{"id":6590,"date":"2014-10-06T00:01:14","date_gmt":"2014-10-06T07:01:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/?p=6590"},"modified":"2014-10-04T10:08:04","modified_gmt":"2014-10-04T17:08:04","slug":"how-to-shoot-video","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/?p=6590","title":{"rendered":"How to Shoot Video"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yes, your smartphone or tablet has the ability to record video. I describe how it works in my various Android For Dummies<\/em> books. What I don’t really do, but I’ll probably do from now on, is really tell you how<\/em> to shoot video.
\n
\nThere is a right and a wrong way to record “more than the moment.” Odds are that you probably don’t really know how to record a video. I went to school for such a thing. I sent my son to a school for such a thing. Yet, most people figure, “Heck! You just point the camera and tap the little red thingy.” That’s only partially correct.<\/p>\n

I’m sure you’ve seen the Badly Recorded Phone Video examples populating YouTube. Some of them are just unwatchable. That’s disappointing because they might show important events or things you really want to see. So, if you’re like me, you end up yelling at the monitor to “hold still” or “point the camera at the subject” or a few other things that make sense to me when watching a video but not to humanity while a video is being recorded.<\/p>\n

Enough ranting!<\/p>\n

Here are my tips:<\/p>\n

1.<\/strong> Start by setting the proper image quality, what you’d call “resolution” for taking a single-shot. For text messaging, use the lowest quality. For the Internet, use something higher, although the highest resolution isn’t necessary for uploading to the web. Directions for making the settings are found in my books, but you must set the quality before<\/em> you shoot.<\/p>\n

2.<\/strong> Hold the device so that you record the image horizontally, as shown in Figure 1. That means the wide part of the phone or tablet is held left-right not up-down. The reason for this orientation is that our eyes are left-right, not up-down. People want to see a video in a wide format, not a tall format.<\/p>\n

\"Figure

Figure 1. Proper video orientation.<\/p><\/div>\n

3.<\/strong> Keep the subject on the viewscreen. That sounds logical and seems simple, but it’s not. When you are looking at something spectacular or interesting, you desire to see it with your own eyes. So you’ll drop the phone or tablet to watch the event unfold. Avoid doing so! Keep your eyes on the viewscreen. Keep your arms holding the camera up. Watch the event on the viewscreen and keep the subject near the center.<\/p>\n

Good recording keeps the scene<\/em> centered, not the subject. You frame the subject, sometimes to the left or right of center, depending on what they’re doing, which direction they’re looking or heading, and what’s going on around them.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

4.<\/strong> Don’t jerk around the image; keep the phone or tablet steady. Don’t zoom in as it’s jarring and you’re physically unable to keep the camera steady enough to properly record a zoomed image.<\/p>\n

Fortunately a software solution exists to help you record video. It’s an app called Horizon. It keeps recorded video oriented to the horizon by using the device’s orientation technology. Behold the video below.<\/p>\n