in this video I'm going to go through and I'm going to help you make way better videos for 2022 by focusing on three key areas. I asked my viewers to send me their videos and about a thousand people applied and I actually downloaded some of their videos and put on my editing software and I'm going to try and edit their videos for you today live and to show you how to apply some of these three key areas. So we're really going to be focusing on a few three things. We're going to be focusing on showing, and this is the thing I think you really, really, really need to focus on in 2022 to make better videos, as as well as confidence, and I'm going to show you some editing tips to actually make you appear more confident on camera, and that's going to be really helpful for new creators too. And then I'm also going to focus quite heavily on planning because the amount of planning that I feel like creators should do to get the best content possible is quite a lot. So I'm going to talk you through how you can plan to make changes by showing you how to do it on other people's channels too. So let's dive in, shall we? So I'm just going to share my screen with you now. and we're going to look at this first channel here so this is one of the viewers that sent in their videos and it's called why humans hurt others i'm not going to focus on much but i'm going to talk about the problem that we have here so this is a channel with many subscribers 17 subscribers and they're new so they're getting used to making videos and as you can have a look what they're making actually looks pretty cool they've got a good look of you know the cinematography there's really slick and nice we're going to play the start of this clip and i'm going to see if you can actually work out what the problem is okay so here we go i'm going to play a few seconds so stick with it whatever they did to hurt you they didn't do it because they wanted to hurt you and to cause you suffering they did it for five key reasons. Number one, they did what they did to hurt you out of ignorance. That means that they were doing their best to do good in that. - Okay, so here's where we're gonna start. What I want you to focus on in your edit is confidence, all right? So when we're new to presenting, we're not necessarily ourselves on camera and I feel like this person is a confident person but there are certain things they're doing in the video which actually make them look a little evasive so this is the first thing to look out for in your content okay this moment right here do you see his eyes are just looking to the left as the transition ends now what what that is is without knowing it shady what do we do when we're not telling the truth we look away And the subtext, and without realizing it, people will actually pick up on that. And it kind of makes you look like a way less confident presenter. So it's an easy fix. All you needed to do is bring that transition in there a bit later. So one way of doing this on your edit is actually taking this first clip here, taking a screenshot of it and not cutting it. So one of the problems you have in your video here as well at the start is this clip doesn't appear for very long. Look, it's not long enough to go. There's no audio. You should be able to see in the waveform here. There's no sound at all. So we've got, you know, two seconds of dead air for people and that's going to put off your viewers. So I think what we want to do is actually look at bringing forward your narrative. If you really want to keep this quote, that's fine. So what we'll do is we'll cut this here. and then I'll get the spinning beach ball of doom. And then I'm going to expand the audio, and I'm just going to slide the audio underneath here, okay? So... Whatever they did to hurt you, they didn't do it because they wanted to hurt you and to cause... So there's this bit where it then cuts back. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to take another skit. I'm going to shorten this bit, and I'm going to bring in the audio, and then what we've got here is... There should be no transition. And we're in to the next clip. So let's have a look at that now. - Whatever they did to hurt you, they didn't do it because they wanted to hurt you and to cause you suffering. They did it for... - And then what we've got here is, you're still looking a little bit lacking in confidence. So we're going to address that again. You see, there's this subtle pause, okay? And it sort of slows down the pace. Now, this is not a video that needs crazy, crazy, crazy pace. So we just want to address this little gap here. and I think we find if I remove that... "cause you suffering they did it..." and what I'm going to do is quite cheeky here I'm going to detach the audio from this clip and then I'm going to slow this clip down a bit so it's b-roll and then I'm going to cut you from it completely "you would to cause you suffering they did it for And again, you're still looking down when the viewer comes back. So we've not got that kind of connection and it doesn't give you the confidence that we need. So I'm still going to look at covering you. And I think this is the point here where you actually need to be on camera. So there are these hesitations as well in your clip. And you can see there's this sort of gap between where you're speaking here and here. I'm going to get rid of that. I'm going to get rid of that and that. And then I'm probably just going to keep you covered up for a bit, or I would try and find some more B-roll to use. So I'm going to stretch this out a bit. And then I'm just going to plonk that under there, that under there. And this is where we want to come back to you. So let's watch that back now. Whatever they did to hurt you, they didn't do it because they wanted to hurt you and to cause you suffering. They did it for five key reasons. Number one. Now, can you see the difference there? Can you see the difference in the confidence and the pace? So we've come on and this guy is more confident. And then it's got this five key reasons which you've brought on. But then you look down. So again, I want to get rid of this look down, looking away from camera as you do this transition. It just doesn't make you feel particularly confident. So I'm going to cut, probably cut your audio out here. And then I'm going to do another cheeky little detach audio on this. I'm going to stretch this out, slow it down a bit. I'm going to pop it over the top if my audio wants to detach. So here we go. Let's go back and watch that again. Ready? Whatever they did to hurt you, they didn't do it because they wanted to hurt you and to cause you suffering. They did it for five key reasons. Number one... Sorry, I didn't do that quite right. So I'm going to position it here. So hopefully you can see the differences it's making. I'll show you before and after again to make it crystal clear. But I just want you covered as the eyes come down because we're going to lose that confidence. And you're a presenter, right? You're making a video called Why Humans Hurt Others. We need you to exude as much confidence as possible. So hopefully you don't mind watching this, but I'm just going to show you. the before, and I'm going to show you the after, and let me know in the comments if you can tell why this is making such a big difference. Okay, so this is the before again. Ready? It started. Whatever they did to hurt you, they didn't do it because they wanted to hurt you and to cause you suffering. They did it for five key reasons. Okay, so there we are. It's 13 seconds, all right? Now, I'm going to delete this clip. and I'll show you the version I've made cutting all of the pauses that were too long and removing any of the evasive eye movement. Remember they did to hurt you. They didn't do it because they wanted to hurt you and to cause you suffering. They did it for five So what I would do next in here is bring in a big number one because we've had to mash this up a little bit. But I just wanted to show you how much of a difference it could make just by removing pauses that are slightly too long and then covering this eye movement and I guarantee you if you're new to making videos what's going to happen is you're going to feel a bit nervous and you're going to want to look away and looking away is absolutely fine but when it's too quick it makes you look more nervous if you're going to look away make it really deliberate like I'm doing right now and then just come back to the camera and you'll start to look like a much more polished creator. So hopefully this is working. Let me know in the comments guys, if this is working for you, because I've never attempted to do this before. So I do really want to make sure that you're getting value. Otherwise I'm going to switch to plan B. So next up, what we're going to look at is showing, and I'm going to spend a lot of time here and showing is a big deal. So planning and showing all work together, right? So this is one of the channels that have actually sent in video and it's called learning curve tech. let me just get this channel up on my other screen and i'm going to share this with you so this guy's great i watched his video and i thought you know he's doing a really good job so we want to have a look at the first thing first now i'm going to address the thumbnail and title here i didn't want to spend too much time on this but i think it's important because i actually think your video is better than your thumbnail and your title and this is a really really big problem that creators have so The first thing I want to look at is this video is the video here. You see where it says "Please stop"? Let me just zoom in there for you. Okay, five things you should never do as an animator. And like I said, your content's good, right? So we need to make sure people see how good you are. So you've put "Please stop" in the thumbnail, and that's absolutely fine. The thing that kind of like, I'm not really loving about it is we need to show them something to stop. So have a think about one of the five things that you're doing in this video and if it's a common mistake that people make, maybe show it and put "don't do this" in the title. You know, actually point out something. And I've just been doing it in my thumbnails recently. Here we are, the Mr Beats one, still this and then this one here on Hylia. These two have just started to fly as a result of this. It's really just intriguing people, showing them something they do and telling them an instruction to do around it. And I think you're going to find your click-through rate will go up because right now there's a bit of a disconnect with your thumbnail. So let's have a look at a bit of this video. I'm going to play you the intro now and we're going to talk about And, you know, what we could do better here and how we could use showing to really take this to the next level. All right, so here we go. There are five things every amateur stop motion animator does that you should never do as an animator. These things will not only ruin your animations, they will also ruin the viewer's