April 18, 2025 • 22 mins
This week Helen breaks down why video formatting is essential for engagement across platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube. She walks through editing basics in CapCut, sharing how to fix common issues like black bars, wrong aspect ratios, and poor layout.
✂️ Key Takeaways:
- Set your aspect ratio first! Use the correct format (like vertical for TikTok/IG Reels) to avoid black bars.
- CapCut Tips: How the first clip sets the project shape, using overlays, resizing content, and adding backgrounds.
- Zoom to Social: Transform horizontal Zoom recordings into vertical, polished content using backgrounds and auto background removal (paid feature).
- Viewer Experience: Avoid overly sped-up clips, chaotic visuals, and cluttered scenes—keep your content clean, focused, and pleasant to watch.
🧠 This Week's Challenge: Self-assessment!
- Review your own videos: Are there formatting mistakes? Are you overusing speed-ups or visuals?
- Scroll your feed: Spot poorly formatted videos and reflect on how they impact your viewing experience.
- Share your reflections: What did you notice, and what will you do differently?
🎯 Goal: Become a more intentional content creator by understanding the impact of formatting on engagement and viewer comfort.
Let me know if you'd like a version for social media captions or email blasts too!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Helen (00:00):
Welcome to The Socialize Strategy, your favorite social
(00:03):
media podcast of the week,right? I sure hope so. Anyway, I
am back and I want to talk aboutvlogging and creative styles of
vlogging. But before I get intoit, I have a little treat for
you. At the beginning of thepodcast, I'm going to start off
with Unsponsored Buy.
And that is a new littlesection, which is only a minute
(00:23):
or two, where I'm going to talkabout one of my favorite
favorite products. And whetherit's because I was introduced to
it by receiving free product,which is what happened today, or
something that I've been usingfor years, each week I'm going
pick something and tell you alittle bit about it and why I
like it. Because I feel that Idon't get to share a lot of my,
I guess, influencer type thingsbecause I don't do that kind of
(00:46):
content. And so I decided, youknow what? This is my platform.
Let's go for it. So today, I'mgonna talk about BeautyStat
because I just received thisfrom the founder of the brand
who reached out to me on TikTokand said, I'd like to send you
some products. We've beenfollowing each other for years.
He is a chemist, a cosmeticchemist, and he used to be a
beauty blogger. His name is RonRobinson.
(01:09):
He was a beauty blogger. He'dalready worked for brands like
Clinique for years as a as acosmetic scientist. And so he
has all the information. Andwhen he started his blog, he was
highlight and he was also asocial media agency, and he was
highlighting other brands. So Idon't know.
You can read about it when hedecided to launch his own brand,
(01:30):
but here we are and he sent methese products. And so I tried
different products through, youknow, through time. I've tried
different brands that were sentto me especially when I had
cancer and people were sendingme things. And I'm really liking
this one. So I want to talkabout it.
First of all, the cleanser, it'slike a pea sized amount, creamy,
smooth, and I even take it inthe shower now and I use it like
(01:53):
I use it on my chest. It is areally, really nice cleanser. I
love it. The second thing thatI'm loving is this Universal C
Skin Refiner because it has thatsmooth it almost feels like it's
filling in the lines when itwhen you put it on and it's got
that silky feel to it. I I don'tI only know one other brand that
(02:13):
I've ever tried that has that inin a sunscreen.
And this is the first time I'veever seen it in a moisturizer or
felt it in a moisturizermoisturizer. I really, really
like it. Also, the peptidewrinkle moisturizer for at
night, and these are tripleaction daily peels. When I read
the instructions, it said thisone might feel a little tingly,
(02:34):
and I didn't experience thatwith this, but I do get a little
tingle sensation with the skinrefiner. But anyway, loving the
brand.
So if you haven't tried it, Iwould say it's it's worth a look
see. And I'm going talk aboutsome of my other favorite skin
skin care brands as we moveforward. But I just really like
that one. So today is BeautyStat Day. Alright.
Let's move on to the topic ofthe newsletter and I'm gonna
(02:57):
talk to you a little bit aboutwhy I picked this topic for this
week and the things that I'mdoing in the studio are always
somewhat reflective of thethings that I share in the
newsletter. But in the studio,we really get into it in a more
lesson savvy way. So I'm puttingspecific lessons up about
things, and I'm really gettinginto the details of commenting
(03:20):
on everybody's videos and givingthem specific directions. So
it's a bit more of hand holdingthat happens in there versus me
just telling you the informationhere and then you go off and
either you figure it out or whoknows what happens. So that's
what I really love about thestudio.
I'm feeling a back and forth, agive and a take, and I'm really
enjoying it in there. And whatwe're doing this week was
(03:41):
talking about formatting and howto make your videos YouTube
friendly and then also back tosocial media friendly and back
and forth. So if this doesinterest you and you wanna try
the studio for seven days, youcan get the benefit of those
lessons and those lives andthen, you know, you can decide
to stay or not stay, but everyweek is a really fun topic and I
(04:01):
already have the topic pickedfor next week. So buckle up
everybody. If you're my studiopeople, you're gonna love that
one and we have a new studioplatform.
We're over at Mighty and it'svery user friendly. It's so easy
to find what you need, show upfor the events, see the chat, be
in the chat, and see whateverybody's talking about. It's
it's a lot of fun. Okay. Let'sget into tips for creative
(04:24):
vlogging.
