YouTube Channels For Dummies

Chapter 6

Acquiring the Tools of the Trade

In This Chapter

• Choosing the right camera
• Keeping your camera on the straight and narrow
• Seeing your way with light
• Getting the sound just right

Let's face it: Making video is easier now than it has ever been, and that trend is growing. Cameras, editing software, and computers that can edit video are now relatively cheap and available, which means that, following a few best practices, almost anyone can make a decent YouTube video with equipment they may already own. This chapter looks at a few of those best practices and helps you make a decision about price versus quality by examining the advantages of new camera and recording formats. To close out the chapter, we also take a look at the production tools you'll need in order to produce great video for YouTube.

Checking Out Your Camera Options

Let's get the good news out of the way right off the bat: There's a good chance that you already own a High Definition (or HD) camera. Video cameras are everywhere. According to the Pew Research Internet Project, as of January 2014, 58 percent of American adults own smartphones. Pretty much any modern smartphone has an HD camera, as do most modern laptops and all-in-one desktop computers. But just because access to cameras is easy doesn't mean that choosing the right camera is simple. Quality varies widely, and there are some tools and techniques that can help even a basic camera shoot good video. We talk about several types of cameras specifically, ...