Notifications

Clear all

[Closed] How to make a great video

Feedback and Suggestions

Last Post by flutsch 20 years ago

2 Posts

2 Users

0 Reactions

2,458 Views

RSS

_Anonymous_

14.06.2006, 06:59 0

What do you want to achieve with your video

The most important question first: What are the intended uses of your video? What should the audience
take home at the end of the video? Your answer to this question does not have to be very specific, but may
consist of only a sentence or two. It may be sensible to write a few notes on what you want to work on in
your video beforehand, so that you have a basic outline which you can follow. Write down in a few words
the points you would like to deal with.

Aims & Objectives

• What your video intends to bring to the community
• What the audience will know at the end
• Noting the content and building a structure of the video prior to recording

The Audience

• Your specific target audience ( Beginner - Advanced - Expert )
• The complexity of language used / explanations given

What are good videos and how do you create them?

Recording good training videos isn't easy. It requires preparation, presentation, good poker knowledge and didactics.

Video formats:
• Theory / Concept video
• Specific hand(s) review
• Stat analysis / leakfinder
• Presentation/discussion
• How-to
• Live sessions
• Session reviews
• User session reviews

You can use tools to improve your presentation or make things more visual. Some tools you could use are listed below. If you want to use an unlisted poker related tool, please consult with your coordinator to see if it is not a problem.

Tools that you can use:
• Pokerstrategy Equilab / Equilab Omaha [instead of Pokerstove]
• Powerpoint
• Excel
• Holdem Manager
• ICM Manager
• NASH
• Forumposts

Didactics:

Explaining the 'why'

For the user to understand the content of the video, it is important for you to explain why you have chosen a certain course of action and why this is most appropriate.

Not every Pre-Flop fold is worth mentioning; avoid explaining information in depth which may not be relevant to the user, for example, common knowledge explanations during a Diamond video.

For the user to understand the content of the video, it is important for you to explain why you have chosen a certain course of action and why this is most appropriate.

Not every Pre-Flop fold is worth mentioning; avoid explaining information in depth which may not be relevant to the user, for example, common knowledge explanations during a Diamond video.

Concepts and Ranges

• Point out concepts to the viewer
• Estimate opponents Hand-range and explain

Good Poker players always use ranges and understand that Poker is not concerned with one hand versus the other; ranges are used to predict accurately.

To ensure good analysis you should discuss how your range performs against your opponents and which range you would be holding in your opponent’s context.

Alternative Lines

• Discuss alternative plays and what effect they could have had
• How would you have played differently in relation to your position
• What type of opponent are you facing and how does this affect your line

Discussing potentially alternative methods of decisions creates a deeper understanding of the fundamentals you have learned and allows us to explore the mindset of the producer.

How to create a good video

Preparation is key! Preparing your video in advance will make your life easier and your presentation better. Overall, the appearance of your video can be greatly improved by a good preparation.

How to prepare:
• Choose a clear, sepcific topic
• Set target audience
• Create a structure and timeline
• Prepare your tools (powerpoint, precalculated ranges, forum posts, hand histories, ICM trainer, etc..)

You start your video by introducing the topic of the video and addressing your target audience. Make sure the introduction takes a little time as possible, since you will otherwise bore your audience. Get into the action as quick as you can!

Start of the Video:
• Introduce the topic
• Mention the target audience
• Start with the topic right away!
• This should in total not take up more than 30 seconds

This is of course the core of the video and should be presented well. As said before, having a good preparation will help you a lot! Here are some key points that will help you present your video well.

During the video:
• Concentrate on your single topic
• If other fields are touched - refer to other pieces rather than explaining.
• Do not repeat yourself, if something is very important: key learning at the end of the video
• All calculations, ranges etc. have to be prepared before the recording. (see how to prepare)
• Talking in ranges, not exact hands

At the end of the video, it is important to recap some key learnings of the video. Make sure you ask members to leave their feedback, questions and opinions in the comment section as well.

