black tape and put it on the red light that you may have on your camera. If you don't have it you're a lucky guy, and if you do have it, just put some black tape on it, so they never can tell whether you're shooting or just trying out something.

 

Teemu Arina: Always Share

Let me ask myself now to Teemu Arina, what is his tip about video production that he wants to share with people that normally doesn't tell anyone?

I got interested in video production because of you. I was interested in this stuff and I'm giving presentations all the time. Over a hundred presentations last year and still giving them.

I like to share my presentations. My recommendation for everyone who's speaking at any venue (if it's five people, 50 people, 500 people, 5000 people, it doesn't matter), is to put your stuff out there. Record it, and just go on with it.

When you put it on the Internet people will find it. Some of my slide presentations for example, have been featured on SlideShare. They have been seen 25.000 times, and that's incredible compared to the audience who I gave those things in the first place.

Regarding the equipment, to make it more enjoyable for your friends, refer to MasterNewMedia.org, that's the best source for information. That was for me. Especially the tip on external microphone input. Thank you Robin.

 

Nicholas Charbonnier: Go HD

But I have here Nicholas Charbonnier.

Here you're displaying some nice equipment as well, so how did you get into the video camera stuff, shooting podcast in the first place. What have you learned?

First, I think that we need to change the media. It's getting boring.., the CNN, you watch one-minute CNN and then it's three-minute advertising. Come on!

I think people should film more videos in HD and put on YouTube. And I think YouTube should do a lot better work in doing voice recognition and putting subtitles automatically, and now the HD, that's really... whoa, it's cool!

I've been putting my videos in HD on Internet since 2005 on techvideoblog.com, but most people watch still YouTube because Google is...

...it's the preference

...yeah. I also put my videos on the other sites. I use Hey!Watch.com (in reality he meant to say Hey!Spread), and it just clones the video and it sends it to 50 different sites at the same time.

I'm just spamming the whole Internet with my videos, so when you search for a guy and I made the video, I'm first search result in the first page. It's YouTube and all the place. I don't get any money, but that's great.

That's the problem: they should really monetize. We are waiting for the monetization, we have cameras and where's the money?

Yes, and since this conference it's all about love, let's have our cameras make love to each other!

Bye-bye guys!

Video Toolkit Setup

Robin Good

Click on the camcorder to go to the technical specifications page on CNET Reviews

• Camcorder: Canon FS-100
• Lens: Canon
• Additional lens adapter: None
• Recording format: .MOD (= MPEG-2)
• Recording data rate: 9Mbps
• Microphone: External wireless Audio Technica ATR-288W
• Memory: Memory Card Transcend 8GB SDHC
• Additional Comments:

  The recording format of the Canon FS series is a little bit of a problem if you do not have any technical video expertise. The Canon FS series records in a strange file format with the extension .MOD. In reality this is just a MPEG-2 file. To make these video files work you simply need to rename them from .MOD to .MPG on a PC, or if you are on a new Mac iMovie 08 will just read them straight as they are with no problem.

  Battery time is excellent on the Canon and recharging it is also pretty fast.

 

Teemu Arina

Click on the camcorder to go to the technical specifications page on CNET Reviews

• Camcorder: Canon Vixia HG-21
• Lens: Canon
• Additional lens adapter: 0.5x wide angle lens (Japanese generic brand) + UV-filter
• Recording format: MPEG-4 AVC/H.264
• Recording data rate: 24Mbps
• Microphone: Directional Stereo Microphone Canon DM-100
• Memory: 120GB Internal HD
• Additional Comments:

  I also have two wireless microphones (AudioTechnica ATR288W) for interviews and I use a mini passive 2-channel mixer to record both in stereo, another speaker in left channel and another in right channel, helps a bit in the editing phase.

  If I have a fixed set, I will run the audio through a DBX 1066 Compressor and a mixer before entering my camera to make sure that levels are what they are supposed to be, in order to save time in editing (Levelator and what not).

 

Charbax

Click on the camcorder to go to the technical specifications page on CNET Reviews

• Camcorder: Sanyo Xacti VPC-HD1000
• Lens: Sanyo
• Additional lens adapter: Wide-angle Sanyo VPC-L07W
• Recording format: .MP4
• Recording data rate: 9Mbps MPEG-4 AVC/H.264
• Microphone: External wireless Azden WM-Pro
• Memory: Memory Card 16GB A-Data SDHC
• Additional Comments:

  There is a new better model of camcorder out that does 1080p instead of 1080i - the Sanyo HD1010.

  I do not recommend the Azden VW-Pro external wireless microphone, somehow I am getting a lot of interference on it, and I am currently looking for a better quality microphone system, or perhaps I just need to use another input volume setting or something to remove that interference.

  The memory card from A-data has SDHC compatibility issues with other of my devices, because it was too cheap when I bought it. But it works fine with the Sanyo HD1000. Though now you can get better Kingston, Transcend, and other brands of 16GB cards.

Compare Video Quality

Robin Good - Canon FS-100

Teemu Arina - Canon Vixia HG-21

Charbax - Sanyo Xacti VPC-HD1000

Additional Resources

The Ideal Camcorder For Small Independent Video-Makers: The Canon FS and HF Series - Wow!

How To Convert .MOD Video Files To MPEG-2 On Mac And PCs

Best Portable Wireless Microphone Kit For Your Video Production Needs: Robin Recommends

Originally prepared by Robin Good and Daniele Bazzano for MasterNewMedia and first published on February 2, 2009 as "Video Production Tips And Tools For Professional Video Bloggers".