I always think of vlogging aseverybody has their own style of
doing it. And most people thinkvlogging is come with me for a
day in the life or get readywith me for blah blah blah.
That's only one small piece ofvlogging in my opinion. So I'm
gonna say that you can have yourown style of vlogging, and I'm
(04:45):
gonna tell you what mine is, andit's in here in a little bit
more depth. But my style ofvlogging tends to be more doing
a music video where I show theevents of a day and I show it
through music and titles.
And that is still vlogging. Soeven though I'm not talking
through it, it's still a way ofvlogging. It's a creative style
of vlogging. So I'm gonna startfrom the beginning and say,
(05:07):
okay, where do you start? If youare somebody who is just like, I
don't even know how I don't evenknow how to vlog.
Like, take me back tokindergarten vlogging. And the
idea of a vlog is to film clipsof your day that you then string
together and you record shortclips. And as you put that
together, that becomes a day inthe life, a story of the day in
(05:28):
your life, a story of an eventthat you attended. So it's a
little think of it as aminiature storybook about
whatever that is. So that's whyGet Ready With Me is a very
traditional style of a vlogbecause it's like telling
someone to come along with me asI get ready.
But other styles of vlogs mightbe, today I went to Union Square
and they were having Earth Day.So that could be considered a
(05:50):
vlog when I share the clips ofwhat I experienced at Union
Square during Earth Day. So avlog can be about your day. It
can be about a portion of yourday. It can be about an event.
It it just it's just a story.That's what you've got to think
about as when you think of theword vlog. So that way you don't
get caught up in it has to be mefilming all day long to create a
(06:11):
vlog. And that seems a littledaunting sometimes to people
because they know they're gonnaget involved in the thing that
they're doing and they're gonnaforget to film the clips. So we
have lots of tips for how to dovlogging that I've already
shared in the studio, how tosuccessfully do that.
So if you're interested in that,you can do a seven day trial in
the studio and go watch thevlogging lesson. But the idea is
(06:31):
to record either record yourvoice over first or shoot all
your clips first. It's up to youhow you want to do it. A lot of
times having the voice over isreally good to have it first
because then you know what clipsyou want to shoot. Okay?
But often you go through thecourse of a day and things
happen that you didn't expect.So then you'll have to revise
(06:53):
your voice over. So they so alot most people maybe like to
record at the end after they doall the events, make a list of
all the things they did thatthey want included, and then
record the voice over. But stillto me, recording the voice over
before you start editing isstill a better strategy. And it
may not be the popular strategybecause a lot of people like to
(07:13):
string all the clips togetherand then they're hurrying up to
like read their voice over superfast to get through all the
clips.
And those vlogs to me, I feellike I'm playing catch up and
I'm chasing. And I feel that theperson is chasing to catch up
with themselves. That's why Itruly recommend as a
professional, because this iswhat I do in my professional
life, in my production life, isaudio first. And then put your
(07:36):
clips on top. Okay?
So you're gonna, even if yourecord all the clips, you go
through your day, you record allthe clips, and then before you
start editing, you record yourvoice over first and think about
what are all the clips that aregonna be in this thing. Let me
record it and then put my videoson top of it. That's how I
recommend it. Okay? It's muchbetter that way.
(07:57):
It will save you a lot of timetrying to re record, re record,
re record because you have tosay something faster because you
only made the shot three secondslong and the thing you want to
say is seven seconds long. Okay?So think about that. Of course
today is the noisiest damn dayand I just opened the window and
now it's like sirens and dogsand woo. I don't know if you can
(08:17):
hear that but welcome to NewYork City.
Okay. The next part of vloggingis to think about it as
narrating the story. So youcould do a vlog where you are
talking it through in real life.So you could be on camera
saying, like I was today. I'm inUnion Square and it's Earth Day.
And so I could kick off with anopening introduction that's me
(08:39):
speaking on camera instead of avoice over. And then I could do
that through the course of theday each time I go to something
different or, oh my god, thetrees are blooming. It's
beautiful. So I could use myvoice to narrate the vlog live,
like, on camera. And then whenI'm saying a line like, it's a
beautiful day in the park andit's Earth Day and there's gonna
(09:00):
be celebration, instead ofstaying on my face the whole
time, it could be a little bitof my face and then I can use
overlays and cover it up withsome of the other scenes that I
shoot.
So that's another style of doingyour vlog. You can use your on
camera self. That is what youcan try if it's something that
you feel comfortable doing, liketurning the camera on yourself
(09:23):
and being in public. A lot ofpeople don't even like to do
that. But if you are out of yourif you can get out of your
comfort zone or get out of yourskin and feel good doing it,
it's so much fun.
No one cares that you'rerecording. No one pays attention
to me. I'm recording all thetime walking around New York
talking to myself. I even hadthat guy shout shouting at me,
you love yourself. Whatever.
I'm making my videos. Leave mealone. I don't really bother
(09:44):
when people have something tosay about what I'm doing. Take a
page out of my book and justdon't worry about it. But hey,
once you're comfortable if youare comfortable doing that, it
is a good way to make sure youcapture all the things because
you can cut you can have voiceover combined with on camera,
you can go back and forth, andyou can be very creative.
So there are so many other waysto get creative on your on your
(10:07):
vlogs other than just saying,okay, I'm gonna talk through it.
You can decide, like I saidfirst, is I'm just gonna put a
music track. The music track'sgonna tell the story because
there could be a music that youpick that really almost speaks
the words of what you're doing.If it's something like, it's a
beautiful day, then I gotnothing to do, whatever the heck
(10:27):
that's the lyrics of that songare. But you would pick a song
where the day, the song speaksto the day, and then you really
don't have to even narrate.