experience. And that's really bad because the whole point of animation is to get the viewer engaged with your story. Don't worry, these five things are actually really easy to fix with some extra effort and time. So let's get started. And fifth... I think we have to give it up for this. There was really, you know, there's quite a strong intro. I love your setup. You know, you're great on camera. I think you're doing great here. But one thing I really want to pull you up on is this. You start showing here. So let me explain what I mean by showing. If every time you are trying to communicate, if you're talking to camera like I am now, if you can think at the same time, how can I show this at the same time? So for example, if I was talking about how drinking water would make you healthier, I would maybe show a person drinking water over the top as B-roll. It really can be as simple as that. But having that extra layer just sucks people into the content. And what happened on your video here is you've started doing it, but it came in too late. This intro needed a little bit more. So, you get to the problem here, and then if we go back, there's one section I want to delete, and this isn't necessarily so much to do about showing, but I think you give too much information, and I'm like, yeah, let me get into your video, but you sort of say some stuff that stops us getting in. And I'm going to play this section here. And that's really bad, because the whole point of animation is to get the viewer engaged with your story. So don't worry, these five things are actually really easy to fix with some extra effort and time. So let's get... I don't think we need to tell the viewer they're going to be easy because we haven't led to that in the title. Five easy things an animator should never do. So I actually think, although it's not harmful, it is getting in the way of what they came for. So let's get rid of that. And I think we'll find it gets you to the information that we want to see quicker. So let me just make sure I haven't done a dodgy cut there. To get the viewer engaged with your story. So let's get started. In fifth place, we have the moving... There we are. So it worked. So if you ever saw the interview of me and Hillya, this is Hillya's tip. You know, if... If there's a bit of information and the bit before it and the bit after it, if you can delete the bit in the middle and it still flows just as well, that bit of information wasn't needed. And that's really, really, really tough to recognise because we always want to explain. And one of the things that makes that tougher is we're often thinking about our avatars. So I think, you know, the persona, the type of people we're making content for. And I think what you've done here is you've probably thought this is for beginners and you wanted to reassure them it's for beginners. But I just don't think that step was needed. So let's go back to showing now and see what we can do to sort of show and suck viewers in. There are five things every amateur stop-motion animator does that you should never do as an animator. These things will not... Okay, so we don't have to have anything visually there, but I think after that point, let's just start showing them some things that will intrigue them. So we don't have to say they're not things they shouldn't do, but maybe let's go look at your B-roll that you've got up here. And I'm gonna steal that, and then I'm gonna steal... What else have we got in your footage that we can... Okay, I'm maybe gonna steal this bit here. Sorry, my editing software is probably gonna lag a bit because I've got so much going on on this computer. And then what else have we got? Okay, so that's cool. We can put two and two together there. You'll see where I'm going with this soon. And let's just do a simple... Drop this at the start. Alright, so think of the context of this video. You've set... This intro's been set up as these are five things you shouldn't do. Let's start showing them some stuff. Let's not say they're not things they shouldn't do, but let's maybe let them fill in the blanks and think, oh, okay, what's he doing there that I shouldn't do? Just to create some intrigue with your B-roll. So I'm just going to line this up really simply. It's not going to be the most polished edit in the world, this, obviously, because I can't spend hours adjusting everything as minute detail as I usually would. I'm just going to watch that back now, okay? There are five things every amateur stop-motion animator does that you should never do as an animator. These things will not only ruin your anima- Sorry, I put that too far away. I'm gonna go from here again. - Never do as an animator. These things will not only ruin your animations, they will also ruin the viewer's experience. And that's really bad because the whole point of animation is to get the viewer engaged. - Do you see that? So what we've done there is you're talking about these, you know, you're saying these things. - These things will not only ruin your animations, they will-- will not only ruin your animation, what we're showing is you doing things. So the viewer's going to be thinking, "Why would that ruin my animation?" And at that point, this comes in. So they're going to put two and two together, you know, the light flickering. is gonna cause this impact. So you're showing them some problems and you're creating a little bit of anticipation there and then it jumps back in. It's to get the viewer engaged with your story. So let's get started. Okay, so you're talking about getting the viewer engaged with your story. So I think we could actually keep the B-roll going and show. So it's like, okay, maybe this clip here would be a good example. So let's think, we're thinking about storytelling, okay? - Animation is to get the viewer engaged with your story. So let's get started. - Okay, so do you know what I like about this? You say engaged and then look at your expression. The focus on your face, it's almost telling a little story and showing engagement. So I'm actually gonna swap this round. and I'm going to tell a different story where we don't actually know what you're focusing on and then it's revealed that you're focusing on some stop motion there. So think of this with your b-roll, like it doesn't matter if there's two or three clips, every little bit of b-roll you want to try and tell a little story. So look, this is the beginning and this is the end of the story. It'd be cool if we had something in the middle. So I'm just going to fly back to the beginning now and we're going to watch this bit again. In fact... Let me do a before and after so we can see how this works. So this is the original, which was still good. There were five things every amateur stop-motion animator does that you should never do as an animator. These things will not only ruin your animations, they will also ruin the viewer's experience. And that's really bad because the whole point of animation is to get the viewer engaged with your story. Don't worry, these five things are actually really easy to fix with some extra effort and time. So let's get started. Okay, so let's get started. That's where we went to. And then what we've done is, remember, we've cut some bits out and we've just thought about how we can create anticipation and show people potentially things they shouldn't do. Here we go. There are five things every amateur stop motion animator does that you should never do as an animator. These things will not only ruin your animations, they will also ruin the viewer's experience. And that's really bad because the whole point of animation is to get the viewer engaged with your story. So let's get started. In fifth place, we have the movie... Okay, so I let the beer run a little bit there. But in an ideal world, I think what I would want to come is get back to you when you say, "Let's get started." So I'm probably going to cut this clip down a tad because I want to come back to you as you say, "Let's get started." because it's like, you know, it's geeing people up. So... Alright, but then the problem we have there is that little cut was a bit too short. So actually, let's go back to what I had, let's keep that covered. And then I think... Now, what you've done here is great, right? So you've got the moving set. Now I don't know if this is wrong or right but it's what I do and it's what I find impactful. So we've got this intro, it's got great energy to it, it's got some b-roll that's showing what's coming. I think what we need to do is kind of let people know the video's started some way. Using text like this on this kind of video is absolutely fine, but I often like to just fill the screen to let them know that it's the first step. Again, this is just a preference, but I just thought I'd show you one thing because we want to make, you know, the step super obvious to people. Now, I'm going to do my best to kind of use your text, if I can find it. Doesn't want to work. There we are. So, What you've done as well is you've gone from the fifth, you've gone backwards, so 0.54321. That's fine. So what was your point? Let's have a look. The moving set. Okay, just going to type that in. So what is the moving set? Is there anything we could put in this image to show it? Okay, just to give a glimpse to let them know that visually, this is a mistake before we dive into why to again, think about that anticipation. So I'm guessing the moving set is you moving stuff. I'm not sure. