OTHER: YouTube Channel. Need Feedback On Overall Quality.

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sillygoboom

Active member
Hi everyone,
So I am currently working on a YouTube channel with my friend and I'm looking for feedback. Below is our most recent video (I'm the guy that shows up later in the video). Please let me know what you think about the color, sound, editing, lighting, set and anything else you would like to give your opinion on. I put everything together by myself so my hope is that it all comes across as professional. Thanks!

 
It would all fit right in with normal day-to-day YouTube content creation (that's a good thing).

My only one recommendation - which is a major pet peeve of mine - is when you're doing close-ups, maybe have a larger monitor around so you can see that you're focusing on the object rather than the background (person's shirt).

This is one of the most common mistakes in the history of video camera operation; accidentally missing focus because you can't see (manual focus) or AF instead focuses on the background object rather than the foreground one.
 
Hi, Gigi!

The first things I notice are that focus is mostly good (watch your closeups) and the lighting is bright and even. For this genre of YT video, fairly even lighting with just a touch of shadow actually works well for me as a viewer. And kudos for not falling into the trap of “we have to have a moody color wash glowing in the background”. The room is bright and happy. The background is well-dressed, too. My only comment there would be, if there’s space to do it, pull the table up a bit more to give some distance from the background. The shelves and the decor are just a little too close and remain a little too in-focus because of that.

Single camera with cropping in post, or multi-camera setup?

As for editing, I’m still not a fan of jump cuts in most cases, but I also acknowledge that they’re pretty much part of the style of these YT videos. I get it.

I’ve replied to your post in the sound forum, but just to reiterate: the single camera-mount mic isn’t ideal. It’s common for this kind of YT production, but still not something I enjoy listening to. It’s just a bit too “roomy”. And with two people at the table, one of them sounds closer to the mic than the other. Not sure exactly where/how you have the mic mounted and placed, but I really think something like a RØDE Wireless GO 2 kit may be a better bet.

You both have very colorful personalities, and that’s definitely a plus. I wish you all the best in building your YT audience!
 
Thanks for the feedback! Sadly, it's just one camera shooting at 4k, then downsized to 1080, that way I can do closeups and not lose quality. Right now, I basically autofocus on my friend's face when she's sitting in the correct position, and once focus is reached, I set the lens to manual since it's usually the two of us and I don't want the autofocus hunting all over the place since my friend Nour moves around A TON. Because of this, I am now working on getting a B cam soon but I can't afford another R5. I have to see what I can find that is a Canon and has c-log since all my lenses are Canon. It's super constricting to only have one camera for sure, specially when I want to do close-ups of products we are reviewing. I tried shooting the products individually first and inserting them later, but I really like the look of different cameras capturing at the same time so I don't think I have a choice but to get another camera. I've spent so much on this already though lol. My bank account hates me. Plus, who know if this will have any success? I don't know how much money I should be throwing at this. Thanks again for the feedback. I am totally in agreement.
 
Although what you're doing with focus is perfectly okay (especially since it's not that shallow), do keep in mind that you have one of the best DPAF cameras in the world, and it will not hunt at all when set to face-tracking or eye-tracking in such a simple setup.

If you ever wanted to shoot with more shallow DOF you should definitely give it a try.

Probably about half of this camera's sales are because of its video AF, ha.
 
Thanks a ton! Let me see how well I can reply:
- Thank you for the lighting and set comments. I had this idea in my head of a fun, bright, happy and somewhat fancy looking set to counter the fact that my friend and I act like we have no class. I'm glad that it translates well.
- Everything is done in my very small garage. I actually attached the lights to wall mounts recently because my friend kept tripping on the light stands and messing up the lighting lol. I can't really move anything anywhere at this point. I agree that the background would look nicer a little less in focus. I mean, that neon heart behind us being that in focus and showing it's defects drives me nuts. If it wasn't so in focus at least I could hide that. By the way, my lens is set to F4 so I could open it up more, but then I'm afraid that my friend might not be in focus because of her constant moving
- Editing-wise I completely understand. I do my best to make things flow without too many jump cuts. I love how I keep blaming my friend for things lol, but I have to heavily edit around her. By the way, she knows all this stuff. I'm not talking bad about her behind her back or anything. She's a handful.
- I will go check the sound section. The mic is placed above and in front of us at the moment. I do have a wireless movo kit with lavalier mics but I haven't really tried to use them yet. Honestly, they intimidate me a bit because I have never really used lavalier mics. Maybe I can try them for the next video. I for sure sound like I am shouting because I speak so loud. I have totally noticed. I did put a rug under the table and there are shelves on every wall and I even put a blackout curtain in front of the garage door, which has helped, but it does still sound roomy.