You can just put titles onsaying what the things are. So
that's a nice if you'reintimidated by the speaking
part, if you're intimidated evenby the voice over part, or you
don't want to have to be worriedabout timing, could just make a
music video. You string someshots together, two seconds,
(10:50):
three seconds, two seconds,three seconds, four seconds, and
just kind of vary it up, andthen throw music on top of it
and see what happens. That is myfavorite way to make a vlog, and
I usually do that when I'm in arush. That is the way to do it
when you're in a hurry.
But once you get comfortabledoing vlogs, can power them out.
You can do a series. There's alot of useful tools in vlogging
(11:13):
that can be used to keep yourcontent flowing and you can have
a playlist of certain types ofvlogs. If you are a person who
does skincare and you do a bunchof vlogs, you can have your
skincare vlogs and then you canhave your your activity vlog. So
really can if you're if you're aperson who loves doing it, I I
say, you know, lean into itbecause we should always do the
content we like doing the most.
(11:34):
That's what will make sure thatyou're gonna be consistent.
Whenever you're doing somethingthat you love, you'll tend to
want to do it more. So itbecomes a lot easier to be
consistent. Okay. Now, there'sso many other creative ways to
work with vlogs.
So I want to talk about some ofthem that I have shared inside
the studio, some of them that Ihave done myself, and some ideas
(11:57):
that I thought of when I wasabout to record this. And I'm
like, ugh, I'm gonna share someof these ideas, and then I might
actually make them into lessonsin the studio. But number one
has already been a lesson in thestudio, and that is looping. To
loop your vlog so that whenyou're when someone's watching,
they don't even know that itended and it started over again.
And the way to do that is totake to vlog your thing and then
(12:19):
the last line, put it at thebeginning.
And don't repeat it. A lot ofpeople go, it's repeating a line
at the end and the beginning.No, it's not. It's not repeating
a line. You're not taking theend and then saying it again at
the beginning because thenthat's, like, repetitive and no
one's gonna stick around forthat.
Don't do that. You wanna takethe ending line off and put it
at the beginning so it startswith the end. And then when it
(12:42):
gets to the end, it's not theend anymore because the end is
back at the beginning. And so itmakes people watch it around and
around. It's like going aroundand around in a circle and it's
a song that never ends.
You know that one. Alright. Sothat's a really useful tool. I
will caution you that you don'twant to loop videos that are
long. So no one's going to stickaround.
(13:04):
Most people drop off fromwatching videos after like ten
or fifteen seconds. So no one'sreally gonna stick around for
really long videos. It's muchmore effective to loop videos
that are thirty seconds at themost. I mean sometimes you can
loop a minute video, but againthat's a long time for people to
stick around to get back to thebeginning. Okay?
So think about that if you aregonna do a loop. The other thing
(13:24):
that's fun and can just pick,you know, pop your vlog up to
another level is to put voiceover, a voice of can't even
speak. It's to put a voice overeffect on it so that it's not
just your voice, especiallypeople who say, I don't even
like my voice. There's so manydifferent voice effects and you
could be a narrator and youcould be a trickster and you
could be there's so many funvoice effects in especially in
(13:47):
TikTok that you could then saveand use those over in Instagram.
It's really a good way to makeyour vlog funnier a lot of times
because sometimes the mostmundane voiceover when it's got
a trickster voice on it ishilarious.
I don't know what happens, butcertain voice effects just make
the content funnier. So ifyou're looking to be funny, slap
(14:11):
a voice effect on it. I'mtelling you. You will not be
sorry. You will not be sorry.
Another trick is to put soundeffects. So if you have a story
and you're doing a thing and athing and a thing and then you
hear a door slam, a soundeffect. Like that could
punctuate. You could be a therecould be a bell ringing. So you
could punctuate your story usingsound effects.
And that makes it funny. If youremember, Elise Myers, when she
(14:34):
was popular here on on the insocial media, she would use
stickers all the time. Sostickers popping on, which is
also fun. Some visual interestpopping on when she was telling
her story and it was like tacosand she would have like she had
hundreds of tacos like flickingall over the screen. And that
was one of her early viralvideos.
So using stickers for humor,using overlays for humor could
(14:54):
be fun. The other thing is I,Julie's really good at this. I'm
not always so good at it. I tryto remember, but when she does a
vlog, a lot of times she'lltransition in and out of the,
shots so that she knows, like, Iswiped to the left on that one
and when when she gets to thenext thing, she's gonna swipe
from the from the right to theleft again. She's gonna so it's
(15:16):
gonna be a continued swipe.
And she really is good at thatbecause she'll do a thing where
she swipes up towards the skyand then her next shot, she'll
start on the ground and swipeup. And so that her vlog
sometimes just goes seamlesslyfrom thing to thing. And I love
it. But you have to be a plannera little bit for that because
you have to remember what shotdid I do last, what direction
was I doing it, and so you haveto be have this continuous flow
(15:38):
built into your your head. Andwe put a sample in the
newsletter about a creator thatmade her whole vlog a transition
video.
So that's a really, really funtrick if you want to do
something unusual. Now, somethings that were not in the
newsletter that I want to diveinto because I think that we
limit ourselves by what's beendone before so many times. We
(16:03):
just think, well, that's how aget ready with me video has to
be done. And then suddenly,somebody steps outside the box
and does it differently. Andthen it's like, ugh, why didn't
I think of that?