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to try and use a sound effects here to bring on the text. So bear with me one second. It might not work this but I just want it to sort of let people know that it's like "Boof, we're in!" Let's see if I can find it. I'm not sure where my explosion sound effects have gone. Here we are. Two over the top, two over the top. Sorry if these are really loud. Let me just try and bring one in and I'll drop it down a bit and we'll see how we can get it to work. So I think in an ideal world what I'd like you to show is the moving set. Get your b-roll to show this. I'm just using a blank text slate. But I think it should overpower the screen at the moment. I think this is a chance to show people what's coming. Fifth place we have the moving set. This one is very- Okay, this is not gonna work. But let me just listen to your music. Very common in beginner animations. But it is also very common- Okay, fine, so you've still got the music coming on there. So what I was hoping for was kind of like a crescendo where the intro's built up and then it's like bang into the content, but I think that explosion didn't quite work. So if this is the moving set... what we would have a look at is something like this. I don't know if that's the moving set, but just show the problem. And then that lets them know what's going on, and then it's back to you. And then you're off, and you're in, and then you start to show, and that's brilliant. But you want to bring that element in early, because these intros are the things that kind of kill, like, everything, right? So, let's try and check out the next channel. Let me just find out who that was. Okay, this one's a travel vlog. So something slightly different here. I'm just gonna stretch this out to make sure that I didn't delete anything. So what we're going to look at again here is a show rather than tell. and also timing and pacing. Now, you as a creator are going to know your content better than me. And I have to admit, in the past I've been wrong. When people have shown montages, I've said, "Get rid of it. Your viewers are not going to want to sit and watch that in the intro." And then we've looked at their data and they've watched the whole thing. So I would assume that anything that doesn't give your vlog a bit of momentum might cause damage. But this video in particular, the creator needs to go and look and see if there's a dip in their attention on this video. So I'm going to go back and I'm going to share my editing screen. I'm just going to play this clip for you, a little bit of the intro and see if you can pick up the problems that I'm going to address and then I'm going to try and fix them. And this is going to make the video so much better and flow better, I think. In this cave is Cornwall's famous Holy Well and in this video I'm going to show you how to find it. Tell you what, it is actually very hot for November. What a beautiful day. Okay, so we're going to go back to the avatars here. This is what I always start with, really thinking about your viewers. So this is the channel. This is how to find the Holywell Cave at Holywell Bay Cornwall. And let's have a look at the channel in particular. So this is the video here. Okay, so the thumbnail is pretty cool. You know, I think that's kind of working in that you're showing... Let me just zoom in a bit for you. What you do is you're showing the thing that the people might be interested in. You've got a map telling a story and you put like found it, which kind of works. So I'm not going to go into too much detail on your thumbnail. But if we have a look at the rest of your channel, what have we got? OK, we've got like van life content and it's a channel from the looks of it that is just dedicated to Cornwall. So who are the people that are going to come to this channel? The people that are going to come to this channel are either tourists or nationally or internationally and you're probably going to find they like active sports, they like the whole van life, windsurfing, beaches, that's what Cornwall's all about and actually I can't quite believe what I'm seeing here, I had no idea Cornwall looked so cool, I kind of want to go and that's really important what I've just said, okay? So that's kind of the goal for your channel, right? It's to give people wanderlust over Cornwall to make people interested in traveling and look and go wow let's go there but not only that to live vicariously through you and that's often what travel vlogs do and it's the same for motorbike channels So when I used to ride a motorbike, if I couldn't ride my bike, I was watching people ride it. And it's weird. I'd just sit there watching them ride around because it was the closest I could get. And that's what you're going to be doing here too, is people who love travel and adventure, when they can't, they're going to want to watch this sort of content. So we have to really think, what do we need to show them? How do we take them on this adventure with us and show them the things that they really want to see? And I think that's a great way to think. So when you're planning your content, and you've got a video like 'How to find the Holywell Cave' the first thing you need to do is kind of show them the cave like you did in your thumbnail and your video but then we need to think about, okay, what happens from then on. So I'm going to go back and have a little bit of an edit of your video. Now the first thing I'm going to fix is this and like I said do not take my word for this you need to check this for yourself but I think this section of the video you're not talking and you've got this little intro stinger and I would say either get rid of it or keep it flowing but at the same time if we just think about what i've said and actually viewers of this channel really just want to try and get as close as they can to experiencing cornwall on a nice sunny day they might actually really enjoy that slow pace so check your attention graph but one quick way to fix this is to just simply cut when you stop um talking Which is here. There. Alright. I don't want to lose that scene. I think it's nice. So, I'm going to cut there. And then I'm going to come to you talking. There, you see, I tell you what. And what I'm going to do is, I think... What you're saying is it's a beautiful day. So let's just bring that audio right to the start. So we don't have any silence and it runs like this because you're basically saying it's a beautiful day and they can see that. So let's have a look and see how that works. In this cave is Cornwall's famous Holy Well. And in this video, I'm going to show you how to find it. I'll tell you what, it is actually very hot for November. So I think we just leave a little bit more of a gap just to let the song come in. I'll tell you what, it is actually very hot for November. What a beautiful day. Just a little pointer if you are coming down here to find the Holy Well. Okay, so of course one issue there, what we have is you have the music going on. So what you would do is you would have brought the music along here and just faded it out to about this point. But what happens is it keeps the narrative flowing. You've got the narrative going on here, the story's going on, there's no sort of respite at the start, which is often what works for YouTube videos, and then you're in. And then the most important thing is, and this is so important for your channel, is just like show, show, show. You know, you really want to be showing them these scenes, and these images are hooks. They're visual hooks for people who are interested in going to Cornwall. I mean if I was planning a holiday down there and I saw this this would almost this would almost sell me on going and I probably want to watch more of your content as a as a result of it so it really is a simple case of just showing rather than telling again so let's see if there's anything else we can do to this video to maybe bring it up a notch I'm going to watch a little bit more I'm just going to undo what I've done and go from here just a little pointer if you are if you are coming down here to find the hook okay so we don't Just a little pointer and then you have this stumble. I don't think we need that stumble. Again, it's that confidence thing. And I'm all for being authentic, you know, and being yourself. But I felt like that kind of threw me a little bit. So let's just cut it out. Let's cut out the if you. Now it's a little bit jumpy, I would polish this a bit more but... Just a little pointer if you are coming down here to find the Holy Well. If you're a National Trust member there is a National Trust car park here. I mean you can use it if you're not a National Trust member but obviously if you are it's free. Okay, cool. All right. So just looking out for little things like that. That wasn't the most polished edit I did, but it's a case of going, all right, these guys want to get to the story. They want to know about how to find the cave. You give them some information about parking, which as a Brit, I appreciate. I don't know if everyone around the world would, but it's usually like, oh, is there parking? We get pretty frustrated. So I'm just going to watch on a little bit more to see if there's anything else. that we can do if you are coming down here to find the holy well if you're a national trust member there is a national trust car park okay so this video is about finding the holy well and you said if you're coming down here to find it let's just delete that because the the video is about the well it's kind of irrelevant whether or not they're coming down or not you know they're watching this video because they want to find the well so let's not talk about things that aren't relevant A little pointer, if you're a National Trust member there is a National Trust car park here. I mean you can use it if you're not a National Trust member but obviously if you are it's free. Okay so we've got this kind of like nice montage again which I think works and again look at your attention if it's dipping here bring in the narrative sooner. But you're doing a nice job of like using b-roll to tell a bit of a story here and to show what's going on. I'm just going to go back to the narrative to see if there's anything else we can show but I think otherwise you've done quite a good job here. It's kind of always a bit of a catch-22 when it comes to National Trust because yes, I don't have to pay. I'm a National Trust member. But at the same time, they don't let you fly drones. So during this journey to go and find the Holy Well, I was hoping to sort of show you via aerial shots, but maybe I'll just... Okay, again, we don't necessarily need that. It's nice that you've mentioned that you wanted to up the quality. It is getting... I want to see the well. I want to see your adventure. So I'd potentially consider cutting that. Which, to be honest, is probably a blessing in disguise today because it is pretty windy. Like, really windy. Okay, so, you know, it's not inoffensive or not, but if your retention graph's dipping, I'd probably get rid of it. and then it's back to montage so we kind of have this whole section that you know it's personal so i feel like if you had a you know return viewers who are really into what you had to say they'd stick around for that but i also think maybe a colder viewer who had found you in search might not tolerate that that's actually something that's worth talking about so you know youtube's looking at your content um and judging it based on you know it expects return viewers to have better attention um And really what you want to think about is, is this video for my community or am I expecting it to get pushed out to more people? And that will dictate the sort of information you leave in, because as a fan, I'd probably sit and listen to you. As someone cold, I'm brutal. I'm like, no, give me what I want. And then I'd leave. So I can get rid of that whole section, I think, too. Let's move on to the next video and let's have a look and see what we've got here. OK, so this one is a vintage lens shootout. So let me get the channel up for you guys. All right. So this is a photography channel. And let me see if I can just find the video to have a quick look at the thumbnail. Maybe it's not there. Let's go to most popular. Okay. Let's not worry about that. Let's have a quick look at the video intro and see how we can start showing, not telling. Now, one thing I want you to do when you watch this back is to think about how you would show the things that he is talking about. Okay. Okay. Because the more you start looking at how creators do show rather than just sit there and say stuff, the better you're going to get at using it in your own