Video blogging has never been as successful as it is today. The launch of social media has made it much easier for people to record whatever they want and stream it to the world. A lot of streamers, bloggers, and artists have managed to create a full-time job that produces a lot of money by simply utilizing social media platforms.
Using video to present any form of content leaves any creator with a lot of room for creativity and innovation. While written blogs are great, the fast-paced nature of today’s society has crowned video blogging as King. Just like any beginnings, video blogging may seem a bit too technical at the start, leaving you a bit overwhelmed with how to get your things in order.
Since you’re still starting out, you’re probably not allocating a lot of your funds into the budget. We’ve created a brief guide that should help get you up and running on your video blog on a tight budget.
Just because you need a decent camera to blog with, it doesn’t mean that you’ll have to spend thousands of dollars on one. You’ll need to consider whether you’ll need a camera with a big battery or a small one, depending on where you’ll be filming your blogs. If you’re at a loss, take a quick look at shootsearcher.com to see the best cameras, mics, and lighting setups for your budget. You’ll want to research before buying your gear to avoid wasting money.
Since video blogging will probably require you to carry the camera around a lot, focus on cameras that are easily portable while being durable. You’ll manage to get away with a couple of videos from your smartphone when you don’t have your camera around at all times, but don’t get used to it. Shop around long enough and you’ll manage to find a good camera for around $250-300.
Decent Microphone
Smartphones are improving, but they’ll never be able to match the quality of a dedicated decent microphone. You don’t want to shoot the best video of your career with bad audio, rendering it pretty useless. A lot of people are even salvaging good audio from incomplete videos and creating podcasts with it. It’s common to use microphones for podcasts if you feel you could divert some of your attention to them.
Great audio will help you alongside amazing footage to market your content as people can easily lose interest in any content if the audio isn’t good. Obtain a mic that you can use to balance the audio levels with to give you as much freedom as possible when it comes to audio editing.
Attracting Your Audience
No matter how big or small your budget is, without a good reason for people to watch your vlog, they won’t. Since social media is a big part of video blogging popularity, engaging your audience will be the fuel that will help your fire burn more. You want your best personality traits and aspects to shine through every video.
There are no standards when it comes to video blogging so you have a lot of room to get creative with whatever you think defines you and your blog. Controversial topics sure have their audience, but be aware that they can cause more problems than they solve.
Editing
Editing is the holy grail of video blogging. It can create fun and engaging videos without raising the budget through the roof. Your edits shouldn’t just be composed of hectic cuts, but incorporate many other elements like trimming and piecing footage. Video editing will also help you match the audio perfectly to the footage, not to mention the audio editing as well. You’ll be able to find a lot of cheap and even free video editors that get the job done easily.
Interviews have helped many vloggers rise to the height of fame overnight. Try to see within your network if you know someone who is respected in their field and arrange an interview. Experts and professionals make for great interviewees as their viewers can easily be attracted to your content if it’s similar in quality and topic.
You can try asking around your group of friends to see if they have someone interested if you don’t already have one in mind. It can add a fresh, spicy layer to your vlog where people can expect to see more than one face.
Video blogging can easily be turned into a career if you’re truly passionate about it. Overwhelming beginnings are normal so try your best to take it easy and learn from your mistakes as you go. As long as you’re focusing more on your content rather than equipment, you’ll find the best angles.
_____________________________________________________
Interesting related article: “What is a Blog?“