What I learned from creating my first YouTube Video
Although I have tried many things in the creative field, I haven't dabbled much in the video. Even though I had bought some video-related cameras like the Ricoh 360 camera, Rylo 360 camera, and DJI Osmo Pocket, I never published anything. I knew I wanted to keep up with the trend and technology, and I don't want to become a tech dinosaur. Other than shooting footage for my friends and being on Instagram Stories, I don't use the video feature on my cameras; I am not even active on Snapchat and Tiktok!
My struggle
I grew up in a time that video was something fancy people in Hollywood does. 20 years ago, I would never guess my phone, and most of my cameras can shoot 4K high-resolution videos. I struggle the most with video because it has so many uncontrollable elements, maybe not for the pros, but it is challenging for a beginner like me. Compared to shooting still images, video is multi-dimensional. Things move and change in the frames, and there is an audio element that is totally foreign to me.
You may laugh at me; I have talked about creating YouTube videos for a couple of years. I had tried and started something, but they never made it to the finish line. I even created another channel for my drawings, but I am still procrastinating and haven't done anything other than update the profile picture and the banner. Well, we all have to take the first step we wanted to go somewhere, so I finally did it this time! It was a video showing you my editing process with the RAW images I shot on my new Fujifilm X100V. It was an insignificant video, but I knew I had to start somewhere. I am glad I did because I have learned quite a lot from doing it.
How I created my first video
To record my editing, I had the option to set up a camera to shoot over my shoulder or opt to record my desktop screen. I had to scrap my first option because shooting with a camera would be too challenging with the plant grow lights in my office. Colors would be off, and I thought color accuracy was important for videos like that. Previously, I had tried the screen recorder app, but it felt cumbersome. I ended up using what I already had on my computer, the QuickTime Player. Seriously, before I looked into it, I had no idea you can record your computer screen or take a screenshot with QuickTime. That just showed signs of me being behind in tech.
Recently, I upgraded my Fujifilm X100S to X100V. Since I have been stuck at home, I tested the camera around the house, photographing my plants. The images I chose for this video were certainly not my best work, but we won't make anything great if we only allow ourselves to create when it's perfect. You can say I have been very controlling with my work, but I thought it might be a good idea to loosen up, showing some snapshots that are more true to represent my life, which are all the houseplants that fill up my space since early this year.
At first, I directly uploaded the recording. It was about 30 minutes long, no audio, simply me working on my photos. I played it a couple of times, it felt too slow, and I did feel like I should add some background music. After researching and checking with my video savvy friends, artist.io seems to be my best option for downloading audios. However, artist.io requires you to pay a yearly fee. I didn't want to do it before YouTube becomes a longterm thing for me. Then I found that YouTube itself has free audios you can download and use in your video. This was a good compromise until I start to make more videos.
I could have used Adobe Premiere to edit the video since I am a Creative Cloud subscriber, but I wanted to keep it simple for my first time, so I pulled up the good old iMovie. The last time I use iMovie was 2 years ago; sometimes, I truly feel like I am stuck in the last decade getting old. iMovie was fairly simple to use since I am not a complete idiot; plus, you can always Google. I found the option to speed up the footage, so the video ended up about 15 minutes long. I added the audio, learned how to do the simple fade out, and then uploaded the video straight to YouTube from iMovie.
What I learned from uploading to YouTube
When you uploaded a new video, it takes time for YouTube to process your video. They would create an SD version before they continue to process and create the HD and 4K versions. It was not too long for them to create the SD version, but it took ages for the rest. At one point, I started to reupload the video thinking maybe there was a bug. In fact, it just needs time to process and store all sizes of your videos. For a 15 minutes video like mine, it took about 4 hours before the 4K version was available. Therefore, it's always a good idea to set your video private when you first upload them, so that nobody would accidentally see your blurry low-res video.
Lesson learned
After looking back and replaying my video a couple of times, I found my video was a little slow at the beginning. This was due to no rehearsing before I dived into editing them. It took me longer to edit the first couple of pictures at the beginning before I got into a better rhythm and sped up my editing. It was probably too real and didn't make it good content. I am guessing most people couldn't sit through the first two minutes lol.
What's next?
What else is coming next? On top of editing photos, I am thinking of making free Lightroom presets and videos of me exploring and photographing the town. My first step was far from perfect, and I know I have to improve my future videos. I would appreciate it if you would look at my video and share your tips for improvement!