Because we're always thinking ofhow it's been done, and we don't
always think how could it beeven done better or how can it
be done differently. So I'mgoing to challenge you. Like
(16:27):
this is a great example. What ifyou were starting your vlog off
with something completely randomthat doesn't even connect with
the voice over? So I'm gonnamake this up like a get ready
with me video starts with youliterally dancing somewhere.
And then it's saying, get readywith me to get ready to go out
(16:47):
dancing. So you're alreadystarting with the shot where you
ended up. And it's notnecessarily a loop video in this
case. This is just a draw peoplein because you're saying get
ready with me, but the person isobviously not getting ready. The
person is already dressed andready and out.
So, doing something that is soopposite and jarring to what
you're hearing versus whatyou're seeing. That is a
(17:10):
challenge. And that is somethingthat I will I will challenge you
right now on this as I'm talkingabout this on the podcast is
what would your typical thingsstart with and what would make
it completely ridiculous tostart it off differently. So
think about what you're sayingand what could be something that
is so not connected with whatyou're saying that you could
(17:31):
start off with. Those are thekinds of things that get the
attention.
It's funny. If I think about allthe people who have become
trendy like the, you know, verydemure. It's hilarious because
if you think about Jules, evenher angle of her camera, it was
like jarring because she wasn'tin the whole camera a lot of
times. She was at the bottom ofthe frame and she's like, it's
(17:53):
it was a terrible angle. Yet, itwas jarring.
So I think what I I want you totake away from this is that it's
great to understand how to dothe things the traditional way,
the way everyone's doing them.But I think what sets people
apart is when they take a stepback and go, I'm not gonna do it
(18:14):
like everybody else. And I I'vewhen Julie was growing up, I
used to say, you don't have tobe like everyone else. All
because everybody's wearing, andI'm making this up, like,
Converse with, you know, theirdresses or whatever. You don't
have to do that, but she was theopposite.
She actually wore Converse withdresses when no one else was
doing it. But, anyway, my pointis, I used to tell her this all
the time growing up. Like, justbe feel your own self. Like,
(18:37):
what would make you feel good?So if you have a video and
everyone's doing these things inthis way and you think, oh, I
gotta do it just like that, I'mhere to tell you that you don't.
You really don't. You do itcompletely different, and you
could be completely silly andand off the wall funny or not
funny or serious. But you can,you can take away take it
(19:01):
yourself away from the norm andthink about what you're gonna
put on the beginning of yourvideo instead of the
traditional. Today, we're gonnawah wah and we're gonna walk,
you know, come it could be sofunny like, cross the street
with me as I get ready for, youknow, the and it's like, cross
the street with me. That'sthat's a ridiculous statement.
That's not anything. Butsometimes, like, I I think of
(19:22):
that because I did a vlogrecently where I was on my way
to teach a video productionworkshop at a corporation. And
my first shot was me crossingthe street talking about how I
was so excited to go to this, tothis workshop where I was going
to teach these executives how tocreate videos. So when I think
about it now and I was crossingthe street, I could have started
that off. Cross the street withme as I head to a video
(19:43):
production workshop.
That would be funny, you know?But sometimes I don't think of
the things quick enough on thespot when I'm in it. I it's
really nice to be able to advisenow when I look back at my old
content and think, oh, how couldI have made that more engaging?
And that would have been afunnier opening than just, I'm
heading to I'm heading toRockefeller Center where I'm
gonna teach these executives howto make videos, and I'm so
(20:03):
excited about it. It's fine.
That was truly what I was doing,but I think it would have been
funnier to do a a funny linethat's like, cross the street
with me instead of get readywith me. Or come with me instead
of come with me. I would say,cross the street with me. Just
something absurd, you know? Ithink it's like the idea of
social media isn't necessarilyto be the most absurd, but it's
(20:26):
like to be the person that isnot just following the line of
everyone else.
That is it for today. I've beentalking for way too long. I'd
love to hear what type of vlogsyou enjoy watching the most. Is
there a specific style you enjoymore than another style? Do you
like fast cutting vlogs?
Do you like slower paced vlogs?There's so many different
(20:49):
styles, and you can create yourown signature style. One thing I
have said, and I've said itbefore, I don't know if I said
it in my studio a lot, but I'veI know I've say it a lot because
it's one of the things that isone of my pet peeves. But people
that speed up their footage somuch and it's like frenetic,
that's not a pleasant vlog towatch. If you're like zooming,
(21:10):
zooming, zooming, zooming, it'salmost like frenetic energy
unless somebody's really likegoing nuts and they want to feel
like a need for speed, maybethat maybe that's appealing.
But your vlog doesn't have to bethis frenetic energy of fitting
everything in. Like if you're ifyou walked three blocks, you
don't have to speed up threeblocks worth of you walking to
(21:34):
fit it into three seconds. Okay?You can do one clip of two
second and one clip of gettingto the next block. Like, you can
skip the whole middle section.
A little bit of walking, cut outall this, the rest of the
walking. So you can tighten upyour videos without speeding
them up to cram it all in. SoI'm gonna leave you with that
because that is my, ah, that isa mothership peeve. So I'm gonna
(21:55):
leave you with that. Don't speedup your videos to try and cram
everything in.