content. Okay. If you asked me, vintage glass is the best glass. And in today's video, we are going to be testing and pitting these two wonderful vintage lenses against each other. In a true shootout style, we're going to test this Canon 55mm. Oh, sorry, guys. I just realized I haven't changed the screen for you. Let me go back and start that again for you. If you asked me vintage glass is the best glass and in today's video we are going to be testing and pitting these two wonderful vintage lenses against each other. In a true shootout style we're going to test this Canon 55 millimeter f 1.2 OK, cool. All right. So that's interesting, the gunshot. It was a little bit aggressive. I don't know if you guys heard it. And if we look at the waveform here, which is basically where you can see the sound waves, you can see there's that big spike. But I think it was a little bit too jolting. So just bring the sound down on that a little bit. But let's just address this intro and let's think about showing because it's going to make such a better introduction. Now, the first thing you say is this. If you asked me, vintage glass is the best glass. OK. So... The video itself is called Vintage Lens Shootout. So you've given an opinion there, which is fine, but we want a bit more. How can we show that? How can we prove your point visually? In today's video. So I think what you want to be looking at here is show this and get a camera, the same camera, and just take a picture of exactly the same scene. and then split screen it and on the left have the vintage glass and on the right have the non-vintage glass and just show it prove your point in an instant let them visually side with you because some people might be new to this and if you think about your avatars like who's watching this they could be in the buying process of going do I want to go vintage or do I want to go modern I'm not sure so maybe that would as an opportunity to win them over so they go oh yeah I see what he means no one's ever done a split screen lab before and show me exactly the thing that he's talking about Vintage glass is the best glass and in today's video we are going to be testing and pitting these two wonderful vintage lenses against each other. Okay so what I would like to see here, this is cool, you say you know we're going to be pitting these vintage glasses against each other. This is where you need to bring in some b-roll. Oh this looks fun. Okay you know maybe bring some of this fun stuff forward. So Let's take this moment... I love it when people do fun stuff on green screen. Especially when it's kind of weird. It's definitely my kind of channel. So I'm just going to steal this bit. Let's have a listen. Okay, that... That's perfect. So let's try and bring that in a bit closer to let them know that there's some fun coming. We are going to be testing and pitting these two wonderful vintage lenses against each other. Okay, so maybe that was an opportunity just there to have a bit of fun with this. So let's have a look and see what we've got. This might be a bit too random, but we'll see if it works. I'm just going to time it so it goes as you finish talking. So let's see if this works, shall we? Again, it's bringing this B-roll in. It's not quite showing, but I'm going to give it a try. Okay, we need to show the glass we're talking about, so that is important. Okay, we do need to keep that on screen, so that's my mistake. Vintage lenses against each other. Okay, I'm going to keep that because I want to show you the lenses. Let's just see if it works. Vintage lenses against each other. In a true sh... So what we would have done there is, I think you could have brought that in sooner. But what we really need to show is some action shots of you. So maybe that didn't quite work. I think you could, if I had the full timeline, I think I could get it working. But I think what we wanna go and look at is some of these funky shots here. This is looking pretty cool. Show you some action shots. Let people know that this isn't just a talking head video. You know, you've gone further as quick as you can. So I'm gonna retry. And that's one of the things about editing. You try stuff. If your idea doesn't quite work, you try something else. So let's see what else we've got. Turn this sound down. Ah this is cool. Look at that drone. Why are we not getting that in earlier? Yes, love it. What else have we got here? Okay cool. So we've got some comparison shots. Maybe let's try that. Bring that in because again we're showing here. You're saying we're going to do this. Let's show them as quick as we can and And I know having done these, I know having watched these videos, I want to see this sort of info quick. So that to me is a real good shot because you're flicking through the lenses. So again, it's thinking about your avatar. What do they want to see quick when they turn up? So we're talking about pitting these two lenses against each other. I'm going to delete the western bit for now. And then let's just have a listen to the next bit and see how we can use this B-roll. Rocker glass are 55mm. If you ask me, vintage glass is the best glass. So we could maybe use that. to show that example, but I feel like my first idea would work better. And in today's video, we are going to be testing and pitting these two... Okay. So I think I would have changed the script here slightly. Or if I could change the script to fit my editing, then that would be more helpful. But I'm just trying to find how I can get this b-roll in. Because we kind of need to see, because you're saying these two, so I can't be off-camera. when you're talking about that. So maybe I could use Canon... Let's have a look. Just turn this down so it doesn't annoy you guys. Let's see if we can find a clip in here that actually shows what I'm talking about. Yes, there's the change. So there's the... is that the 50? Okay, so you're pitting these two lenses. So we can show that because you actually got this later in the clip. Best Glass and in today's video we are going to be testing testing and pitting these two wonderful so let's bring in a bit of action so there's a bit of movement these two wonderful vintage and then bring in this bit to show the comparison wonderful vintage lenses against each other so we've seen the comparison there so Testing and pitting these two wonderful vintage lenses against each other. In a true shootout style, we're going to test this Canon. And then we could probably bring in some more of this stuff to keep the story going. But again, you've referenced the lens there. So it's like, okay, we kind of need to jump back on screen when we see that. In a true shootout style, we're going to test this Canon. I need to show you doing the shootout because you said in the true shootout style I'm not sure the drone shot is quite working so maybe we can start on the close show you doing a shootout on one of them. Unfortunately you're talking to camera there so maybe we could just show a bit of the lens. shootout style, we're going to test this Canon. Okay, so we'd have to play around with that, but I feel like you've got the B-roll there. And then you're talking about the Canon. So again, what's more useful to your viewers? Showing the action scene of the lens or you holding it? Both kind of work, but what I'd like to have seen would have been testing the Canon. A U of a shot with it, maybe one split screen, and then the result we've had on the other side. So if we say... and we could probably build that now quite quickly but this is this is the process I go through with every video like you know look at especially the intro it's like trying to make every second count so this is the canon and what I'm going to do is I'm going to layer these guys up and I'm going to split screen them so I'm going to keep that in there I don't know if that's the canon apologies if it's not we're going to show that and then we're going to show this again show I'm going to say that many times so we can see now What's a little bit confusing is I'm going to split the screen not quite in half because it doesn't work but can you see the split screen because of the colours it's kind of blending in so I'm just going to really divide them now with just a bit of white and I'm going to crop it to make this little line. It's just going to make it look that little bit more obvious that it's a split screen comparison. It's just a bit grey, so let's make it bright white. There we are. Okay, so let's see how I can fit this in with the story now. The beach ball of doom stops. So I'm going to delete that for a sec. Back to where I was, I can't find my place. Okay, so this cannon. Let's cover you up whilst you say it. Let's show a bit of the result. Here we are. I don't know how much clip we've got. I'm just going to make that a split screen so that I can control, sorry, a still shot so I can control how long it lasts. Ready? Okay, so the control's got to go. And then another thing I'm just going to do is I'm going to make this what's called a compound clip. And then I'm going to add a little bit of movement because it's a little bit static, right? So you can see on the left, what you've got is that there's subtle subtle movement but it's kind of a dull image at the moment it looks like a picture so let's just make it slightly move and i think what we have here if the beach ball stops spinning there we are this cannon 55 millimeter now what i've done here is a bit of a rookie mistake okay so when you're adding this effect it's called a ken burns effect You don't need to zoom in too fast. Think about the pace of your video, right? And what information on the screen is important. So actually what's important here is this, and we don't want that to go out of screen, and we also don't want it to feel like it's moving too fast because it kind of ruins the pace. So I'll show you what I mean here, right? So check out this slower pan. 55mm f/1.5. It's so subtle. I'd probably go just a tad faster. But what I would do is, and this is one of the annoying things when you start doing this, just a little bit faster, but I would make sure that that text wasn't going off screen. So we'll see if that works. 55mm f1.2. See that? Now if I make that fast, like faster, watch this. It's going to ruin it. So, look, it goes everywhere. But I see this a lot on YouTube. People pan too quick. 