12 Quick Tips to record quality videos using Smartphone
We’re in 2017, Now smartphone cost as much as an entry-level DSLR. Smartphones camera have improved a lot in recent years. You’ve good smartphones camera around you – in fact, they’re everywhere. Using mobile phones for video recording have several advantages :
- Mobile phones are part of our lives and we carry them to everywhere we go. So You don’t have to take to camera gear everywhere instead you can use your smartphones to create video content anytime.
- Many apps are available for both iOS (Apple) and Android (Google) mobile devices that extend the functionality of the video camera, provide sophisticated editing and digital effects capabilities
- With phones becoming more capable, video entrepreneurs are opting for that much more affordable device, too.
1- Lighting is very Important
As you know Smartphone camera have smaller images sensors and lenses so light has a huge impact on the video quality. It’s advised to shoot the video in brightly lit areas. This will help you to avoid unnecessary shadow and grainy areas in your video. Try not to point your camera to the bright light source, it will cause lens flare and overexposed footage. Lighting must be stable and steady; the image sensors of mobile cameras are not too much sense to quick light changes. Try to play with the backlighting and white balance settings if the light is still not enough for quality videography. Make sure to focus the most important aspect of the video, the automatic exposure control will have an easier time making small adjustments if lighting condition begins to change.
Tip: If you press to hold the focus square/circle in your camera app, it will lock the AE/AF to that specific object.
2- Stay Close to your Object
Stay close to the object, it will help you to record better audio as well as there will be less noise and better focus in your video. Try to avoid using digital zoom as much as you can. If you have dual camera setup in your phone like in iPhone 8+ and Samsung Note 8, You can use a telescopic lens to get more details in your shot.
3- Always Use Landscape and Avoid Portrait Orientation
Most of the people hold their phones vertically while shooting the videos. Say no to portrait orientation, no matter what, always use landscape orientation as it looks better, and somehow professional, on all platforms as we have wider displays everywhere.
If you want people to be able to watch your video at full size on a monitor or TV screen, keep your smartphone horizontal when you are recording. Shooting a video clip with your phone upright doesn’t seem like an issue at the time because you’re watching it on a device with a vertical screen, but as soon as you want to play the video anywhere else, your clip will be fighting for space with two black bars on either side of the screen.
4- Use Tripod to avoid unnecessary Motion and Blurry Frames
While you record video with your smartphone or other cameras, don’t handle or shake your mobile device a lot; it will only make the audio quality, as well as the video quality, worse. Unnecessary handling of the mobile, while you are recording, will cause a lot of unwanted noise. For better audio quality use a tripod to keep your smartphone or external microphone or digital recorder steady and free from unwanted handling or vibration while you are shooting video.
Here are some of the tripods you can get on Amazon.
5- Keep it Near Source
Keeping the microphone you are using to record as close to the audio’s source as possible is, perhaps, the most important tip for getting better audio for your videos I can give you. Distance creates problems for both video and audio. While shooting far away from your audio source, you will record more ambient or unwanted noise and the audio levels of the sound you do want, begin to drop dramatically after it leaves the source. So, if you are shooting an interview, it is better to keep your audio recording device close to your subject to keep their voice focused, clear and audible.
6- Use Flash or External Light when required
Smartphones, you see, come equipped with LED lights that are too bright and can easily skew the color temperature of photos. Also, the video will often time still come out poorly lit in the end. If you want to record a photo at night, you’ll have to find another light source.
Get creative with available lights such as a neon sign or jukebox. They can add a little bit of needed glow while also jazzing up your video with color. If you record on your desk mostly, Try to place a Backlit Keyboard in the background to give a beautiful blurry effect.
7- Use Computer or Mobile Apps for video improvement and additional Stabilization
The camera app on your smartphone may do a good job but there’s more to video recording than what most of them have to offer! Some third party apps are very intuitive with great features for those new to developing video content while some others unlock professional-like features. While you will find some pretty good free apps, investing in a couple of apps that cost a little bit of money can pay huge dividends.
8- Be prepared for the right moment
Before you begin recording your videos, make sure that you have all of the gear, props, scripts, actors and shooting locations ready to go. Additionally, make sure your phone is charged and that you have enough storage space (available memory) to store the footage – high definition (HD) video files can get large and will drain a battery quickly.
Try to take multiple shots from different angles if you have plenty of storage and battery. Don’t forget to use a decent stabilization gear.
9- Use an external Audio recording device
There are some great external microphones available for your mobile device. You will use this external microphone as a replacement for your internal smartphone microphone while shooting your video with your cellular smartphone or mobile device’s camera. If you use an external microphone or handy digital recorder while recording your video footage, you will be able to get an excellent audio quality for your recording if you keep the rest of our tips in mind. Many of these external mics are more directional and designed to cancel out ambient or unwanted sound while you are recording.
Here are some of the mics you can get on Amazon.
10- Edit your audio and add background music if required
If you have already recorded very nice video, but the audio is less than ideal, it is a good idea for you to edit your video with a better audio track. For the new audio track, use a high quality audio recording device to ensure that you get an excellent result for your recording. If you cannot replace dialogue consider adding a voiceover or soundtrack; music, sound effects, and ambient noise might all be a good replacement. Then, you can use your favorite video editing tool to simply remove the camera’s recorded audio with the better audio track. This can solve your poor audio problem quickly and effectively.
11- Avoid Backlighting
There’s something else you should keep in mind when thinking about flash and lighting in general: avoiding backlit-settings.
You may be able to see people and their faces when they’re backlit, but your smartphone camera usually can’t and will output footage with a bright light haloing a dark figure. That figure will also have no visible features, meaning you just missed whatever it was you were trying to capture.
To avoid this situation, try configuring a basic light setup. Those of you who are recording on the fly can also improve a backlit situation by moving to one side or another. Although some stock camera apps try to reduce the effects of backlighting, you should try reducing the effects on your end as well.
12- Mix it up
Although a video made up of a single clip might show what you intended, a video made up of many shorter clips often makes a more interesting watch, and you can pick out some smaller details, not just the overall scene.
Whatever your subject, think about what other shots you can get to complement your master shot, and add to the story. It can be as simple as shooting your subject both from close up and further away or getting someone to repeat a performance (like a cartwheel) a few times so you can capture it from a variety of angles. You’ll end up with better video as you’ll find better angles to shoot from.
You can use multiple lights to overcome the low light situations. If you’re recording in door keep your device plugged in and when you’re on an adventure, try to keep some power bank with you.