Just make shorter clips and thenyou can cut the same clip of you
walking down the street, cut out25 steps forward, and then cut
the next part of the walkingdown the street. So you have two
seconds and two seconds. That'sfour seconds instead of taking
twenty seconds of walking andspeeding it up to four seconds.
Alright? That is my hot tip fortoday.
(22:17):
Please don't do that. It's notpleasant at all for the viewer.
And, I'd love to hear what otherstyles of vlogs you really
enjoy. Do you like music videovlogs? Do you like when the
person's talking on camera?
Do you prefer the voice over?What's your favorite type of
vlog? Tell me in the comments.Alright. Have a good weekend,
and I will see you next Friday.
Have a happy Easter for thosethat celebrate. Bye.
Welcome to The Socialize Strategy, your favorite social
(00:03):
media podcast of the week,right? I sure hope so. Anyway, I
am back and I want to talk aboutvlogging and creative styles of
vlogging. But before I get intoit, I have a little treat for
you. At the beginning of thepodcast, I'm going to start off
with Unsponsored Buy.
And that is a new littlesection, which is only a minute
(00:23):
or two, where I'm going to talkabout one of my favorite
favorite products. And whetherit's because I was introduced to
it by receiving free product,which is what happened today, or
something that I've been usingfor years, each week I'm going
pick something and tell you alittle bit about it and why I
like it. Because I feel that Idon't get to share a lot of my,
I guess, influencer type thingsbecause I don't do that kind of
(00:46):
content. And so I decided, youknow what? This is my platform.
Let's go for it. So today, I'mgonna talk about BeautyStat
because I just received thisfrom the founder of the brand
who reached out to me on TikTokand said, I'd like to send you
some products. We've beenfollowing each other for years.
He is a chemist, a cosmeticchemist, and he used to be a
beauty blogger. His name is RonRobinson.
(01:09):
He was a beauty blogger. He'dalready worked for brands like
Clinique for years as a as acosmetic scientist. And so he
has all the information. Andwhen he started his blog, he was
highlight and he was also asocial media agency, and he was
highlighting other brands. So Idon't know.
You can read about it when hedecided to launch his own brand,
(01:30):
but here we are and he sent methese products. And so I tried
different products through, youknow, through time. I've tried
different brands that were sentto me especially when I had
cancer and people were sendingme things. And I'm really liking
this one. So I want to talkabout it.
First of all, the cleanser, it'slike a pea sized amount, creamy,
smooth, and I even take it inthe shower now and I use it like
(01:53):
I use it on my chest. It is areally, really nice cleanser. I
love it. The second thing thatI'm loving is this Universal C
Skin Refiner because it has thatsmooth it almost feels like it's
filling in the lines when itwhen you put it on and it's got
that silky feel to it. I I don'tI only know one other brand that
(02:13):
I've ever tried that has that inin a sunscreen.
And this is the first time I'veever seen it in a moisturizer or
felt it in a moisturizermoisturizer. I really, really
like it. Also, the peptidewrinkle moisturizer for at
night, and these are tripleaction daily peels. When I read
the instructions, it said thisone might feel a little tingly,
(02:34):
and I didn't experience thatwith this, but I do get a little
tingle sensation with the skinrefiner. But anyway, loving the
brand.
So if you haven't tried it, Iwould say it's it's worth a look
see. And I'm going talk aboutsome of my other favorite skin
skin care brands as we moveforward. But I just really like
that one. So today is BeautyStat Day. Alright.
Let's move on to the topic ofthe newsletter and I'm gonna
(02:57):
talk to you a little bit aboutwhy I picked this topic for this
week and the things that I'mdoing in the studio are always
somewhat reflective of thethings that I share in the
newsletter. But in the studio,we really get into it in a more
lesson savvy way. So I'm puttingspecific lessons up about
things, and I'm really gettinginto the details of commenting
(03:20):
on everybody's videos and givingthem specific directions. So
it's a bit more of hand holdingthat happens in there versus me
just telling you the informationhere and then you go off and
either you figure it out or whoknows what happens. So that's
what I really love about thestudio.
I'm feeling a back and forth, agive and a take, and I'm really
enjoying it in there. And whatwe're doing this week was
(03:41):
talking about formatting and howto make your videos YouTube
friendly and then also back tosocial media friendly and back
and forth. So if this doesinterest you and you wanna try
the studio for seven days, youcan get the benefit of those
lessons and those lives andthen, you know, you can decide
to stay or not stay, but everyweek is a really fun topic and I
(04:01):
already have the topic pickedfor next week. So buckle up
everybody. If you're my studiopeople, you're gonna love that
one and we have a new studioplatform.
We're over at Mighty and it'svery user friendly. It's so easy
to find what you need, show upfor the events, see the chat, be
in the chat, and see whateverybody's talking about. It's
it's a lot of fun. Okay. Let'sget into tips for creative
(04:24):
vlogging.
I always think of vlogging aseverybody has their own style of
doing it. And most people thinkvlogging is come with me for a
day in the life or get readywith me for blah blah blah.
That's only one small piece ofvlogging in my opinion. So I'm
gonna say that you can have yourown style of vlogging, and I'm
(04:45):
gonna tell you what mine is, andit's in here in a little bit
more depth. But my style ofvlogging tends to be more doing
a music video where I show theevents of a day and I show it
through music and titles.
And that is still vlogging. Soeven though I'm not talking
through it, it's still a way ofvlogging. It's a creative style
of vlogging. So I'm gonna startfrom the beginning and say,
(05:07):
okay, where do you start? If youare somebody who is just like, I
don't even know how I don't evenknow how to vlog.
