Recording short videos for ecommerce

WHY VIDEO?

 

  • Communicates some things better
  • Preferred by some people over reading
  • Liked by google
  • Can be viewed on many devices including TV
  • Can be published on your site and many other platforms
  • Video is a persuasive medium

 

VIDEO FOR…?

 

  • Location
  • Process – timelapse
  • Brand story
  • Show the person/people
  • Show/demo the product
  • Event
  • Customer/product support
  • Testimonials
    • Social proof, reviews
    • Easy to buy fake reviews
    • How do we know its not fake? Video reviews
  • Promotional / advert

 

TIPS

 

  • Keep your hands close to your body for less shaking
  • Don’t jump into the video without thinking about it
  • You need to slow down
  • Tripod slows you down, frees your hands

 

SOUND

 

  • Half of the video is sound: microphone

 

VIDEO TYPES

 

  • Cut away
    • You can paste different videos on a main video (eg an interview)
    • You can also use photos as well. You can zoom in photos to give it a motion
    • You can cut away to photos

 

LENGTH

 

  • Brand story can be few minutes (someone interested would be viewing it)
  • Most other stuff 30-60 seconds
    • Most people won’t commit more than this duration

 

WHAT CAN BE IN VIDEO?

 

  • Camera video
  • Archive video (by you or someone else)
  • Stills
    • Photos, graphics, slides, diagrams, screenshots
    • You can do image search and filter it by image rights
    • License for reuse
  • Animation
    • Placeit
    • Keynote magic move
  • Screen recordings
    • Still capture
    • Or video capture Loom
  • Sound, voiceover, music

 

HOW TO BE BETTER THAN 99%

 

 

EQUIPMENT

 

  • Spaces and windows
  • Reflectors including mountboard
  • Tripods, including for phones and tablets
  • Microphone – Lavalier or “Lav” mike

 

STORYBOARDING

 

  • Even slight thinking before shooting, makes you better than 99% of videos

 

EDITING

 

  • Use a clap to sync multiple sound tracks and sync them
    • Like a Clapperboard

 

VIDEO FORMAT

 

  • Size 1920 x 1080 or 1080 square
  • File format: MP4 has become the modern standard
  • Compression format (or codec) H.264
  • Above combination suitable for all of FB, TW and IG
  • IG, TW – file size limits are 15 mb
  • IG 60 seconds, Google my business 30 sec
  • Use Youtube embed on website
    • Use rel=0 tag not to show related videos at the end

 

SERVING VIDEO

 

  • Video is large file size
  • Needs a host or content delivery network (CDN)
  • Some other website your video lives on
  • Eg Youtube, Vimeo, Wistia

 

MOVING THE CAMERA

 

  • By hand – with image stabilization
  • Optical image stabilisation is much superior – in 6S Plus, 7 onwards
  • Low cost dollies and gimbals for phones and tablets
  • Steadicam

 

WRAP UP

 

  • Everything takes too long
  • Throw almost all of what you shoot away
  • Less is more, cut before its gets slow
  • Rhythm, try to make your cuts regular
    • See music videos

 

Instructor:

https://www.davidjamesross.co.uk/