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Steer clear of shaky footage
If there’s one surefire way to make your professional video look amateur, it’s shaky footage. Unless you’re filming the Blair Witch Project, your audience should not notice your camera work. To avoid that trembly effect, you can use a tripod when filming.

Ciao
Fiore
www.fioreimage.com

Ensure the backdrop is simple
Audiences are easily distracted by additional objects, shadows, or graphics in the background. If you want to direct their attention elsewhere, you should make sure that you keep the backdrop super simple. Eliminate anything that doesn’t need to be in the shot.

Ciao
Fiore
www.fioreimage.com

Make use of soft lighting
Proper lighting can make or break your professional video. When it comes to video production tips, this next one should be a major priority.
As a general rule, you should shoot your video using soft lighting, rather than hard lighting. Hard light is bright and tends to create dramatic shadows (which is great for horror movies!). Soft light is more all-encompassing and doesn’t cast severe shadows at all.

Ciao
Fiore
www.fioreimage.com

Choose the right location
The location of your professional video matters. When you’re planning out your content, consider what the location tells your audience. It’s vital that you scout out the location in advance. Head to it, see how viable it is as an option, and look into particulars, such as background noise. Ensuring that these things are on point will help you along the way. As a bonus, you may choose to do a “test shoot” to see how the location looks on camera.

Ciao
Fiore

Photo by Fiore: Santa Fe, New Mexico
www.fioreimage.com

Plan your video first.
First things first, you need to plan out your video. Rolling the film and hoping for the best won’t get you anywhere fast. As I have mentioned, you need a brief and a storyboard. You should also write a script if your professional video includes a voiceover or a piece-to-camera. Have your actors or whoever will be on camera rehearse thoroughly first.

Photo by Fiore: Santa Fe, New Mexico
www.fioreimage.com

The Post-Production

If you thought filming took time, you were wrong. Post-production is when you edit all your footage to create a rough cut of the film. Once done with the rough cut, you’ll begin adding things like sound effects, music, visual effects, and color correction. This process will require the use of editing software — if you’re not confident, feel free to find/hire an experienced editor.

Before you polish up your rough cut, show it to people whose opinions you can trust. It’s better that you find out what isn’t working now rather than when your audience is watching the final version.

Photo by Fiore: Santa Fe, New Mexico
www.fioreimage.com

The Idea

Every movie you’ve ever seen first starts with an idea in someone’s brain. Although things change as a project goes on, the story you come up with in the beginning will serve as the foundation on which everything else will be built. Start thinking about the kind of story you want your film to tell and all the important story elements involved: plot, characters, conflict, etc.

Ideas pop into our heads unexpectedly! Be sure to have somewhere to save ideas on your phone or carry a journal. It’s also a good idea to create a folder in which you save newspaper and magazine articles, snippets of overheard dialogue, notes on characters you see on the street, and even dreams. You may not know what to do with these things now, but the day will come when you do.

Every business needs videos.

Photo by Fiore: Santa Fe, New Mexico
www.fioreimage.com

The Filming
It all comes down to this. To prepare, be sure to have a shooting script ready along with an organized schedule of what will be filmed and when. Give yourself plenty of time to shoot scenes so that you’re never rushed and can accommodate changes or problems. It’s common for a scene that will last one minute in the final cut to require more than five hours to film.
If time permits, try filming the same scenes from new angles. This way, you’ll have more footage to work with that can keep your viewers engaged.

Every business needs videos.
Photo by Fiore: Santa Fe, New Mexico
www.fioreimage.com

Shoot to Edit

This particular “pro-tip” simply means that you should think like an editor when filming. When recording a scene, you’ll want to capture several angles and a few “safety shots”. This means you’ll have choices later when creating your final cut. This will save you time and effort that you might otherwise spend on refilming. Plus, it will prevent you from settling for subpar shots that will make your work look unprofessional.
And when you edit, use a simple video editing software that you can get used to before moving on to more complicated programs. You can learn from our video editing tips, which include simple yet professional techniques aside from the simple cutting, clipping, and correction of video clips and audio levels.

Every business needs videos.

Photo by Fiore: Santa Fe, New Mexico

www.fioreimage.com

You may need to construct sets for a setting you’d like to have. But for scenes where an actual location will do, you’ll need to do some scouting to find the best spots. Take a camera with you and do as much traveling as possible, snapping shots of places you think will serve as the perfect setting for particular scenes.

My tip: Always consider the space required by the cast and crew. Don’t choose a cramped, narrow space where only the actors will fit well and not the cameras, lights, etc.

Every business needs videos.

www.fioreimage.com