How to sit or stand

If you’ve got an option, stand up. It gives your voice an energy and makes it far less likely you’ll slouch. If you can’t stand, at least sit in an upright position. The term we use is ‘stand from the hips up’. (We mention this in the video later, about energy in your recordings.)

This video shows you the ideal way to stand – it’s worth spending some time going over the exercises involved. It was taken live and you might need to expand it to full screen in order to be able to read the on-screen comments. They’re not 100% critical though, so don’t worry.

No one is suggesting you need to be this absolute in how you stand, but it’s an indication of what you should be aiming for.

Walking – the advanced version of standing!

If you can afford it, a Gimbal is a great investment. It stablises your camera (in this case and iPhone) so that your videos are level and don’t wobble if you move.

Here’s a quick way to add energy to your videos…

If you’ve got the technology available to do it sensibly, consider walking as you record – but remember that this is a pretty advanced technical option so we won’t be looking at it here. There is however, a reason a lot of TV shows have otherwise-sensible conversations recorded as people rush down corridors for no real reason. Just look at how much of hit series like NCIS is filmed in corridors with people rushing for no particular reason!!

For an example, take a look at this short video from a friend of mine talking about a slightly better way of doing email marketing. As you watch it, consider that it’s basically a ‘talking head to camera’ video and then think about how much less interesting it would be if it had a static background – if the presenter wasn’t walking.

Exercise: try a simple video as you walk. It works best if you follow these incremental steps:

prepare your script in the normal way and get very used to it: walking gives you one more thing to think about as you talk and you wont’ be able to use a prompt so easily so it’s important you are really familiar with it
record the video in the usual way (that is, stationary) so that you smooth out glitches before you add any complications
test out your gimbal etc and your microphone cables etc
have a go at recording as you walk.