55mm f1.2. Maybe it wasn't too bad. But that's the sort of thing to think about. It's like what you've done is a good job. You've done a good job of just using it as a prop. And I love props. I think they're useful. But I think your audience are creative. They're artistic. It's the same as mine. You need to inspire them. And you've done that so well here with all this creative stuff. you need to ask yourself why wasn't that sooner and then really focus on this intro you've almost done the the exact opposite and made the the rest of the video you know put the ton of effort into let's bring that bit forward so hopefully guys you guys in the chat box let me know if this is helpful and you're enjoying this and hopefully i'll have a little bit of time to do some questions so don't fire them in yet i will uh i will get around to that and then we're going to move on to the next video to check out what have we got here um I think it was this one. Okay, so this is actually an educational video. Again, this is like a sewing video. And we want to be looking at showing. Now, this lady shows the whole way through. But we have to think about the type of person she's making this content for. So let me just get their channel up so I can share this with you. Okay, so this is their channel. And let's have a look at the homepage. All right. So Crafts Unleashed by Robin. It's a crafts channel. These channels get massive. It's a cool niche to be in. And I can see you're really hammering Christmas right now, which makes total sense because of the time of the year. So this thing about your avatars is like, who are you making this content for? Now, I don't have your data, but I'm going to assume you're not making videos for 20 year olds. I think you're making videos for either much younger or older. So maybe mothers, grandparents who are looking to make their home look cool this Christmas. That's just a guess. I might be wrong. But we're going to edit that with that in mind. So I'm going to show you what happens when you edit for someone like me who is not your target audience. And basically that's what you've done, but I'll show you why it's a problem. So this section in the video, you're listing these items. Okay. I'm just going to play it to you. Let's dive right in and make a candy cane gnome. What you're going to need is some yarn or a mop head, whatever you choose to use. Okay. So that's it, right? The first time I watched this, even though you picked it up and showed it to the camera, I was looking at your screen going, what's the mop head? What's yarn? And you list everything, right? But the thing is, and this is why avatars are so important, is if you're talking to the very, very beginners, if you're thinking, I want to make this to inspire people to start from fresh, which I don't think you are, you've got to be super duper duper obvious, right? And I think just labelling this image would have made it way more helpful for me. So a bit of text there, right? There's my text. I'm going to keep this super simple. So this is yarn. And always think about this, especially you educators. Even though you might not make videos for, you know, people who are completely new to it, a quick way to keep them engaged and not really offend you know, people who know what they're talking about and actually make it more engaging for them too, is just to put this, number one, yarn. So it's like an ingredients book, right? And we can make that really simple, you know, I think because of the busy background, we've got to really think about making sure this text sticks out. I'm going to make it capitals. And we could just, you know, if we really wanted to, we could do that. I don't think that's the right style. So here you could use something called a lower third. So lower thirds you'll find in your editing software a lot and often they bring on people's names but we could use it here just to itemise what's on screen so nobody feels left out. So this is an example I have in my software and that's not particularly great because you can't read it on the busier background and there's nothing wrong with having a busier background it's just any text might get lost on it so we need something to frame the text or make it stick out so something like this might work. So it's got up to here type in I'm going to get rid of that. I'm going to keep it super simple. I don't like this text. Let's just do that for now. Really basic. But for any of you guys who are like me and... I have no idea what's going on with anything craftsy. Just adding this might be enough to let us know and not feel kind of like silly. So there we go. What you're going to need is some yarn or a mop head, whatever. And then it's simply just a case of listing stuff. Just use some fabric, felt. Okay, so fabric and felt. So we could just put that in. So I'm being really like, you know, like I said, I'm not your avatar. I just wanted to show you what can happen when you maybe don't forget, you know, you forget about beginners, if they are your market. If beginners aren't your market, do not worry. Hopefully that little spinning beach ball go. There we are. Whatever you choose to use, some fabric, felt, and one of the Dollar Tree Santa hat. Okay, and you just do that. Now, it's not the slickest looking design that I've done, but basically it's just, you know, making sure that... Even the silliest of people like myself understand. And then what happens is you jump in. So here we go. You go into your content. This is step one. The first thing you're going to want to do is take all the tinsel off and then using a pair of wire cutters or utility scissors cut off. OK, so in terms of chaptering your content, you haven't used the chapters. but another suggestion I'd make is think about how people are going to watch this right they're not going to they're going to pause it a lot they're going to go back and forth so we want to make this as easy for them to get back you know to the start of a section as possible so YouTube chapters might come in really handy another way is just to do you know again what I said earlier is just make these big text chapters so people can flick back and go oh I know I was on section one or two um I know I was on section one or two. So the first section is this. The first thing you're going to want to do is take all the tinsel off. Okay, so the first step is... This is a set of instructions, right? So let's make it easy for them. And one, I'm not sure how you spell tinsel. I'm just going to keep this super basic. And what I want to do is I want to show them what you're talking about. So again, someone like me, I'm thinking... what's the tinsel? Because in my head tinsel is not what I can see that you're doing. So I'm just going to take a still here and I'm going to put it underneath. I'm going to... that's not the best still. I kind of want to visually show them in the chapter what it is you're about to do before you do it. So there. Again it'd be nice if you had like a close of you cutting you know to show this up close which we've not got. So... We could like bring this up a bit. It's too hard to see this because the footage has blurred. But in an ideal world, you'd have a nice crisp shot there of some tinsel getting cut off. And again, we need to make this text stand out from the background because when you plonk it on like that, it doesn't really work. You know, it's too, it's not clear enough. So things like drop shadows, if you ever have them in your software, bring the opacity up, you know, we can see that sticking out a little bit more or put a little bit of a box around it. something super simple you could put in, let's just use a, this is going to look a bit ugly but it's going to help prove my point. So let's get rid of that bottom bit. All right so it's like, like I said, I don't, I've already run out of time to make this look incredible. because you guys will get bored but it's just like a little text chapter we could have a little arrow or something pointing to the scissors that might make it you know obvious that there's this action going on again you don't have to do this I just find it helpful for learning stuff when we chapter stuff in the same way like you know books have chapters I find educational content when it's broken up into sections more digestible let's you know put a little arrow in there Again, it's not the best looking. Let's just watch that back. So this is like step one we're going through. The thing you're going to want to do is take all the tinsel off and then using a pair of wires... Okay, so let's bring that in a bit earlier. And then before, really simple. Remember that movement I added? Because it's a bit static and a bit boring. Let's just do a slight zoom in. What you want to do is take all the tinsel off and then using a pair of... and then come back. Now in an ideal world this would be video, you just have this really crystal clear so you know if you could get the camera and have a close an angle change that would be great and a really easy way to do this is actually if you have like a GoPro or something you put it on the other side you could potentially then have two angles quite easily and then you can move around and it's going to make your tutorial easier for people to follow because in the edit you're going to go okay what's the best angle that is going to capture this to make it clear to lots of people on different levels So there we are. And that's as simple as it. It's just a case of adding chapters. So it's not a case of, you know, doing anything too over the top with this. And actually, when I watched the tutorial, you know, I was following it. You spoke nice and slow. But I thought you could just help people a little bit by pointing out objects, make them really, really obvious, even if it seems like it's kind of dumb. And then, yeah, break it up into different sections and so on. So look, I'm going to head to the questions now and I'm going to take some questions from you guys because I know there's lots of people in there asking questions. So fire away. I'm going to answer questions that are not specifically about your channel. So if you ask me what do I do for, you know, how do I solve this problem for my channel? You know, who are my avatars? You know, how do I make my videos better? Can't really answer that in a question. Anything else, just go for it. and I'll wait because there's a slight delay on the stream. What could make all of this much easier is pre-planning. That's what someone said straight away. And yeah, that's kind of it. So if I'm planning my videos, and I kind of have to do a lot of planning because, let's see if this doesn't crash my computer. If you guys saw the video I did about MrBeastReacts, I'll show you every second where I'm like, show, show, show. This is my timeline. If it loads. It might not load because I deleted all the... the render files what editing software is this is final cut pro so the reason i like final cut pro is if anyone is um used to imovie this is the next logical step up you just buy it once that's it you don't have to pay for it again it's always updating it's quick and i actually tried adobe and i found that adobe almost had more than i needed and i know as a editor i do a heck of a lot of you know, stuff in my edits, but I just found Final Cut suited me. So I do recommend it. Anyway, this is the Mr. Beast timeline. So you can see the effort I'm putting into every second to just show something, show what I'm talking about, back up what's being said, tell a story. Remember what I said about earlier when you use B-roll? It's like, how can you make your B-roll tell a little story? Here's the beginning, the middle. I'm watching Mr. Beast, you know, he's in the middle of my story. And then that's kind of just the end bit and it works with the narrative I'm talking about. So let's go and