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First YouTube video experience

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Well, I'm a twit.

Over the last 10 years I've had a couple of 'Youtube' accounts with different gmail addresses I had and lost. Anyway, in an effort to clean up, I decided to delete one said account as I was aiming to bring it all down to one. Instead, I managed to take out all three, including my main youtube channel which was starting to have some traction.

Anyway, there's no hope of recovery.. youtube doesn't do that anymore. I still have the videos so those aren't lost.. just views and subscribers. So I guess I have to decide if I'm going to restart it, and if so if I shouldn't maybe give it a better name. The 'BradH' moniker simply came because that was the default when it used to require you to create a channel to comment.

I'm wondering if it makes sense to just go with a generic name like 'vintage computer stuff', which ties to a website I have, or if I should be a little more creative? Not sure how channel names play into search.
 
Thanks!! This happened in the context of trying to move my channel to a brand channel and separating my old personal videos from.the rest while deleting some orphaned accounts. I found a support forum where someone passes the old channel links up to tech people where branding is involved and they've often been able to restore. Cross fingers.
 
Okay so - new question. Is there a way, when filming an old composite monitor, to do away with the 'band' that constantly moves up/down the screen? I assume because the camera is too fast for the monitor?

Youtube was not able to recover my channel after whatever happened happened, so I've had to start anew. If you were watching/subscribed before I apologize. New channel is here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0UflzOybq16vw7b638_-pg/
 
falter said:
Okay so - new question. Is there a way, when filming an old composite monitor, to do away with the 'band' that constantly moves up/down the screen? I assume because the camera is too fast for the monitor?
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Fix your shutter speed at 60hz and it should go away.
 
Hmm.. I don't think it'll let me do that.. I'm shooting with a Galaxy Note 10+... I can control FPS but I don't think hz.
 
So when you say "band" do you mean a dark area where the screen contents aren't visible that's slowly rolling across the visual area, or an unusually bright area on an otherwise viewable display?

If you're getting the former, do you have very strong lights turned up in the room? Basically what's going on in that case is even though you might have the frame rate set at something basically compatible like 30 or 60hz the exposure is shorter than the time it takes for the electron beam to sweep the whole screen, so you just keep catching a lit fragment of it. (And of course since your camera and the CRT are unlikely to be perfectly in sync that bit of lit area slowly cycles.) If you turn down the ambient light then the exposure time should go up and you'll get a more solid picture, but of course it'll be harder to film things that are *not* the CRT if you want both clear at the same time. If the camera doesn't let you fiddle with forcing a longer exposure time (maybe by trading off ISO sensitivity or whatever) then... yeah, it's a pain in the neck.
 
falter said:
Hmm.. I don't think it'll let me do that.. I'm shooting with a Galaxy Note 10+... I can control FPS but I don't think hz.
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OpenCamera should let you fix your shutter speed at 1/60 which should minimize the moving band you're seeing in the recorded video. It won't eliminate it, since the band is actually firing at 59.94 Hz (or 59.92 Hz if shooting a CGA-connected monitor), but it will minimize it.

"Real Cameras" (costing over $1000) have options to set the shutter speed either in single-place decimals (like "59.9") such as the Panasonic GH5 or GH5s, or in 1/360-degree shutter angle increments such as the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4k. These are exact enough that they pretty much eliminate the band from just about any video mode refresh rate, but of course they cost you.
 
Eudimorphodon said:
So when you say "band" do you mean a dark area where the screen contents aren't visible that's slowly rolling across the visual area, or an unusually bright area on an otherwise viewable display?

If you're getting the former, do you have very strong lights turned up in the room? Basically what's going on in that case is even though you might have the frame rate set at something basically compatible like 30 or 60hz the exposure is shorter than the time it takes for the electron beam to sweep the whole screen, so you just keep catching a lit fragment of it. (And of course since your camera and the CRT are unlikely to be perfectly in sync that bit of lit area slowly cycles.) If you turn down the ambient light then the exposure time should go up and you'll get a more solid picture, but of course it'll be harder to film things that are *not* the CRT if you want both clear at the same time. If the camera doesn't let you fiddle with forcing a longer exposure time (maybe by trading off ISO sensitivity or whatever) then... yeah, it's a pain in the neck.
Click to expand...