Like, take me back tokindergarten vlogging. And the
idea of a vlog is to film clipsof your day that you then string
together and you record shortclips. And as you put that
together, that becomes a day inthe life, a story of the day in
(05:28):
your life, a story of an eventthat you attended. So it's a
little think of it as aminiature storybook about
whatever that is. So that's whyGet Ready With Me is a very
traditional style of a vlogbecause it's like telling
someone to come along with me asI get ready.
But other styles of vlogs mightbe, today I went to Union Square
and they were having Earth Day.So that could be considered a
(05:50):
vlog when I share the clips ofwhat I experienced at Union
Square during Earth Day. So avlog can be about your day. It
can be about a portion of yourday. It can be about an event.
It it just it's just a story.That's what you've got to think
about as when you think of theword vlog. So that way you don't
get caught up in it has to be mefilming all day long to create a
(06:11):
vlog. And that seems a littledaunting sometimes to people
because they know they're gonnaget involved in the thing that
they're doing and they're gonnaforget to film the clips. So we
have lots of tips for how to dovlogging that I've already
shared in the studio, how tosuccessfully do that.
So if you're interested in that,you can do a seven day trial in
the studio and go watch thevlogging lesson. But the idea is
(06:31):
to record either record yourvoice over first or shoot all
your clips first. It's up to youhow you want to do it. A lot of
times having the voice over isreally good to have it first
because then you know what clipsyou want to shoot. Okay?
But often you go through thecourse of a day and things
happen that you didn't expect.So then you'll have to revise
(06:53):
your voice over. So they so alot most people maybe like to
record at the end after they doall the events, make a list of
all the things they did thatthey want included, and then
record the voice over. But stillto me, recording the voice over
before you start editing isstill a better strategy. And it
may not be the popular strategybecause a lot of people like to
(07:13):
string all the clips togetherand then they're hurrying up to
like read their voice over superfast to get through all the
clips.
And those vlogs to me, I feellike I'm playing catch up and
I'm chasing. And I feel that theperson is chasing to catch up
with themselves. That's why Itruly recommend as a
professional, because this iswhat I do in my professional
life, in my production life, isaudio first. And then put your
(07:36):
clips on top. Okay?
So you're gonna, even if yourecord all the clips, you go
through your day, you record allthe clips, and then before you
start editing, you record yourvoice over first and think about
what are all the clips that aregonna be in this thing. Let me
record it and then put my videoson top of it. That's how I
recommend it. Okay? It's muchbetter that way.
(07:57):
It will save you a lot of timetrying to re record, re record,
re record because you have tosay something faster because you
only made the shot three secondslong and the thing you want to
say is seven seconds long. Okay?So think about that. Of course
today is the noisiest damn dayand I just opened the window and
now it's like sirens and dogsand woo. I don't know if you can
(08:17):
hear that but welcome to NewYork City.
Okay. The next part of vloggingis to think about it as
narrating the story. So youcould do a vlog where you are
talking it through in real life.So you could be on camera
saying, like I was today. I'm inUnion Square and it's Earth Day.
And so I could kick off with anopening introduction that's me
(08:39):
speaking on camera instead of avoice over. And then I could do
that through the course of theday each time I go to something
different or, oh my god, thetrees are blooming. It's
beautiful. So I could use myvoice to narrate the vlog live,
like, on camera. And then whenI'm saying a line like, it's a
beautiful day in the park andit's Earth Day and there's gonna
(09:00):
be celebration, instead ofstaying on my face the whole
time, it could be a little bitof my face and then I can use
overlays and cover it up withsome of the other scenes that I
shoot.
So that's another style of doingyour vlog. You can use your on
camera self. That is what youcan try if it's something that
you feel comfortable doing, liketurning the camera on yourself
(09:23):
and being in public. A lot ofpeople don't even like to do
that. But if you are out of yourif you can get out of your
comfort zone or get out of yourskin and feel good doing it,
it's so much fun.
No one cares that you'rerecording. No one pays attention
to me. I'm recording all thetime walking around New York
talking to myself. I even hadthat guy shout shouting at me,
you love yourself. Whatever.
I'm making my videos. Leave mealone. I don't really bother
(09:44):
when people have something tosay about what I'm doing. Take a
page out of my book and justdon't worry about it. But hey,
once you're comfortable if youare comfortable doing that, it
is a good way to make sure youcapture all the things because
you can cut you can have voiceover combined with on camera,
you can go back and forth, andyou can be very creative.
So there are so many other waysto get creative on your on your
(10:07):
vlogs other than just saying,okay, I'm gonna talk through it.
You can decide, like I saidfirst, is I'm just gonna put a
music track. The music track'sgonna tell the story because
there could be a music that youpick that really almost speaks
the words of what you're doing.If it's something like, it's a
beautiful day, then I gotnothing to do, whatever the heck
(10:27):
that's the lyrics of that songare. But you would pick a song
where the day, the song speaksto the day, and then you really
don't have to even narrate.
You can just put titles onsaying what the things are. So
that's a nice if you'reintimidated by the speaking
part, if you're intimidated evenby the voice over part, or you
don't want to have to be worriedabout timing, could just make a
music video. You string someshots together, two seconds,
(10:50):
three seconds, two seconds,three seconds, four seconds, and
just kind of vary it up, andthen throw music on top of it
and see what happens. That is myfavorite way to make a vlog, and
I usually do that when I'm in arush. That is the way to do it
when you're in a hurry.