look at some more questions that you guys have got talking about here. Where do you get your music and stock photos? So I started using Envato Elements. And I'd say for smaller channels, it's a good option 'cause you can get video, stock video footage, templates, Music, pretty much everything for like $14 a month. Otherwise for years I've used Shutterstock for photos, which is like 140 pound a month. And it's, you know, it's quite a lot for just pictures. Storyblocks is fantastic for stock footage. I think there's a link. If you go on the tools I use page, there'll be a link in the description that shows you all the stuff I use. Storyblocks has a ton and ton of variation for editing. And I think it's important for YouTubers to get stock footage because it can help them tell stories if they don't want to film it themselves. Let's go for a few more questions. Why do YouTube videos suddenly drop? There's so many reasons for that. Let's have a look and see if we've got any questions about production itself. Okay, so for a fitness video, yoga, any suggestions on... Oh, I can notice the screen. There we are. How I can make videos more interesting. I just have two camera angles. So my girlfriend's a yoga... influencer and this is something that we work on with her if you go and check out her channel it's live in leggings she uses b-roll so it's always always showing in fact i can show you this let me just hop on her channel and uh let's uh let's give you some examples of now unfortunately it isn't she's very up for making youtube content doesn't have quite the same kind of like love for youtube as me because she's an instagrammer but let me see if i can show you this video This is her yoga channel. And this was a simple talking head video. So this is her using stock footage that's not my girlfriend. Can you hear that as well? Let me just see if I can turn that up for you and we can go from the start. But she's using storytelling, okay? So this is called How to Become... Are You Advanced Enough to Become a Yoga Teacher? And she starts off with a humorous story. And it was at that moment, as her toes touched the laptop screen, that she knew she was ready to become a yoga teacher. Give me a break. You're probably wondering if you're good enough at yoga to take a yoga teacher training. Maybe you think you need to be able to do that. So in this video, I'm going to answer that question and give you five concepts to consider to help you decide if you are suitable to take a 200 hour yoga teacher training. - Okay, so you get the gist, right? But look at her content. She's talking, talking, stock footage, talking, talking, talking. And then she starts to use more stock footage and then you know there's a bit of a gag here in the middle let's have a listen to that sheet okay so it's the same sort of principles apply to all types of content and again b-roll okay So, you know, let's just get on with all that on our own. So, you know, think about how can you shoot B-roll to tell the story? The title is "I Wish I'd Known This Before Yoga Training" and she goes back to her, you know, she tells a very quick five second video about, you know, how she felt, a common misconception that the viewers will also be feeling too. And then it's into the content, scattered in with some more B-roll. So, it works in every niche, this. And if you just have two camera angles, just have one, you're making your life harder there, you can jump back and forwards between, you can jump back and forwards between, you know, you can do a jump on this, so you know, I could do, if I can get this up on here, I can zoom out, I can zoom in, and do a cut there, you know, the next bit there, the next bit there, it makes it feel like you've got two cameras, right? So I think what I would do is put the effort into trying to shoot your own B-roll that brings your information and story to life. Okay, hopefully that was useful. See what else we've got. What's something you can do to increase your personality in your video performance? There's so much to do. There's so much so much you can do to do this. One big part of it is practice. Now what I'd advise you is if you don't like being on camera and everybody hates the sound of their voice when they start is film yourself just doing the same line multiple times. So let me see if I can open up a a doc and show you what I mean and I'll read a line from one of my scripts and I'll read it in different ways so that you can see how much of a difference emphasis on points makes. Spare me one second, just gonna get a script up. So maybe I'll use the scripts on the video I did about MrBeast. If I can find it. Okay, I've not got that but I've got a script here. This was one about how not to be another boring YouTuber. So I'll give you some examples of how emphasis can work. Let me just read this. Okay, so the line here is, let me share my screen with you, this one here, alright? So let me try this, right? And the first weapon they pull out in battle is to show, not tell. Alright, that's one way of doing it. Now look, I've put capital SHOW, so this is where we're going to throw loads of emphasis. And this is going to make you feel like there's more personality and you're more passionate. And the first weapon they pull out in battle is to show, not tell. okay you see the difference so what you want to look at is look at your script or your intro or just write a sentence and try and find different words to put emphasis on and different ways to use pauses and just film yourself do loads you don't have to show anyone this and give it energy and then pick words and emphasize them so let's see if we can find there this one he could have stood there and ranted about how youtubers always talk about how kit doesn't matter or i could put emphasis on like he could he could have stood that went wrong he could have stood there and ranted about how youtubers always talk about how kit doesn't matter so again i've gone up so it's really a case of just playing with words and and trying different things and what happens is over time you get used to this and you build up practice so if you have a script like i do I kind of know where to put emphasis as I'm going along, but I think you don't really know until you've practiced doing it. And I think that's one of the things that makes creators better on camera is they suddenly understand what words to put emphasis on and then how to like bring their voice up a tone and then down a tone. So if it's serious, we start talking like this, but if we want energy, we get really excited. And that to me is kind of what it's all about. All right. So let's see if we've got another question I can fire to. How do we know what to keep and what to throw away when editing an unscripted video with 30 minutes of entertainment and you want it to be 5-10 minutes of video? How do you know what the best parts are? So I would plan. So I'm going to do a vlog soon and I've planned the whole thing. Now, it might not turn out like I planned but I kind of know the story I want to tell and I want to know the journey I want to take people on. So you've gone and done that, you should be thinking before you edit, what's the story in this? What's the hook? Because there could be multiple ways that you could go. And you might find that one direction is more impactful to the viewer than the other. So the video that I made about monetization, where I monetized this channel quite fast, at one point in that video was about how upset I was that this other channel was growing faster than the one I put so much effort into over the years. And that was the story it was going to take, the story of how some niches are just a lot harder than others to grow in. They're all hard, trust me. But But at the end, I was like, actually, the cool story of this is certainly not that. It's depressing. Don't tell that story. Sorry, my earphone just fell out. So you need to plan the journey of it. And I think if you just line everything up and then go, what do I cut out and keep cutting bits out? You're never really telling a story. So plan. and then think "alright, what's the best content in this?" to tell that story that I think is in it and get kind and the best parts can be anything and that's the thing about editing you can make the worst part the best part if you want you can go to town on a section and pump up the pace, use music, throw in text, graphics and make a really boring thing quite exceptional So that is an element of practice and practice, practice, practice. Look at your attention, see where people drop off and you'll start to learn kind of like what is the best bit to your viewer. Any books you'd recommend to content creators? Yes, Dara Lee's YouTube formula. I think you should read that a lot. 100%. This is an interesting one. Any suggestions for a tech channel? Yes. So there's a little trick. If you've got some money, you can buy some tech. You can review it and you can potentially take it back. Now, don't damage it, but I know that there's some tech channels out there who basically do that and they have a pot of money. They buy the stuff, they send it back until they get to the point where those brands are going to you know, work with them. Now at the end of the day you might go, "Well that's a little bit dishonest" but you know, they're reviewing these products, they're doing them a service and it's kind of how the industry works. How are people supposed to get into tech reviews if they can't afford it? So you know, at the end of the day, no harm done as far as I'm concerned as long as you're not damaging it. How many views is good for a first video in a hyper niche with no audience? It's an interesting question. So we really have to get out of the habit of caring about view numbers and start thinking about how they're relevant to us. So I'm constantly getting messages like "Ah, when you hit 1000 subscribers" and it's kind of sad because I know half of my subscribers have quit YouTube so they don't really mean anything because the amount of people who come on YouTube, they quit. So I'm really interested in viewers but at the same time, you know, what's the point of the viewer? It's great that you can have all these views but if you get one view and that person becomes a client or buys something of yours or, you know, struck up a partnership that changes your life Well that was a good view amount! So think about the goals for yourself, don't worry about other people and then work out how many views you need to achieve that. So if there's no audience, and there's no audience at all, which would be very surprising on YouTube, then you might not get any views. But what you might have to look at is find where else your audience are hanging out and you might have to start making content similar to the sort of stuff they watch and introduce them to your ideas and your theories. Okay, let's see what else we got. Any advice for script writing, especially the intro? So I usually write a few versions of my intro and you know what, I'm not that great at them I find it a lot easier to help people with their intros than write