Yes... I did this video using a Sanyo VM4509 and it's a rolling 'bar' where the text dims.

I'm going to try what Trixter suggested (thank you, Trixter) with Open Camera instead of the default Samsung app and see if that improves matters.
 
Looking at the video, the bar is half the size of the screen, so this is clearly a shutter issue: Shutter was 1/30th, or 30fps. Hopefully OpenCamera will help. (The program isn't the most intuitive, but IIRC the shutter stuff is in the +/- "box" at the top. Put it on "m", then modify shutter slider to 1/60, then modify ISO to account for brightness.
 
Many Sony camcorders lock the shutter speed to 1/60 if you turn off SteadyShot.

Canon camcorders refer to 1/60 shutter speed as "TV mode".
 
Dwight Elvey said:
Most camera will extend the shutter time if you just dim the background lighting.
Dwight
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That's the opposite effect of what he needs. He doesn't need a longer shutter time, he needs a shorter one. It's defaulting to 1/30th, he needs 1/60th to more closely match the monitor.

Since this is a cell phone he's working with, the automatic software may not actually go beyond 1/30th when shooting 30p video; hoping he has more success with the manual mode of OpenCamera.
 
Another question.. is there any way to control what appears in the Up Next sidebar? Or is that controlled by the algorithm?

Like if someone is watching one of my videos.. it'll usually put an LGR or similar video up next to it. Is there a way to bump that out of there and suggest one of my other videos?
 
You can't change the up next sidebar, but you CAN add end cards to your video that point to 1. your own videos or channel, 2. a specific video (yours or otherwise), 3. a playlist you create, or 4. a video of yours, chosen by youtube, that youtube thinks the current user would like. Youtube highly recommends you add end cards to every one of your videos to try to drive traffic your way.

Checking my last video, I used two playlist cards and a channel card.
 
Yeah I have those.. but it depends on people watching that particular part of the video. So far my engagement rate is like 44%.. i think most people these days just skip along when watching these.

Funny side note.. I was watching an old LGR video today while doing some accounting and watched his process in the reflection of the monitor he was sitting in front of. He had a piece of paper he was reading from as he went through it. I always wondered how he could just talk straight through. Makes me feel less inferior. Slightly. :) It was an older video.. i wonder if he still does it that way today.. maybe with teleprompter?
 
Trixter said:
That's the opposite effect of what he needs. He doesn't need a longer shutter time, he needs a shorter one. It's defaulting to 1/30th, he needs 1/60th to more closely match the monitor.

Since this is a cell phone he's working with, the automatic software may not actually go beyond 1/30th when shooting 30p video; hoping he has more success with the manual mode of OpenCamera.
Click to expand...

Others have had this same problem and we have found that leaving the shutter open for several display cycles is better than the shorter 60Hz shutter. If there is no 60Hz mode, extending the stutter open time works just as well and the image has better contrast. But it is up to the person to try what works best for him.
Dwight
 
falter said:
Yeah I have those.. but it depends on people watching that particular part of the video.
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No, you're confusing in-video info cards with end cards. The end cards are big icons that appear in the last 15 seconds of the video and partially obscure the screen.

It was an older video.. i wonder if he still does it that way today.. maybe with teleprompter?
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He ad-libs everything when he's on-screen or just messing around with something, but writes a script and narrates for when he's off-screen. You can usually tell which sections use which technique.

I'll be experimenting with a teleprompter soon as I have a full minute of something to deliver in specific language.

Dwight Elvey said:
Others have had this same problem and we have found that leaving the shutter open for several display cycles is better than the shorter 60Hz shutter.
Click to expand...

This is true for still shots of static screens, but isn't appropriate for 60Hz moving images. Of course, if the on-screen motion is slower than 60Hz, one can reduce the shutter speed to match.
 
Trixter said:
No, you're confusing in-video info cards with end cards. The end cards are big icons that appear in the last 15 seconds of the video and partially obscure the screen.
Click to expand...