But once you get comfortabledoing vlogs, can power them out.
You can do a series. There's alot of useful tools in vlogging
(11:13):
that can be used to keep yourcontent flowing and you can have
a playlist of certain types ofvlogs. If you are a person who
does skincare and you do a bunchof vlogs, you can have your
skincare vlogs and then you canhave your your activity vlog. So
really can if you're if you're aperson who loves doing it, I I
say, you know, lean into itbecause we should always do the
content we like doing the most.
(11:34):
That's what will make sure thatyou're gonna be consistent.
Whenever you're doing somethingthat you love, you'll tend to
want to do it more. So itbecomes a lot easier to be
consistent. Okay. Now, there'sso many other creative ways to
work with vlogs.
So I want to talk about some ofthem that I have shared inside
the studio, some of them that Ihave done myself, and some ideas
(11:57):
that I thought of when I wasabout to record this. And I'm
like, ugh, I'm gonna share someof these ideas, and then I might
actually make them into lessonsin the studio. But number one
has already been a lesson in thestudio, and that is looping. To
loop your vlog so that whenyou're when someone's watching,
they don't even know that itended and it started over again.
And the way to do that is totake to vlog your thing and then
(12:19):
the last line, put it at thebeginning.
And don't repeat it. A lot ofpeople go, it's repeating a line
at the end and the beginning.No, it's not. It's not repeating
a line. You're not taking theend and then saying it again at
the beginning because thenthat's, like, repetitive and no
one's gonna stick around forthat.
Don't do that. You wanna takethe ending line off and put it
at the beginning so it startswith the end. And then when it
(12:42):
gets to the end, it's not theend anymore because the end is
back at the beginning. And so itmakes people watch it around and
around. It's like going aroundand around in a circle and it's
a song that never ends.
You know that one. Alright. Sothat's a really useful tool. I
will caution you that you don'twant to loop videos that are
long. So no one's going to stickaround.
(13:04):
Most people drop off fromwatching videos after like ten
or fifteen seconds. So no one'sreally gonna stick around for
really long videos. It's muchmore effective to loop videos
that are thirty seconds at themost. I mean sometimes you can
loop a minute video, but againthat's a long time for people to
stick around to get back to thebeginning. Okay?
So think about that if you aregonna do a loop. The other thing
(13:24):
that's fun and can just pick,you know, pop your vlog up to
another level is to put voiceover, a voice of can't even
speak. It's to put a voice overeffect on it so that it's not
just your voice, especiallypeople who say, I don't even
like my voice. There's so manydifferent voice effects and you
could be a narrator and youcould be a trickster and you
could be there's so many funvoice effects in especially in
(13:47):
TikTok that you could then saveand use those over in Instagram.
It's really a good way to makeyour vlog funnier a lot of times
because sometimes the mostmundane voiceover when it's got
a trickster voice on it ishilarious.
I don't know what happens, butcertain voice effects just make
the content funnier. So ifyou're looking to be funny, slap
(14:11):
a voice effect on it. I'mtelling you. You will not be
sorry. You will not be sorry.
Another trick is to put soundeffects. So if you have a story
and you're doing a thing and athing and a thing and then you
hear a door slam, a soundeffect. Like that could
punctuate. You could be a therecould be a bell ringing. So you
could punctuate your story usingsound effects.
And that makes it funny. If youremember, Elise Myers, when she
(14:34):
was popular here on on the insocial media, she would use
stickers all the time. Sostickers popping on, which is
also fun. Some visual interestpopping on when she was telling
her story and it was like tacosand she would have like she had
hundreds of tacos like flickingall over the screen. And that
was one of her early viralvideos.
So using stickers for humor,using overlays for humor could
(14:54):
be fun. The other thing is I,Julie's really good at this. I'm
not always so good at it. I tryto remember, but when she does a
vlog, a lot of times she'lltransition in and out of the,
shots so that she knows, like, Iswiped to the left on that one
and when when she gets to thenext thing, she's gonna swipe
from the from the right to theleft again. She's gonna so it's
(15:16):
gonna be a continued swipe.
And she really is good at thatbecause she'll do a thing where
she swipes up towards the skyand then her next shot, she'll
start on the ground and swipeup. And so that her vlog
sometimes just goes seamlesslyfrom thing to thing. And I love
it. But you have to be a plannera little bit for that because
you have to remember what shotdid I do last, what direction
was I doing it, and so you haveto be have this continuous flow
(15:38):
built into your your head. Andwe put a sample in the
newsletter about a creator thatmade her whole vlog a transition
video.
So that's a really, really funtrick if you want to do
something unusual. Now, somethings that were not in the
newsletter that I want to diveinto because I think that we
limit ourselves by what's beendone before so many times. We
(16:03):
just think, well, that's how aget ready with me video has to
be done. And then suddenly,somebody steps outside the box
and does it differently. Andthen it's like, ugh, why didn't
I think of that?
Because we're always thinking ofhow it's been done, and we don't
always think how could it beeven done better or how can it
be done differently. So I'mgoing to challenge you. Like
(16:27):
this is a great example. What ifyou were starting your vlog off
with something completely randomthat doesn't even connect with
the voice over? So I'm gonnamake this up like a get ready
with me video starts with youliterally dancing somewhere.