my own and what I do is I write it and then I write another version and I'm like which one works better and then I usually just go away for a day just to let it sit and then I'll come back and say Okay, it's kind of like clear what will suddenly be worth cutting out of it to make it shorter and more impactful. So that time away is quite good. So I'd say that like write a few, put it down, come back another day and you have this clarity and then you can suddenly start to see things that might slow down and get in the way. But otherwise, you know, you don't want backstory you just need to think about your title and how you can quickly let people know they're in the right place as well as hook them and it's a real art and it's one of the hardest things on youtube and i think you know most creators struggle with them after thumbnails and titles i think the intro is definitely the hardest bit so there's a lot of practice and then measuring look at your drop off and if you can get the drop off two percent less than the previous video then that script did better so it's like how do i improve on that okay so let's see what else we've got there Sorry, there was a lot of chat in the comments today. Is using Beamer more effective than stock footage? That's a good question. Yes and no. It depends how you use it. So you could potentially get away with stock forever. What I found is that when I started recording my own, it enabled me to tell stories that stock can't tell. So you're constantly reliant on a bank. And although places like Storyblocks have tons of you know, and tons of content they're putting in, it's always going to limit you. And what I would say is, if you are using stock footage, don't just stop at the stock footage. Look at how you can make their stock footage better. So keep editing it, use sound effects, add animations, add text to that, and build up on what they've given you. And I do find there's a bit of a disconnect. You can often tell it's stock. So, and that's not a problem, but... I think if you can film your own, that's fine, but it takes a lot of time and honestly, I hate filming. I hate filming myself. It takes me ages, the setup, it's frustrating, the batteries go. My cameras have been broken for ages. They've been running off the mains. There's wires everywhere. Sometimes I think, can't I just do this in stock? But I do think filming it yourself is more beneficial. This is an interesting question. Why don't you plug your personal social media? I just don't like social media. It's tough because you have to kind of use it for business, but I just don't feel good when I go on it. TikTok's fun, but YouTube's the only platform that you know, I generally love coming on and I try my best with the community wall to keep that. I wish YouTube would make the community more of a thing because I'd like to put more out but right now I'm not willing to do something I don't like doing. So I do have social media, I'm just not really on it for Film Booth. So this is a good question: for review style channels that are mainly faceless, would you say that doing voiceover is better than recording the sound during filming? So it's a tough one. I would think about your process. Now I think I would personally just film it and not give myself something extra to worry about with sound whilst I'm filming because you've got the mic, the camera, you might have lights, there's more things to play with. And then just like, you know, that's my voiceover mic, go and record that and then line it up in the edit and I think what you'll end up is a slicker product and you'll probably get less frustrated too depending on the setup but at the same time it is quicker to try and do it all at once but you know I think if you can get a nice voiceover mic that are not particularly expensive it's always going to sound a bit better than you know one that's not as good which probably sounds obvious So that's how I would do it. There's no right or wrong way and it kind of depends on the content. So if your reviews are very long and you're kind of giving detailed, you know, really detailed descriptions, they might not want tons of editing. They might need talking through every element. But otherwise, give it a try doing it, your voiceover separately and see which one works. And that's kind of the thing with YouTube. You've really got to try stuff and find what works for you. So let's find the next question. Someone says "I missed the name of the book" It's "The YouTube Formula" by Derral Eves Derral's like Neo from The Matrix but for YouTube He just sort of sees YouTube in binary code and totally gets it and is a very very clever man I'd totally recommend his book, it will transform your opinion on YouTube So what else have we got in the questions? How do you narrow down your avatars? I've been working on some for my channel and I'm still miles away from the details you've shown. So I've never shown you my avatars. What I've shown you is a mock-up of my avatars that wasn't real. So all the videos where I show clips of my avatars, that's not actually my avatar sheet. I never said it was. I just wanted to give a quick glimpse as to what the process looks like. But it's not my kind of official process that. There's parts of it there. So look, what I would say is you don't make up an avatar in the same way as you discover it. So you kind of have to have a rough idea as to who your viewers are. And then over time, you learn from data and mistakes as to what they like. Now, I'm actually currently writing, I've just written 10,000 words on this. because I've got a workshop coming on avatars. So I can't give too much away. But what I would say is the best way to learn is not to ask your viewers and to work out how to give them stuff they want but don't know they need. and when you make content always always analyze your click-through rate and your attention especially your click-through rate because that's going to tell you what your audience if they cared about what you're making and you can actually tick things off your list and go that didn't work they're not interested in that so my avatar does not care about either this thumbnail title or topic and then you might have to make a video again knock out one of them and go okay the thumbnail might be working but the title and topic didn't and so on so it's a long process but one that you build up over time So let's just keep going down the questions. I've got another sort of 10 minutes for you guys. Okay, I'm just going. There's a lot of questions. I appreciate you guys turning up today. There's a lot of spam as well. This is making it harder to find these questions. Oh, this is a good question. So what's your opinion about showing the final result of a video for a couple of seconds at the beginning as a hook? Um... So another creator that I've had on the show, James Kelly, has had this problem where he does these sort of videos about making product commercials and for him, he was like, if I show it early, they leave. That's the thing they've come for. So you kind of have to test it. You need to do a few different ones and see what works best. Now you want anticipation at the start. You could potentially use your thumbnail to create that anticipation and show the result. So if you did my thumbnail workshop, you'll know about the comparison thumbnail. This is the idea of showing befores and afters. So you could tease the end result in your thumbnail or just show the end result in your thumbnail and let them know that's what's coming. But what you want them to do really is to understand how do I get there? And it's kind of like the transformation process and the step-by-steps to get there that should interest them. If for some reason they just care visually about the end and seeing that, they can always skip. and go there. So have a look at your data and see if people are skipping to a certain point where they're just seeing the reveal. You might be like, "Okay, let's bring it further forward, and let's try putting it in the middle. Let's try and turn it into a story." But it's your job to keep them interested. So even if they want to leave, you know, and you figure that actually they do leave after they've seen this, you kind of want to be looking at going, what can I do to keep them in? How can I turn this into a story where once they've seen the result, I'm actually making them think there's more to this. You know, something unexpected happens. You drop a hint that actually this result was not that easy to get and all of these things went wrong and that becomes the thing of interest. So unfortunately, again, it's trying things out and making mistakes. And that's what's so frustrating about YouTube. It's been ages on a video, but, and for myself, you know, I look at videos that I made a couple of weeks ago and now I see the glaringly obvious problems with them as to why retention dipped in certain places. But I'm like, okay, I won't do that again. I'll just keep getting better. So that's what you've got to do too. Do you prepare thumbnails yourself? I spend two hours a week with my thumbnail coach on the strategy of thumbnails. There's a video coming about this because it's pretty cool what's happening. And I'm just going to keep trying to make them better and better. I'm not particularly happy with them right now. But yes, I use Photoshop. And it's tricky Photoshop, it's very good value, it's very powerful, but you're only going to use like 2% of what it's capable of. Now I think it's something creators should learn, but at the same time if you don't have time, hand it over to a thumbnail designer. What you need to think about is the strategy. It's way more important than design. It's like 80% strategy thumbnails, 20% design. So you need to be passing people over. You need to spend lots of time on like how am I going to get people to click, and then you could pass that over to the designer, or you then use software like Photoshop. When you say to have a common theme like yours, I think what you mean is mine have like different colours and text. So again, in my thumbnail workshop, link in the description, it covers all of this. And it's kind of like, you don't have to keep everything the same, you know, a bit of branded text on every video will help build that over time. And this kind of like common theme doesn't really become apparent to people until they start seeing more of your content and they've seen a few videos, you know, and they start seeing them pop down the side. So they start to recognise fonts, even just the style of a photo like Matt D'Avella, you recognize, even if he's not in it, you know it's his video from the way that he color grades his images and that's how you have to think about, you know, what's going to work for the content telling your story and how you can come up with a theme that works for you to your best ability. Do you script your entire video? I'll show you my scripts if you want. Let me show you my Mr. Beast script. So yeah, I script absolutely everything. I'm not good enough in terms of riffing. I find it hard to articulate things. So, you