End of video:
• Present key learnings (takeaways, memorable sentences)
• Motivate users to ask in comments & discuss
• Crosslink other material if adequate

Make sure your video has an appropriate length. A live session can probably take 40 minutes, where a theoretical video can be as long as you need to explain the topic.

Some nice example video's:
Cornholio: Room for improvement
BogdanPS: Variance in Poker
Collin Moshman: Low Blind Bluffing

Golden rules to make a great video

The most important question first: What makes a great video? In general we believe a great video induces the following comments:

'This video was fun and exiting'
'I enjoyed watching the entire video'
'I really learned something from this video'

To ensure this, here are the Five Golden Rules that will help you achieve this mission.

1. Be professional

Being professional includes many things. In general, it is about showing appreciation to your viewers. Therefore:
• Don't smoke/eat/drink/swear
• Show respect to other players
• Avoid any sounds and pop-ups from softwares and other devices, such as: skype/facebook/msn/e-mail/any other messenger/cell phone
• Ensure a good audio and video quality

2. Be prepared

Being prepared is important because it will greatly improve your presentation and the structure of your video. This makes it easier for the viewer to follow your story and remember something afterwards. Before you start your recording:
• Choose a clear/specific topic
• Know what you want to say, have a story line in mind
• Any presentation tools (such as powerpoint) should be well structured, have a good layout and use proper language
• Prepare sample hands, ranges, calculations before recording

3. Show and induce passion

To not lose your viewers after a few minutes, you have to be able to keep your audience interested. Of course an important factor would be to tell something interesting, but the way you tell things definitely counts as well.
• Be enthusiastic about what you are telling
• Encourage viewers to take part in discussions in the comments and on the forum

4. Have good didactics/explanations

To teach your viewers something, it is important that you explain things well. A mistake that is easily made is that you start reporting situations, instead of deducting them and explaining your thought process. Therefore always think about:
• Build attention bridges by e.g. introducing your topic with a question that will be answered during the video
• Explain the 'why' and your though processes
• Talk about alternatives, create ''what if'' scenarios
• Try to talk in ranges, wherever possible

Interactive tasks are a great tool to increase the attention span of your viewers. Example:
1. Ask a question
2. Ask the viewer to pause the video, and think about the question and resume when he has an answer
3. Make a little pause
4. Give the answer/explanation to the question
Asking questions keeps your audience more involved and helps them learn more.

Read our didactics tips and tricks guide:

5. Have a good opening/closing

• Start and end with 'This is XYZ for PokerStrategy.com'
• Keep your introduction crisp, come straight to the point
• Keep your video timeless; Don't mention things that aren't relevant in the future, as it can confuse people
• End with summary/key learnings and answering the question that you asked in the beginning

If you stick to these golden rules, there is a high chance that the community will receive your video well and that it contributes to a great poker school offer.

1 reply

flutsch

Joined: 02.03.2006

Posts: 1

14.06.2006, 17:07 0

Using Camtasia

In this Guide: Editing with Camtasia & Technical settings

Before recording

• Always conduct a test recording before you begin, even if no settings have changed.
• Always use a quality microphone/headset, no Laptop mics.
(If you have no idea what headset to use, here is a recommendation)
• Ensure you have your materials prepared

1. Setup

Choose the "Tools" Tab first and then "Options" in your Camtasia Recorder (not the main studio window; instead select the screen capture option & go from there.)

Select "Inputs" and use the following settings:

After you've applied all these settings you are ready to start the actual recording - make sure that you double check the settings before every recording.

Recording Dimensions of the Video:
Always set the resolution to the highest possible option.

In this example we record four tables but we do not use the unnecessary black empty space on the left and right. We made the table size as big as possible and then we only have choosen the are of the 4 Tables with "Custom Area"

(click to enlarge picture)

For example if you want to record the Hold 'em Manager 2 re-player window only, make this window as large as possible and set the recording area to the full area of the re-player window.