If I'm not mistaken, both end cards and info cards only can appear at certain times in the video? So if you have a 10 minute video and three or four info cards and one end screen.. if someone just sort of skips along there's a good chance they miss them all?

He ad-libs everything when he's on-screen or just messing around with something, but writes a script and narrates for when he's off-screen. You can usually tell which sections use which technique.
Click to expand...

Yeah his voice is different when he's adlibbing. I watched one of his 'Blerb' videos and he is much more.. what's the word.. demure? When he narrates he has a certain voice and cadence he speaks in. But I think his earlier videos were often at least partially scripted, or perhaps 'Cliff Notes-ed'.

I'll be experimenting with a teleprompter soon as I have a full minute of something to deliver in specific language.
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Let me know when you do - I'd love to hear how it works out.

This is true for still shots of static screens, but isn't appropriate for 60Hz moving images. Of course, if the on-screen motion is slower than 60Hz, one can reduce the shutter speed to match.
Click to expand...


So it turns out my Samsung camera app has a "Pro Video" mode that allows you to adjust exposure times, etc.. and voila, I've gotten a 'flicker-free' screen by adjusting that. Doh. I've also been able to lighten up my 'set' - it was frustrating me that the video produced was darker than it looked in real life. I was thinking maybe my single bulb box lights just weren't powerful enough.

That brings me to another question - getting sufficient lighting without it interfering with your ability to move around. I find to get good lighting I have to bring all my box and umbrella lights in close around the subject. This creates a problem because it leaves me almost zero room to move and interact with whatever I'm working on. Obviously for some situations like overhead shots this isn't a problem - I just set up the camera on the opposite side of the table looking down and then flip the video in post, but if I'm trying to show what's onscreen while I type something it can get a bit cramped. Any suggestions on that? This was another thing I was watching channels like LGR intently for - one of them explicitly said they were basically reaching around the camera tripod to type.
 
falter said:
If I'm not mistaken, both end cards and info cards only can appear at certain times in the video? So if you have a 10 minute video and three or four info cards and one end screen.. if someone just sort of skips along there's a good chance they miss them all?
Click to expand...

If they skip around, the (I) info card icon is still there and shows all previous info cards.

You don't have to use them, but using them (and end cards) are a way to direct people to your other videos. (I guess there are still viewers in the world who don't understand how youtube discoverability works)

So it turns out my Samsung camera app has a "Pro Video" mode that allows you to adjust exposure times, etc.. and voila, I've gotten a 'flicker-free' screen by adjusting that. Doh. I've also been able to lighten up my 'set' - it was frustrating me that the video produced was darker than it looked in real life. I was thinking maybe my single bulb box lights just weren't powerful enough.
Click to expand...

My advice is to become familiar with the triangle of "ISO - Shutter Speed - Aperture" and learn all three contribute to how "bright" or "dark" your overall exposure is. And if you're inside, always add more light -- a single bulb softbox isn't usually enough. Even opening a window and getting natural light in from the outside is a big help, although if your inside bulbs are overly cool (2700k) then the resulting color mix of indoor and outdoor light might be odd.

getting sufficient lighting without it interfering with your ability to move around
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Welcome to video production, where most problems can be addressed with money. Panel lights on high stands is one way to address that, or mounting them to the ceiling possibly but you have to drop them a bit to allow for heat distribution. Another option: If you have a white ceiling, you move your lights farther away from your working space but then throw all of the light upwards, and hope enough of it bounces down (or, you can hang a reflector on the ceiling).

I find to get good lighting I have to bring all my box and umbrella lights in close around the subject.
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Yes. Or, get more powerful lights. Or, lower the shutter to 1/30 if it isn't already, although this might make motion odd. Or, use a mirrorless camera -- you're shooting everything on a cell phone where it's tough to get a lot of light onto the sensor.

This creates a problem because it leaves me almost zero room to move and interact with whatever I'm working on.
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Get a mirrorless camera with a 24-120mm (full-frame equivalent) zoom lens, position it above and behind you, then zoom in and focus on what you're working on.

You're running into the limits of making product shots with a cell phone.
 
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