know, if I don't write my scripts, I can't I can't make content good and I honestly don't think there's a person in the world who won't make better videos without writing. Some niches maybe they can't, you know, they have to get a, they have to wing but you should 100% be writing at least your intros because otherwise if you're just on the fly what you do is you repeat all the time and your script has a chance just to edit that down. So here's my MrBeast script. and this has got editing notes this has got voiceover different colors represent different things and then i'm talking about certain things in there too i've written a version of that that doesn't have all that mumbo jumbo on it which looks like this but yeah i've deleted the um i've deleted the intro of this video i wrote multiple versions but every second is planned and then what i do is in the edit i um I then edit it down more because I find it hard to edit my scripts so that they flow as a video. So often they're 12 minutes long and I usually cut out a few minutes in the editing process because I haven't realised there's repetition and things that need to go. So the way I look at it, it's like writing gives you a chance to edit. You know, you film and you're saying it out loud and I use a teleprompter. So I'm just basically like presenting what's on the screen in front of me. And what that enables me to do is to not worry about what I'm saying. I can just trust that it's down. And one of the biggest problems that people come up with is that they, up against is they when they're new especially they get foggy head it's like what do I say I've got these three points but I can't talk and what what why is that going on like this should be easy and then they get flustered and frustrated if you write your script and you have it in front of you you don't have to worry about that you just focus on the things like emphasis like I showed you earlier and it's it took so much strain off me now people always go I don't I don't want to do a teleprompter because I'll be reading it's like well you might to start but practice and then do it bit by bit so I only record a couple of sentences then I stop or I make a mistake usually and then roll it back and go again or I might be like I can do that line with more energy or maybe I'll try that line with more emphasis so having a script enables you to relax more edit more get more creative there's not a chance in hell I'd be able to do half of this stuff if I didn't plan it and write it before and then in the edit I still edit it back so I'm a massive advocate of a script of course if you're like a fly on the wall vlog it's not quite the same but there's still a lot of planning that you could do Okay, so let's see if there's any more questions. How would you get things like B-roll in gaming videos, if that makes sense? Well, you kind of are. Like, the whole game is the B-roll. You could potentially, you know, what could be fun is if you make a joke or something goes wrong, you've actually got a camera set up with you playing it, and it cuts to you, like a look on your face, like, oh my gosh, I can't believe how stupid that was, or celebrating, and you could try experiment. And it would be interesting to see, because so many gaming channels are reliant on their gaming content, but just to cut back and meet the creator you know imagine FIFA it cuts to you everyone's high-fiving when you scored a goal you're celebrating I think that would be pretty cool but at the same time people tend to have their you know their clips down here in the corner which do that so I think gaming channels they all kind of copy each other in terms of that a lot of them rely on b-roll and fast editing a lot of them rely on the game itself which is fine but I'd love to see a gaming channel who broke out of that and showed the gaming but then cut back to real life to enhance their storytelling every now and then. But just experiment. Don't try and make this whole entire video where there's loads of stuff going on. I think Just think, okay, maybe I'm just going to try one bit of my video and I'm going to bring in some more creative B-roll where I'm filming and then go and look at the retention graph and see if the drop-off was less on that point. And then build up your confidence because if you try and jump in and make the whole video crazy, you end up spending weeks on it like me. And I can do it because one of my videos takes me two weeks to make. which is annoying, but you know, if I got experience doing it and it probably take me months to make without that experience. So you have to kind of build that up. Let's see what else we got here. Is 30% audience retention okay? Audience retention is really kind of tricky to measure. What happens is when you release your video, it goes out to your community first. They're generally likely to watch your video for longer, so you might find your retention is higher. Then as it gets more impressions and YouTube tests it with more people, that could dip. I've got videos that have done amazing with like some of my lowest retention but it's only low because YouTube's given it so many impressions and tested it with people who maybe shouldn't have seen it and new people who hadn't seen me before so they didn't want to stick around in the same way that the return viewers want to stick around. So you have to take retention with a pinch of salt. and actually you need to establish what's good for your channel not you know i would say 30 you know mr b says you need 70 or 80 so 30 would be bad but at the end of the day i've seen channels with 25 do well so it's kind of like niche dependent and also i think what you want to look at is go okay my best ever video retention is 30 what do i need to do to get my next video to 31 what do i need to then get my next video to 32 and once you've made you know if you can do that for like 30 videos you're gonna have epic retention but that should be the goal so don't worry about your retention in terms of other people just worry about it in terms of yourself because you're only fighting against yourself okay let's just fly in um what else have we got this is interesting let me just resize this makes you uh makes me feel so much better about my own weaknesses knowing some of the things that bother you are the same yet your content is that i'm good really inspiring i'm rubbish at a lot of stuff like it shouldn't take me two weeks to do what i do and I struggle with writing I really struggle with taking my idea and turning it into something creative um I'm not very I'm you know my attention's awful so I'm constantly scattering around the place when I'm editing trying you know suddenly I'm looking at emails so there's tons I do really bad and you know I end up doing what I do and it shouldn't take me as long I think I should be able to do it in half the time if I was more focused I had better processes you saw my script That's not a very well-written script in terms of giving notes to an editor. So I think we've all got weaknesses. No one is the best. And really, to become an amazing YouTuber, you need a team of people because it's so big. And I'm constantly looking at what I do thinking, I can do this better. I can do this easier. And there's certain elements I don't enjoy. So I think we've all got stuff. that we have to get better at it's just taking the time and patience to get better at them and realize you know what it is that you're not particularly good at but i don't think anyone's perfect uh there's a question here should i go back through my videos that are not performing and retitle re-optimize the description just leave them and redo a new version why re do this uh so i guess redo the description so why would you do that um do you mean the title like the Like, the description just helps let YouTube categorize stuff. If your video's not performing, it's not because of the description. It's because it needs better attention and better click-through rates. And, you know, you don't have seen videos do amazing without a description. The description's kind of metadata. It just helps YouTube categorize what your video's about. But YouTube analyzes every second of your content. It reads the text on the thumbnail. It even knows where photos are taken on thumbnails and will put it on a map. If you look at Google's Cloud Vision, that will actually show you the AI that's analysing your content. And then it's reading your script and it's also looking at your B-roll. So if you've got a picture, if I hold up a plant, the AI is going, there's a plant in this, maybe it's about gardening. If it keeps popping up, it categorises content like that. So your title is super important. But really, after that, three lines written naturally with some keywords in are kind of not just shoved in like spam. That's enough. I don't think redoing descriptions is going to help much you need to work on that retention and click-through rate and I don't know if I'd redo them I'd look at your thumbnails go and find the problem go and look at them and be like why is this in the traffic source I want this to perform in why is this not doing well and it'll be your retention or click-through rate that's really holding it back so I hope that helps is it true algorithm doesn't really pick you up to your 90 of no so you can blow up on YouTube in one video I've seen it happen. Paddy Galloway is a great example. You guys all know him. He's done like 30 videos and his last video got like a million views in three days. It's just incredible. The reason people say you need to make 100 videos is because you need to get good at making content. If you're good at making content already, then that is half the battle. And then if you understand how to position your content so people click on it, that's another battle. And I think they say 100 videos because that's maybe how long it takes for you to start to understand how YouTube works. But at the same time, you know, if I started a channel from scratch now, I wouldn't make all the mistakes that I made before. You know, I've done my 100 videos and I'm pretty certain, in fact I did, I can get the algorithm to pick me up almost instantly. So don't think of the algorithm as something that doesn't, you know, just looking for people who have done a certain amount of videos. They're looking for quality content and that's down to thumbnails, you know, click-through rates and retention. Okay guys, thank you very much for coming. Let me know in the comments if just seeing behind the scenes of editing is helpful. I never really know. I try these things and, you know, I've found that working one-on-one with my clients, actually editing their videos in front of them and undoing old mistakes on their content has actually probably been the most beneficial teaching I've ever done. So, you know, if it works on a live stream, let us know. Otherwise, thank you very much for your time as always. I really appreciate the support and I will see you another time. I'm quite excited about my next video. Hopefully I'll get it out in the next couple of weeks. Take care, guys.