Always record powerpoint presentations in full-screen mode.

Record and save your Video

To start recording there is an option above the "Clip Bin" to open the screen recorder, select this. Simply click the record button to begin. Once you are done recording, press "Stop" to allow the video to save.

After a short rendering time, a preview will appear where further action from us is required to ensure the video is fully stored. Click "Save & Edit" to proceed to the editor with your video securely stored on the computer.

Once you get into the editor, save the project again to be safe.

At this point you may want to edit your video to improve the quality. Continued below are editing & rendering tips.

2. Editing your Video

Contents: Cleaning the audio, cutting & using Camtasia "call-outs"

1. Audio Cleaning

Microphones record the background noise of the room you are in - this background noise can be sampled in camtasia, and subsequently removed using an automation within the Software, as shown below.

Choose a part of your timeline where there is only silence and no voice, this is the background noise which we want to capture. (blue area) Select a second or two of this "silence" between the red & green selectors and then click "Manual Noise training on selection" to clean the audio. Enable the noise removal check box if not already done automatically and your audio is clean.

2. Cutting your Video

Cutting your video is good if you make a mistake, or if you want to remove any unnecessary silences - at the push of a button. Select where you want to cut the Video and simply press "S" on your keyboard. You can then make another cut to create a slice, which you can edit or remove completely by pressing your "Delete" key.

Be Careful: When you cut your Video, the audio track will also be cut at the same location - please keep this in mind or your Video can end up making no sense. First we need to split the Audio from the Video, and then lock the track we want unchanged. To do this we click the blue circle next to the padlocks followed by clicking the padlock of the track we want to lock. Keep in mind if you cut something from the audio / video track, it's length will change.

3. Callouts (Censoring, Watermarking & more)

"Callouts" are a function in Camtasia which allow us to add elements to the video, such as a watermark, or a "blur" Callout to censor, for example, a players screen-name. Callouts appear on the time-line, which allows us to choose their duration, fade in/out and we can specify the dimensions of the Callout itself on the video preview.

Avoid using the fade options if you mean to censor something in your video.

To add a watermark to your Video, choose the image callout option - specify the dimensions and location in the preview and the duration and fade options on the timeline. A typical example is a small image in the bottom right corner with high transparency.

Approach your Poker School contact should you need further assistance!

3. Rendering the Video

Saving in .camrec (Recorder settings) allows us to go back and change the video in many ways without compromising on quality. So it's good to keep all your projects in .camrec for this reason.

The final render of your video should be .mp4 as this our preferred format. When we render to .mp4, we reduce the file-size drastically and as such the video quality decreases (an acceptable amount) so there is a good balance between file-size and video quality which we aim for. A rough guideline we use is 500 kb/s bitrate in the .mp4 format, although the optimal range is dependent on the video itself.

"Rendering" is what we do to shape the video the way we want. And so when we render, we produce our video according to any specifications we desire.

This is where the important part comes in - Camtasia always saves the dimensions of the previous project, so we need to specify each time the maximum resolution to ensure best quality is maintained at this stage. The resolutions can be changed to the top-left of the video preview screen in the main window of Camtasia.

You will also be prompted to choose the resolution when you drag your video from the Clip bin into the timeline, you should always select "Recording Dimensions" - if you fail to do this, your video will have a very bad quality.

Camtasia should be open, either with your file already on the timeline, or in the clip bin (if so, you should drag to the timeline and choose the resolution)

As standard, you should implement certain post-edits to your production routine, such as noise removal and volume optimization amoung other things. This ensures a standardized higher quality to any video you make.

Now click on "Produce & Share" at the top to specify the dimensions of your render.

A new series of window will open, use the following settings as shown in the screenshots:

(Click to enlarge)

When you have applied all the settings - begin your render. When completed, conduct a final quality check on your .mp4 and ensure it meets your own high standards of production.