And then it's saying, get readywith me to get ready to go out
(16:47):
dancing. So you're alreadystarting with the shot where you
ended up. And it's notnecessarily a loop video in this
case. This is just a draw peoplein because you're saying get
ready with me, but the person isobviously not getting ready. The
person is already dressed andready and out.
So, doing something that is soopposite and jarring to what
you're hearing versus whatyou're seeing. That is a
(17:10):
challenge. And that is somethingthat I will I will challenge you
right now on this as I'm talkingabout this on the podcast is
what would your typical thingsstart with and what would make
it completely ridiculous tostart it off differently. So
think about what you're sayingand what could be something that
is so not connected with whatyou're saying that you could
(17:31):
start off with. Those are thekinds of things that get the
attention.
It's funny. If I think about allthe people who have become
trendy like the, you know, verydemure. It's hilarious because
if you think about Jules, evenher angle of her camera, it was
like jarring because she wasn'tin the whole camera a lot of
times. She was at the bottom ofthe frame and she's like, it's
(17:53):
it was a terrible angle. Yet, itwas jarring.
So I think what I I want you totake away from this is that it's
great to understand how to dothe things the traditional way,
the way everyone's doing them.But I think what sets people
apart is when they take a stepback and go, I'm not gonna do it
(18:14):
like everybody else. And I I'vewhen Julie was growing up, I
used to say, you don't have tobe like everyone else. All
because everybody's wearing, andI'm making this up, like,
Converse with, you know, theirdresses or whatever. You don't
have to do that, but she was theopposite.
She actually wore Converse withdresses when no one else was
doing it. But, anyway, my pointis, I used to tell her this all
the time growing up. Like, justbe feel your own self. Like,
(18:37):
what would make you feel good?So if you have a video and
everyone's doing these things inthis way and you think, oh, I
gotta do it just like that, I'mhere to tell you that you don't.
You really don't. You do itcompletely different, and you
could be completely silly andand off the wall funny or not
funny or serious. But you can,you can take away take it
(19:01):
yourself away from the norm andthink about what you're gonna
put on the beginning of yourvideo instead of the
traditional. Today, we're gonnawah wah and we're gonna walk,
you know, come it could be sofunny like, cross the street
with me as I get ready for, youknow, the and it's like, cross
the street with me. That'sthat's a ridiculous statement.
That's not anything. Butsometimes, like, I I think of
(19:22):
that because I did a vlogrecently where I was on my way
to teach a video productionworkshop at a corporation. And
my first shot was me crossingthe street talking about how I
was so excited to go to this, tothis workshop where I was going
to teach these executives how tocreate videos. So when I think
about it now and I was crossingthe street, I could have started
that off. Cross the street withme as I head to a video
(19:43):
production workshop.
That would be funny, you know?But sometimes I don't think of
the things quick enough on thespot when I'm in it. I it's
really nice to be able to advisenow when I look back at my old
content and think, oh, how couldI have made that more engaging?
And that would have been afunnier opening than just, I'm
heading to I'm heading toRockefeller Center where I'm
gonna teach these executives howto make videos, and I'm so
(20:03):
excited about it. It's fine.
That was truly what I was doing,but I think it would have been
funnier to do a a funny linethat's like, cross the street
with me instead of get readywith me. Or come with me instead
of come with me. I would say,cross the street with me. Just
something absurd, you know? Ithink it's like the idea of
social media isn't necessarilyto be the most absurd, but it's
(20:26):
like to be the person that isnot just following the line of
everyone else.
That is it for today. I've beentalking for way too long. I'd
love to hear what type of vlogsyou enjoy watching the most. Is
there a specific style you enjoymore than another style? Do you
like fast cutting vlogs?
Do you like slower paced vlogs?There's so many different
(20:49):
styles, and you can create yourown signature style. One thing I
have said, and I've said itbefore, I don't know if I said
it in my studio a lot, but I'veI know I've say it a lot because
it's one of the things that isone of my pet peeves. But people
that speed up their footage somuch and it's like frenetic,
that's not a pleasant vlog towatch. If you're like zooming,
(21:10):
zooming, zooming, zooming, it'salmost like frenetic energy
unless somebody's really likegoing nuts and they want to feel
like a need for speed, maybethat maybe that's appealing.
But your vlog doesn't have to bethis frenetic energy of fitting
everything in. Like if you're ifyou walked three blocks, you
don't have to speed up threeblocks worth of you walking to
(21:34):
fit it into three seconds. Okay?You can do one clip of two
second and one clip of gettingto the next block. Like, you can
skip the whole middle section.
A little bit of walking, cut outall this, the rest of the
walking. So you can tighten upyour videos without speeding
them up to cram it all in. SoI'm gonna leave you with that
because that is my, ah, that isa mothership peeve. So I'm gonna
(21:55):
leave you with that. Don't speedup your videos to try and cram
everything in.
Just make shorter clips and thenyou can cut the same clip of you
walking down the street, cut out25 steps forward, and then cut
the next part of the walkingdown the street. So you have two
seconds and two seconds. That'sfour seconds instead of taking
twenty seconds of walking andspeeding it up to four seconds.
Alright? That is my hot tip fortoday.
(22:17):
Please don't do that. It's notpleasant at all for the viewer.
And, I'd love to hear what otherstyles of vlogs you really
enjoy. Do you like music videovlogs? Do you like when the
person's talking on camera?
Do you prefer the voice over?What's your favorite type of
vlog? Tell me in the comments.Alright. Have a good weekend,
and I will see you next Friday.
Have a happy Easter for thosethat celebrate. Bye.
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