Thanks again for all the feedback!
 
I think part of my autofocus fear is because I'm actually a photographer. I studied video in college for a year and then switched majors to photo. My video knowledge is somewhat limited, so when I see the camera doing something funny I didn't ask it to do I immediately set everything to manual in order to not allow it to make any decisions for me lol. Perhaps I should trust it for at least one video and see how it goes. Maybe it will surprise me. It is a great camera after all.
 
Your fear is understandable and still shared by millions worldwide as big sensor video AF didn't really become totally reliable until about 2-3 years ago (with major advancements in 4K AF starting in 2016).
 
Lots of good feedback here. I'll just chime in and say I think overall your quality looks great, well done! :D

Nice bright lighting - a good high key feel. Clean sound. There is nothing at all distracting about this video. All of the advice here is good, and you can also breathe a deep breath and know that your average viewer will think this looks very nice, non distracting. I would focus on your content and growing viewership at this point, because that is what will ultimately grow your channel (and thus budget). I don't see anything here that makes me think "Fix this ASAP or you're going to limit viewership".

In service of maximizing quality, some things videos pros will notice have been mentioned and I will not repeat those but will simply add:

I can tell when you are cropping in for the zoom to save yourself a second camera, but mostly because I work in this stuff. Eventually you'll want a second camera or two for your close-ups to keep the quality up, but I don't think it's urgent. Only to say, I can tell because the quality drops a little and the crop in image looks flat compared to a true b-cam.

Next, it seems two things are happening. You may have a shallower DOF than ideal because you are so close to the backdrop and want that to appear blurred out, that it makes it difficult to keep in focus your main action. So for example at :14 the Keto box is slightly out of focus even though it can't be more than 12" at most in front of the subject. Problem is, if you stop down to increase DOF the background will get too in focus, right? So ideally you'd be able to pull the table out from the backdrop and stop down, in the end making the background more out of focus and giving a larger sweet spot for the items on the table and the talent. This may solve the focus issues mentioned above. I realize this might not be possible with your current set, and so if it's not, I wouldn't sweat it for now.

As well the image looks a little artificially sharpened, are you adding post sharpening or are these the stock camera settings? Are you adding digital sharpening to make up for being slightly soft in focus?

Little details with audio - at 2:05 I would turn down the volume on the mixing, it's uncomfortable.

As for sound, the good news as mentioned is it is clean and non-distracting. There is definitely room for improvement to get the sound less roomy, but I think you already have some help there.

Hey, all in all, great looking starting. You're already 80% of the way there to "Good+". All of these things will help bring your production value to the next level, but I don't think the lack of them will stop you from growing an audience. So have fun slowly improving production value and don't sweat the $$$, that will come as the channel grows. Content is king.

Good luck!
 
filmguy123,

Thanks! Yeah, I can tell when I crop in too, specially when I go past a certain percentage. Buying another camera is on my list for sure. I did try using my Canon 6D but it doesn't autofocus while shooting video or have clog so I had a hard time matching colors and focusing on things so I gave up on using it.

The video does have some sharpening on it. I looked up videos on the "best" settings and they said to set it to some number and that's what I did. I will lower it for the next video and see if that looks better!

About the sound, I actually thought about lowering the sound for that part because it goes on for way too long and people with headphones on might want to kill me. I wasn't sure though because I compressed all of the audio to be at the same level so I thought maybe it was just me being too picky. You are right though, it's a lot. I won't do that again I promise.

Thanks for all the feedback!
 
Hi everyone,
So I managed to move the table more. Does this look better now? I also tried the movo but I'm not so sure about the sound. Thoughts? Please ignore the fact that the lavalier isn't clipped on properly and that I am so shinny lol.

 
Addressed sound in the other thread.

That slight adjustment in distance from the background made a noticeable difference! Everything has a nice softness now: not in focus, but not too blurred. Good job!
 
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